SMART Goal Setting

SMART goal setting helps you achieve your goals through improving the very nature of them. By ensuring all goals follow the 5 SMART criteria, you can create better goals and have a better chance in meeting them. To find more information about how to establish tasks in HabitRPG visit here.

The SMART criteria are:
 * Specific
 * Measurable
 * Achievable
 * Relevant
 * Timely

Specific
Having specific goals helps make sure they're measurable and meaningful. If goals are too vague, it can be hard to know where to get started and how to track your progress. Goals like "Clean my house" and "Dust and organize" are examples of goals that are too vague.

Examples:
 * Instead of keep house clean, you could have don't leave dishes in the sink overnight.
 * Instead of get in shape, you could have go for a walk every day.
 * Instead of do well in school, you could have improve grades by 1 letter grade.

You don't want to be too specific either. If your goal description adds too many unneeded words or descriptors then it might become less appealing to try and work towards. A goal like "Keep my 2 story farmhouse neat and tidy by spending at least 30 minutes every single day cleaning and organizing in order to prevent allergen buildup and to keep my precious things orderly and organized so I can be happy" is way too specific and could go with less descriptions and specific identifiers. A better way to say it would be "Spend at least 30 minutes a day cleaning and dusting my house in order to keep it clean and organized". Keep in mind that some goals might need some lengthy descriptions but for other goal it would be best to try and keep it both specific and concise.

Whenever you are trying to make a goal specific, remember to ask yourself these types of questions to see if more needs to be done with how specific this goal is:
 * Is my description specific enough that someone else could understand what the goal is connected with?
 * Could I make this goal more concise but still be able to understand the original goal?

To learn more about how to name your goals and tasks more effectively visit here.

Measurable
It's hard to track progress on your goals if they aren't measurable. Having goals that can be measured in one way or another helps you see your progress and can be very motivating! It doesn't have to be a numerical or quantitative measure, either. Qualitative measures are still measures so long as the measure has meaning to you!

Examples:
 * Read for 20 minutes, instead of read
 * Complete 15 sit-ups instead of do sit-ups during workout

Achievable
The goal has to not only be realistic, it must be realistic for ''you. ''Different people have different capabilities, and just because a goal is suitable for someone else doesn't mean it isn't too difficult or too easy for you. Don't be afraid to aim high, but it's best to start small so you don't lose motivation in the face of such a huge goal.

This can be done by breaking down big goals into smaller ones. If your goal is to run a 5k, you could divide it into small tasks, like "Research what is required to run a 5k," "Evaluate my current running ability," "Find a running program or running group," and so forth.

Relevant
This applies not only to the goal itself, but also in the way you measure it. Make sure the goal you're working toward is something that is tangible and important to you! "Make my bed every day" might be a good goal for many, but if you really, truly find you feel no better coming home to a made bed, skip that one. Find goals that matter to you.

Make sure the measures are appropriate. If your goal is "Get healthy," (which in itself is a little too vague), don't measure purely by weight. Try alternative measures to ensure you're getting the whole picture and not focusing on the wrong thing.

Timely
Most goals should have some kind of time limit to keep yourself motivated and prevent stagnation. "Run a 5k by the end of the year" might be more motivating than "Run a 5k." Other goals can have time constraints that are recurring, such as "make my bed every day." Keeping a goal within a reasonable time limit is also crucial. You can say that you want to "Run a 5k within two days" but if you have not planned ahead before that or have not done any preparations before hand, then its not likely that this goal will be able to be achieved.

Another optionally good thing to do for making goals timely is to add regularly scheduled status/progress checks into the goal. An example would be: "Run a 5k by the end of the year and check my training progress every 1-2 weeks".