Why Setting Goals in Life is Important?
The tragedy of life doesn’t lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy lies in having no goals to reach. Benjamin Mays
Why Having Clear Goals in Life is Important?
Is it enough to keep on working hard or should you set clear goals for yourself? Different people give different answers to this simple question. A large number of people believe that it is important to keep on working hard. They believe that they will get what they deserve. They believe in the philosophy that an individual’s right is to work only, but never to its fruits. By following this view, they miss the importance of setting clear goals for themselves. I believe that it’s important to work hard, and not to get obsessed with results or the outcomes. But it’s also equally important to have clarity about the goals that you want to achieve. If you just keep on working hard without setting any goals for yourself, how would you know what actually you deserve. There are a lot of people who do not set any goal for themselves. If you ask them what is that you want to achieve in your life, they are not able to answer you very clearly.
Goals give you a vision for your life. They set direction of your life. They focus your energy. If you have a clear vision for your life and you work hard to achieve that, chances are very high that you will be able to get that. It is very aptly said that “if you can see it, you can have it.” If you are not even able to see it, how is that you can achieve something substantial in your life. Hence, I strongly believe, having a clear picture of what you want to achieve in your life is very important.
If you look all around you, you will see that a majority of people keep on living a life of scarcity and low achievement. Why most of the people keep on living an ordinary life? Why they keep on thinking that there is not much they can have in life? I think it’s because they don’t dream of or visualize a life of high achievement. It’s because they have a scarcity mindset. They don’t visualize a prosperous life. They don’t think of ways to have a prosperous life. In other words, they don’t have a vision or they don’t set clear goals for themselves. I believe that if you are living without setting any clear goals for yourself, you are not doing justice to your life.
A life Without Goals
A life without goals is like you are walking but without knowing your destination. Suppose you are travelling day and night but you don’t know where do you want to go. Then where will you reach? Where will life take you? You reach to some place and after reaching over there, you realize that this is not the place where you wanted to reach. Then again you start traveling without having any destination in mind. Like that you can keep on walking but will not be able to reach your destination because you don’t know your destination.
If you do not set clear goals for yourself, you will not be able to achieve those. It doesn’t matter how hardworking you are. With focus and hard work, setting a direction for yourself is also equally important. If you are a passionate and hardworking person, you will get the results of your hard work. I have seen many people who are very dedicated, hardworking and producing fantastic results, but they are not really very successful and satisfied in their life. Since they don’t have any clarity about what actually they want to achieve in their life, they don’t set any short or long-term goals for themselves. They just keep on working hard. Though because of their passion and hard work they are able to produce some wonderful outputs, they are neither very successful nor satisfied in their life. Simply being passionate about something and keep on working hard will not take you anywhere as you don’t know where you actually want to go. Hence, setting clear goals in life is very important.
Setting Goals in Various Domains of life
Goals that you set for yourself should not be limited to work only. You should have clear goals for your personal, family, and social life as well. If you are not having goals for your personal health and well-being, family life and social life, no matter how much money you make or how far you progress in your career, chances are that you will not be able to fully enjoy your life. So, having clear goals for your personal, family, and social life is also equally important.
To be successful and happy, we should pay attention to all domains of our life. Even Indian ancient scriptures clearly highlighted the significance of various life phases and domains. Indian ancient scriptures presented the concept of Asrama system to signify the importance of various life domains. As per ancient Indian system, a person’s life is divided into four major phases. It offered young adults four lifelong paths post-vedic initiation: Brahmacharya (student’s life) – birth to 25 years, Gṛhastha (household life) – 25 to 50 years, Vanaprastha (retired life) – 50 to 75 years, and Sannyasa (renounced life) – 75 years and above. Though many things have changed in the current context and the time frame suggested in the Asrama system may not be totally applicable in today’s time, one thing remains central to this is that we should have equal concern for all aspects or phases of our life. Hence, you should set goals not only for your work or career but also for other domains of your life.
Tips for Setting Clear Goals in Life
Even if you want to have clarity about, and set, goals in your life, there is a big question in front of you. The question is how to set my goals. I believe you should develop short-term, medium-term and long-term goals for yourself. Short-term goals are that you would like to achieve in the next six months to one and one and a half years’ time. Medium term goals can be set for 2 to 3 years’ time frame, while long -term goals can be set for 5 to 7 (or maybe 10) years’ time frame. Below I mention some steps that you can follow to set goals for yourself:
- First, comfortably sit down at a place where no one interrupts you. Think about the goals of your life in various domains, like work/career, relationships, personal growth/education, money, lifestyle/possession, leisure/travel etc.
- Then think and write down for all the areas mentioned above things that you would like to achieve in the next 5 to 7 years.
- Close your eyes and imagine yourself in an ideal world/situation where you have all things that you have written in the previous step.
- Based on what seems most meaningful from the ideal scene you have created, write a list of ten or twelve important goals for your life.
- Then write down ‘My Five-Year Goals,’ and from the list you have created in step 4 select the most important goals you would like to achieve within the next five years.
- You can further narrow down your ‘Five-Year Goals’ to goals that you would like to achieve in the next 2 to 3 years. Write down these goals.
- Make a list of actions that you are going to take to achieve the goals you have set for yourself.
Be specific about the actions that you will take and start working on it. Simply making a list is not going to help you in achieving your goals.
