The Danger of Setting Big Goals

[nancyshanice]

All the experts encourage you to dream big. Making your goals big and bold, they say, will help you persist in the face of obstacles. But many times, this thinking doesn’t cut it.

Big goals can become a double-edged sword. Big can get you off the couch, but it can also create frustration: I’m in the battle for my life, struggling in the trenches, getting shot at, and you want me to focus on winning the war? I don’t think so. How about focusing how to survive the next 24 hours?

There’s a fine line of course. If you exclusively focus on the immediate like what’s right in front of you and ignore the bigger picture, your work may start to feel pointless. To achieve of a healthy balance, try the following:

1. Think big. In order to get the motivation to enter the race like start a company, write a book, lose weight, learn to play drums, start a blog, it’s important to visualize the finish line and to bask in the mental glory of crossing it. The bigger you think, the more excited you’ll be to get started.


2. Act small. Get out of your head and start doing small things every day to get one step closer to reaching your goal. You’ll find that even the biggest goals and longest stretches can be achieved by focusing on those small things that will take you a few steps closer to your destination.

3. Start today. Thinking about successfully achieving a big goal is easy. Actually achieving a big goal is hard. This is why most people talk and only a few do. If you want to accomplish a task, you must do something today, right now that moves you closer.

If you’re afraid of heights, the rule is not to look down. Always think of things that are within your reach not things that you will strain yourself more than expected, you may be hurted.

[Alloys]

The worse one is setting too big goals because big goals may be attained but too big the chances are almost zero. Ask yourself if at all you have the capacity to do that, which you want to do.

[lynkez]

Everything begins at square one; you have to tackle small ones so that the more you move on the more you expand your goals. You will gain the appropriate skills on how to strategise them to accomplishment. Goals beyond your capability have greater chances of failing hence small and medium goals are better for they are cheaply met. Measure things as per your standard first before you buy oversize shoes.

[iviivi]

Thanks Nancy just to add on as a point 4.
Nobody says/said it will be easy.
In whatever you have decided to venture in, you should be advised that its not going to be easy and therefore whenever you meet a challenge, whenever you stumble or fall, just remember to stand up and try again until you succeed. Failure is not an option until you stop trying

[205victor]

In reality no goal is too big for one not to achieve following that for it to have come of the big goals one must have achieved it, we only need to employ favorable strategies to see us realize our goals. We should be reminded that Room was not built in a day. In essence, break that big goal into small achievable goals while target that end huge result. Also, ask God to see you through for without Him, you will be disappointed.

[nalced]

The only limits we have are the limits we place on ourselves by listening to others who tell us we can't set too big of goals, and our doubtful minds for listening to others opinions ahead of our own. No goal is too big. As Napoleon Hill once said, if you can believe it, you can achieve it.

[Mercy20]

Precise goals are easy to work upon and achieve, cumbersome goals add a burden to our mind to tackle. Learn to act small always and you will grow gradually.

[Ivyc]

One starts from known to unknown, you start from the grass level then you go up gradually. One has to at least start from somewhere, start with something that the mind will be able to think and sort out well before moving on to big things.

[jeremiahbusey]

This sure is a potent one. Big goals are most likely to become causes of anguish when continued to be seen as big. We have to see the parts or we lose our energy to work on them quickly. Randomly setting a goal of reading a 200-page book won't usually work, but having a desire to read the book and seeing it as a 10-chapter package, or as something we read when we have the interest, works out almost all of the time.

We are all fine with putting out the effort to tie our shoes, so we just have to scale that up for items of effort that are like tying 100 shoes, one-by-one.

[Joshua]

When we are inspired to dream big it doesn't mean that we should set goal that are unrealistic. We should first weigh our abilities before setting goals. A goal that is too big, for this case beyond our ability, will lead one to be frustrated.

The goal you have should make you have a positive attitude while pursuing it.