This is the year. I’ll read a book a week. I’ll write 500 words a day, seven days a week. I’ll publish two articles. I’ll organize my deadlines, exercise three times a week, learn Spanish, sort out my finances, call my parents, do my taxes in January. That novel’s not going to write itself. This is the year: I’ll curb my dependence on social media!
I might start, though, by being a little less sardonic. I’ve long been skeptical of New Year’s resolutions—those noble and outsized goals that are as soon begun as they are interrupted, shifted around on the calendar, left on the bus, exhaled in a sigh of exhaustion, and eventually left behind as we settle back into our time realities. Since we only make them once a year, New Year’s resolutions begin as all-or-nothing wagers and turn into productivity specters that hang over our shoulders and make us feel guilty for not accomplishing the overly ambitious goal that we only formulated a week ago. And while I am still skeptical of such resolutions for this reason—why should lofty promises about how we’ll spend our time hold such power over our mental health?—I also find myself wanting to set real goals for this year. Maybe I’m getting tired of the productivity hibernation engendered by lockdown. Maybe I just want more structure. Whatever the case, I want to be working toward something. I want to be resolved.
So how can we set goals that we feel passionate about but don’t make us feel bad? I recommend some strategies that are focused on making goals more achievable by being less intimidating:
- “Realistic” vs. “Reasonable”: In my experience, “What can I realistically do?” can easily become “What’s the most I can do?” With credit to my Fellowships & Writing Center colleague, Louis Gerdelan, changing realistic goals to reasonable goals puts the emphasis on what you can manage rather than on how you can maximize. Setting a reasonable goal means acknowledging that we are human—that we sometimes set our expectations too high, need more time, and have to deal with unanticipated setbacks. Treat goal-setting as a dynamic and self-conscious process. Revising your expectations and timelines will not only help make a goal more achievable, but also the goal itself may evolve in ways that reflect your growth and experience.
- Flexible Language: Relatedly, I recommend tweaking the language of your goals to be less daunting. “I’m going to publish that article” sets up a lot of implicit steps: writing the article, revising it, submitting it, and potentially having to revise and resubmit it. A more reasonable goal would be to submit your article to a journal. While still plenty ambitious, this language cuts down on the number of implicit steps while also putting the focus on the thing that’s within your control—the actual writing process. It’s also worth being flexible with deadlines. I recommend asking a faculty advisor or friend to set you a soft deadline, i.e., an ambitious deadline that can be extended without any penalty.
- Fewer Numbers-Focused Goals: If you can say “I’ll write 500 words per day” or “I’ll go to the gym 3 times a week” and actually do it, all the power to you. But a lot of goals (especially those around setting daily or weekly routines) are first on the chopping block precisely because of their rigidity. Sometimes, it can be useful to make a goal less specific while still focusing on the work you need to do. In a discussion I was having recently, a friend gave me some really useful language for this: “I’m going to make time for ___.” Since we aren’t liable to receive a sudden influx of unscheduled time, arbitrary numerical goals can overreach our means. Starting with the more modest goal of making time for something does two things: 1) it reminds us that making time for something is itself part of the work; 2) it gives you a chance to break the goal down into achievable steps rather than applying an arbitrary timeline.
- Reconsider the Task-List: While task lists can be a pivotal tool in keeping track of when and where various obligations are coming due, they can also make you underestimate how much time each opportunity will take. If you use a task list—or, for that matter, if you’re a serial yes-person—practice politely declining opportunities. It feels better to do a great job on three things than a mediocre job on a dozen.
Most of all, give yourself a break if you don’t reach your goal the first time—for your sake and for the sake of the goal. What hamstrings most New Year’s resolutions is the fact that, coming around only once a year, they feel less like a goal and more like a wager. If you feel resolved to do something, give it another try, and another, and one more after that. You might find yourself making genuine progress—or better still, you might find the goal itself changing to reflect your growing understanding.
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