02/22/15 New Year; Newer, SMARTer Goals
by Marcia J. McKinley, JD, PhD, LCPC

On New Year’s Eve, the next year looms before us, looking like a blank slate full of promise. Anything is possible in that new year. The new year is when we can lose weight that we have been hanging onto, run the 5k we have always wanted to, get the grades we always wanted, declutter our houses…or, in my case, begin to blog.

Then, the end of February rolls around and I find myself finally sitting down to write my first blog entry. To be honest, I wouldn’t be doing this if I were not stuck inside the house due to Winter Storm Octavia.

So, what happened to all those good intentions?

Was the problem that I didn’t really want to blog? No, I don’t think so. I love to write and have been known to overwhelm friends (and sometimes mere acquaintances) with voluminous correspondence. Blogging seems a much better outlet for my writing energy than burying friends in emails and letters that they then feel bound to keep up with.

Was the problem that I didn’t know what to write about? No, I have a list of blog ideas three pages long. Generating ideas is rarely an issue for me.

Was the problem that I don’t believe my blogging doesn’t have value? No, I trust the reader to move onto other pages if nothing on this screen interests or inspires them.

Was the problem that I didn’t have time to blog? Well, possibly. After all, I do have a fairly busy life. Still, how long does writing one blog entry really take for someone who already has the ideas and types 100 words per minute? Surely, I could find one to two hours per week to put fingers to keyboard.

No, I think the issue started with this: While I had a goal to blog, my goal was not a “good” goal. That is to say, it wasn’t a SMART-P goal. It wasn’t a goal that’s Specific, Measureable, Actionable, Realistic, Time-Sensitive, or Process-Oriented. (Well, maybe it was actionable and process-oriented, but it certainly didn’t meet the other criteria.)

As an ADHD coach, I teach people all the time how to develop SMART-P goals, but I failed to do that for myself, at least about blogging. Moreover, I didn’t identify a reward for myself for meeting my goal.

What New Year’s resolution did you make on December 31, 2014, that you have not yet started? Join with me over the next few weeks to explore how we can make — and achieve — SMARTer goals. After all, we needn’t wait until next December to work on our goals. Although it might not be New Year’s Day on any official calendar, February 22^nd is the start of a new year. In fact, every moment of our lives is the start of a new year that is full of promise.

Copyright©2015.  Marcia J. McKinley.