Learn to Set Micro Goals

By Betina Gozo

We've all set goals before—setting them is the easy part, because dreaming big can be really fun. Following through to make those dreams a reality? That's the hard part.

My advice is to take your big-picture goal and break it down into more specific, doable micro goals.

For example, I have clients who say their goal is "to get in shape". That's a great big-picture goal. But it's easy to put off starting until tomorrow because there's no deadline and there's no quantitative way of measuring whether or not you're meeting the goal.

So, I ask clients to drill down and to be more specific from there. "I want to get in shape, so I'm going to start working out". Okay, getting there, but not specific enough yet.

Betina Gozo

"I want to get in shape, so I'm going to start doing three workouts a week for the next month". Boom! Now that's a goal you can achieve.

Or maybe you say your goal is "to eat more healthily". Said in that way, it's so vague that it's almost too big to accomplish.

What are the nuts and bolts of what you could do to achieve that big goal? Make those your teeny-tiny micro goals.

Turn it into: "I'm going to cut fizzy drinks out of my diet this week". Or, "I'm going to replace my nightly snack of gummy bears this week with a piece of fruit". I guarantee, if you tell yourself "I can't have gummy bears", you're going to be miserable. That's a restriction, not a goal. Instead, reframe it as something you're doing in service of meeting your big goal.

If you keep meeting your micro goals—working out three times a week or replacing sweets with fruit—I know you're going to see major results.