It’s easy to forget how important goal setting is to self improvement. You can have lofty ambitions for changing or improving who you are, but if you don’t begin the journey with one step and then break it down into smaller plans, the journey might seem impossible.

Goal setting:

The reason goal setting works as a means of self improvement is two reasons:

1. It allows you to break a really complex task down into small parts that are easier to follow, more detailed, and less overwhelming.
2. It provides you with constant motivation. Whenever you accomplish that goal or objective on the way to the greater goal, you feel as if you made progress, and it emboldens you to work towards the next goal in line.

Before you can begin goal setting for self improvement, you must determine what it is about yourself that you would like to change and for what reason. For example, for some people self improvement means quitting smoking cigarettes. For others, weight is a self improvement issue.

Once you’ve identified what it is that you want to improve about yourself, you can begin the goal setting process. Start with the ultimate goal (example: lose 30 pounds). Next, depending on how large your ultimate goal is and how long it will reasonably take you to accomplish, start setting objectives with timelines. For these smaller objectives, it’s a good idea to tie them to actions instead of results. For instance, your action of going to the gym three times each week is a result you can check off and happily complete each week. Your ultimate goal of losing 30 pounds won’t seem impossible this way, and your esteem is rewarded instead of punished because you congratulate yourself for your actions.