June 9, 2016

How to Set Goals And Build Systems

Daily Writing Blog, General Thoughts

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Systems And Goals

A lot of people get all wrapped up in their goals.

There’s a common thread of thought which is particularly helpful: you should build systems and not goals.

In practice, this means that you shouldn’t concentrate on getting visible abs but instead you should make a system out of going to the gym and working out your midsection every day.

This is great advice and if you peruse this blog, you’ll see that a hobby of mine is breaking everything down into workable plans and repeatable steps. I try and build systemic thinking into most things I undertake.

However, at some points it’s difficult to reconcile systematic thinking with linear goals. Ultimately, nobody wants to spend hours in the gym, but everyone wants that six-pack.

(Here’s a cursory apology to some guys I know who do enjoy their gym time. You guys are the exception, not the rule.)

I’ve been thinking about this recently as I embark on another crazy scheme.

I’ve split the goal-setting process into two stages: Cyclical goalsetting and linear goalsetting. Then I’ll talk about how these two interact.

Cyclical Goals

This is what people refer to when they talk about “systems instead of goals.”

Every linear goal is built upon habit.

You want to earn money online, so you write a blog post every day.

You’d like to lose weight, so you go to the gym.

The important thing with cyclical goals is that you think of them in terms of goals. It’s all good building a system, but our brains still want rewards and achievement trophies.

Every time you complete a cycle, understand that that’s a goal achieved. My personal habit is to tick off a box in my diary. You’ll create a long chain after a while, and your circular goal becomes a linear goal naturally as Success: Day One! Turns into Success: Month One! And Success: Day 300!

Other things that’ll help with cyclical goals are making them easier than you think you can handle and ultimately very achievable in the short term.

I failed at exercise for years because I wanted to go to 100% every time I exercised. In practice, this meant that I failed with all my linear goals and the system failed because for every workout I did, I’d need to miss the next two weeks’ worth of workouts in order to recover.

Do a little less, work your way upwards and you’ll hit your ceiling sooner or later anyway.

Linear Goals

When people set New Year’s Resolutions, long term goals or simply tell you about their wishes as a person, they’re usually referring to linear goals.

Linear goals are goals where you’ll have a set vision that’ll occur at a set point in the future. (You might not know where that set point is though.)

You want to have a great body in six months.

You’d like a Ferrari in your garage by the time you’re thirty.

You don’t want your kids to be in debt.

These are all wishes, and you turn them into goals by adding action to them.

You want to have a great body in six months, so you join a gym and exercise.

You’d like a Ferrari, so you start investing in the stock market.

Your kids don’t know how to avoid debt themselves, so you teach them about it and build up a secret stockpile to bail them out if needs be.

These are all linear goals, and there’s nothing wrong with them. However, they don’t do anything on their own.

That said, you can spend a ton of time with cyclical goals or systems that don’t get you where you want to be.

Systems and Goals: Putting It All Together

You need systems/cyclical goals and linear goal-setting to get where you want to be.

The problem with just having systems and good habits is that you can have a great habit that won’t get you where you want to go. A powerlifting routine is a great routine to follow for strength, but it probably won’t get you a bodybuilder’s physique. Making money online is good business, but it’s probably not going to get you into a respected position at a law firm.

To put it together you have to have awareness of your long term goal and make detailed notes on the actual results of your cyclical habits in terms of that long term goal.

You also need to prepare and be willing to adapt. There are a ton of people who’ll stick in careers even though they know that they aren’t going to get them where they need to go in life. There are people who’ll do the same workout routine for years even though it doesn’t get them where they want.

To summarise, you need:

  • A good long term goal that’s a little unrealistic
  • A good system for every day, incremental improvement that is easily achievable
  • A means of measuring the results of that system
  • An idea of how those results will cause your long term goal to come about
  • The ability to change the system if ever the system isn’t pushing you towards the goal
  • The willingness to do the above

If you can wrap your head around this, then you’ll probably achieve a lot of short term goals and quite a few long term ones too.

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