Why you should focus on as few goals as possible • 02.19.07
People do different things in order to achieve different results. Many of us usually make goals every now and then in order to achieve certain results. Even though aiming for certain results is a wonderful thing, you should avoid aiming for a lot of results at once. Doing so would affect the important goals you should be solely focusing on. Trying to achieve everything at the same time will probably result in low quality results for most of your goals. Aiming for fewer and more specific goals will result in better results and a higher level of achievement.
While having many good goals may sound attractive, you have to realize that having more than one goal at a time means you have to allocate your time, effort and resources to each goal. The more goals you have, the less attention you can give to each goal. When you have to focus on fewer goals, you can realize which goals are important and which goals can be pursued later. This concept applies to almost everything in life, whether the goal is related to something that is personal, a business plan, a social interaction or even blogging.
Having fewer goals can help all areas of life
If you have a lot of goals to pursue, space them out in order to allow yourself to focus on a few specific goals at a time. I have listed here a small outline for different categories of goals for which your focus at any given time should be on as fewer goals as possible in order to achieve maximum benefits from your efforts.
- Personal
For goals related to your life, personality or character, if you try to achieve a lot of things at once you will only disappoint yourself. Aim for realistic goals and do your best in achieving them before taking on other goals. It is your life and you are in control; go slowly when possible and go fast when feasible.
Wanting to change your diet, change your religion, change your attitude about social topics, achieve more happiness, reduce stress, quit smoking, dress differently and sleep differently all at the same time will only stress you out. Focus on the major and most important things, and other smaller and related things will happen on their own.
- Business
A business is successful when it gets the best of efforts put into it. Business deals are the same. You will probably not be successful in a business or enter good business deals if you try to aim for everything at the same time through a single effort. Realizing what is really important in a business will help you realize the things you should really aim for in a business deal and things you can leave out of a business deal for the time being.
For example, Feedburner started with taking care of feeds and partnered with FeedBlitz in order to manage RSS feeds via e-mail. FeedBlitz took care of RSS feeds via e-mail for sometime while Feedburner put their efforts only in the thing that was their main priority. Only when Feedburner was confident enough with achieving their original goal of having a solid RSS management system did it come out with its own RSS to e-mail service.
- Social
Try not to expect everything from your daily interaction with others. Aim for certain characteristics in people and certain goals. Other related goals will show up and develop over time on their own.
For example, looking for a girlfriend or a boyfriend who can be your significant other, spouse, business partner, best friend, family, closest adviser and more at the same time from the beginning will only make it harder for you to find someone who you may like. Focus on some specific qualities and goals, and other traits will soon start appearing on their own.
- Online
If you strive hard to have your blog achieve several goals at once, you run the risk of ruining your chances of achieving any blogging goal. It can be tempting to aim for a lot of things on the internet because of the simplicity of interacting via the internet. You should resist such temptation as expecting a lot of things from your blog means you have to put your effort into every goal you are hoping to accomplish. It is hard to focus on everything related to your blog at the same time.
Blogging goals can consist of many things including achieving high traffic, making money, creating communities, creating new contacts and creating new trends. All of such goals are achievable, but they can only be achieved when you put special effort into each one of those goals separately. Just as with personal goals, focus on only a few major blogging goals at a time, if not only one, and other smaller blogging goals will happen on their own.
Prioritize your efforts
Aim for some specific goals at a time before taking on new goals. Prioritize your efforts to realize which goals to focus on today and what to focus on some other day. Do not expect to achieve everything at the same time. Expecting everything to happen at once will probably disappoint you in the long run. Achieving things take time, so you have to plan out your efforts and timing.
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