It’s that time
of year where people view things as a “fresh start”. It’s January after all,
which signifies a new year and, for many, new aspirations, goals, aims, resolutions,
and so forth. I’m so for this whole “fresh start” thing in January; for me, the
new year is a time where you can really start ‘anew’ and re-focus on the things
that you really want to do and achieve. It’s about laying things out on the
table and setting new goals in order to make the new year bigger and better
than the previous one. I’m a BIG believer in setting goals in order to make the
most of each day, so I thought I’d write a post on this and a couple of my own
work-related goals!
For as long as
I can remember, I’ve always set goals and had ambitions. I’ve always found the
process of goal-setting to be such a good way to really evaluate the things
that matter to me, and to therefore understand more clearly what I need to do
to achieve those particular goals. When you have a goal or goals, it enables
you to fully narrow down the things that you need to do, and funnel out the
things that are just a waste of time: you have an end goal(s), and ultimately
need to get to grips with what road best leads you to it/them, if you want to
make a success of it! For career/work purposes in particular, I find that
sitting down and listing what my goals are massively helps in terms of where I
should place my focus and full attention. Therefore, when you clearly map out
what your goals are, it has the potential to make your days ten times more
productive because you know exactly what you’re aiming for, and subsequently,
what your action plan is to get there. In my own personal experience, I feel
like goal-setting can make me so much more motivated because I have an aim,
which also makes me ten times more productive. In actual fact, on the days
where I feel unmotivated and unproductive it tends to be because I lose sight of my goals
temporarily, and thereby lose inspiration as to why I’m doing what I’m doing.
So, why are you
doing what you’re doing? By putting your attention on this question for 10/15 minutes,
and fully getting to grips with what your aims/goals/ambitions are, it can put
a lot of things back into perspective and help you to refine your focus. Sometimes
it can be quite easy to lose sight of your goals, because days can get busy and
all we can tend to focus on is just getting the job done! But, I personally
think it’s important to remind yourself every now and again of what exactly it
is that you want to get out of what you’re doing – often I can feel revived and
motivated again when I zoom in on my goals. Goals can be a reminder to keep on
doing what you’re doing and to keep focused – they can be a kick up the arse,
basically. Of course, not everyone is a goal-setter, some aren’t entirely sure what their goals are yet, but that’s fine – everyone is different and can find inspiration/motivation from alternative places.
I thought I'd share my own goals to offer some examples! So here are a couple
of my work-orientated goals to see me through this year:
Goal 1: get the grades!
This is
probably a really obvious one, but it is SUCH an important one for my pathway
into academia nonetheless. This is the main goal that prevents me from having
lazy work days (obviously I’m still guilty of the odd procrastination here and
there), because I indubitably need to do well in my MA! It’s the goal that
keeps me motivated most days, and it definitely keeps me focussed. Whenever I
start to lose focus, I will think of this goal and it very swiftly snaps me
back into shape. Oh dear, thinking of essay results now just makes me feel sick…argh!
This is my favourite motivational picture ever, by the way:
Goal 2: keep refining my research
interests
Again, such an
important goal for my next step, which is the PhD. I really, really, want to
feel confident with my initial research questions! So in preparation for
commencing my PhD, I want to utilise my MA preparation year to really
understand the literature out there in the research area I’m going into.
As you could
probably imagine from how enthusiastic I am about goal-setting, I have plenty
more on my list – but I don’t want to bore you with them all so I shall leave
it here! Hopefully we will all achieve the goals we have set for ourselves in
2017 – so the best of luck to everyone, let's do this! J
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