This month, I’m reading Eat That Frog: 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done In Less Time*
Sounds like a dream, right? Get more done in less time?! I’m in.
The basic premise is based off of a Mark Twain quote that I’m going to grossly over-simplify: If you have to eat a frog every day, you definitely know that’s the worst thing you’ll eat and probably do all day.
What tasks do you avoid all day? For me, it’s writing evaluation reports to completion. I’ll edit to my heart’s content, but editing to the point of publishing? No way! Given a deadline, I ALWAYS tweak my reports up until the very last minute. This “never done”-ness is probably why I actually enjoy the busier times, I don’t have time to tweak-tweak-tweak my reports.
According to Brian Tracy, a good first step is writing down your goals. Makes sense to my SLP brain! When you write down measurable and attainable goals, you’re already on the right track. This is so true for my clients as well, when I write the right goal, with the right attainable skill, therapy tends to take off!
Brian recommends writing out your goals from the perspective of the future. Where do you want to be a year from now? Write it as if it already happened.
I ran a 10k without stopping to walk
I recommend following the SMART goal strategy, making it extremely clear what you need to do to accomplish your goals.
Here’s what SMART means:
Specific
Don’t make a goal that is vague. Write exactly what you want to see. Instead of “get better at running” you could write “run a mile under 10 minutes.”
Measurable
This goes hand-in-hand with being specific. Sure, you may want to improve your running, but how? Do you want to run faster? farther? longer? You might want to measure how fast you run one mile, how far you can run in 30 minutes, or increase runs from 30 minutes to an hour!
Achievable
This one hurts. If you have a goal to become a marathon runner, but every time you run you know you get injured… this might not be the goal for you! Make small goals so that you can achieve them and build momentum.
Realistic
Don’t pretend you’ll be able to go from deep couch sitting every weeknight to running a marathon in one month. You want to write goals you can achieve. If you get there early, then you know you can set a bigger goal for the next time around.
Timely
Put a time limit on it. Do you have an important date coming up? A wedding is a perfect goal-achievement day! Better yet, a week before your wedding so you know you’ll have made your goal well in advance! Birthdays and New Years are perfect goal days as well.
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