Make It Specific Enough to Actually Do

You can’t do anything with “get healthier.” It’s too vague and open to interpretation. What does that even mean? More vegetables? Less beer? Standing up occasionally? All of the above? It’s a riddle with no answer, so nothing happens.

Compare that to “20-minute walk every Tuesday and Thursday” or “call one mate every Sunday evening while making dinner.” Those are actual instructions. Concrete actions with clear parameters that you can tick off without needing to convene a mental committee to decide if it counts.

The more specific your goal, the easier it is to know whether you’ve actually done it. Vague goals give you wiggle room for excuses and creative interpretation. Specific goals are binary—you either did the thing or you didn’t.

The test: Can you describe exactly what you’ll do, when you’ll do it, and how often? If you’re still using words like “more” or “better,” it’s probably too vague.

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Move Toward Something You Actually Want

“Spend more time with people I care about” lands differently than “stop being so pathetically isolated.” Same basic outcome, totally different feeling. One pulls you somewhere good. The other just nags at you about what’s currently lacking.

These are called approach goals, and they work better than avoidance goals for a simple reason. Moving toward something you want feels better than running away from something wrong with you. It’s the difference between aiming at a clear target versus desperately hoping to avoid the bunkers on both sides while your playing partners watch in sympathetic silence.

The test: Does your goal sound like progress or penance?

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Attach It to Something That Already Exists

Link your new habit to something you already do with complete reliability. After your morning coffee, read for five minutes. After your weekly round, ring someone you’ve been meaning to check in with. After you brush your teeth at night, write down one thing from the day.

This works because you’ve removed the “when should I do this?” question entirely. You already have the routine. You’re just adding something to an existing pattern rather than trying to create a whole new one from scratch and hoping you remember to do it.

Also, telling one person about your goal makes you significantly more likely to actually follow through. You’re after low-key accountability here, someone who checks in occasionally because they care, asking “how’s that thing going?” rather than giving you motivational speeches about believing in yourself.

The test: Can you complete this sentence without hesitation—“After [existing habit], I will [new thing]”?

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Know Why It Actually Matters to You

Goals powered by “I should” rarely survive past Valentine’s Day once the novelty wears off.

Goals powered by genuine interest stick around because they’re connected to something deeper than external pressure or vague guilt about self-improvement.

There’s a meaningful difference between lowering your handicap because you genuinely love the challenge of watching your game improve versus doing it because Dave from accounts keeps banging on about his and you’re tired of feeling inadequate during Monday morning golf chat.

One sustains itself because it actually matters to you. The other feels like homework you’re doing because you think you should, which is rarely enough fuel to keep you going past February.

The test: If nobody ever knew whether you did this, if it never came up in conversation and you couldn’t mention it casually to demonstrate your personal growth, would you still want to do it?

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Plan for When Motivation Disappears

Motivation ebbs and flows like the tide. Some days you wake up ready to conquer the world. Other days getting out of bed feels like a significant achievement worthy of celebration.

People who stick with things long-term just make it easier to keep going when the initial buzz wears off and it becomes another item on the list. Put your gym kit by the front door the night before so you trip over it in the morning. Join a regular group so someone’s expecting you and you feel mildly guilty about letting them down. Build an if-then safety net for when life gets complicated—if you miss Tuesday, you automatically go Saturday instead.

Systems beat willpower every single time. Willpower is a limited resource that tends to run out somewhere around lunchtime. Systems just keep running regardless of how you feel about them.

The test: What happens to this goal on a rubbish week when you’re knackered, mildly stressed, and fundamentally can’t be bothered with any of it?

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Start Small, Stay Consistent

Ten minutes twice a week will do more for you in the long run than an ambitious three-hour session you complete once, feel deeply virtuous about, then never repeat because it was completely unsustainable and left you exhausted.

Small wins compound quietly while you’re getting on with life. Even just noticing “I’ve done that three weeks running” counts. That’s the point where it starts shifting from “aspirational activity I occasionally attempt” into “thing I actually do now.”

Tiny improvements done regularly add up to something substantial over months and years. The aggregation of marginal gains applies to life goals exactly the same way it applies to shaving strokes off your golf game. You’re aiming for sustainable progress over time, not heroic one-off efforts that make good stories but achieve nothing long-term.

The test: Could you still do this version on a difficult week when everything else is falling apart and you’re running on fumes?

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When You Fall Off

You might fall off at some point, possibly multiple times. Life gets complicated, three weeks vanish in a blur of unexpected commitments, and suddenly you realise you’ve completely lost the thread.

This gives you useful information rather than proof of anything terminal. Maybe the goal was too ambitious for this particular season of your life. Maybe the timing needs adjusting because Wednesday evenings turned out to be when everything else happens. Maybe you just need to dust yourself off and restart without the elaborate production of beating yourself up about it first.

Treating yourself with basic kindness actually improves long-term outcomes. Being harsh with yourself tends to make restarting feel significantly less appealing. It’s the same principle as dwelling on a bad shot for six holes instead of resetting mentally for the next one and getting on with it.

When you fall off, notice it happened. Figure out why without turning it into drama. Adjust the goal if needed. Then just restart.

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When to Let Go

Sometimes a goal isn’t working because it was the wrong goal for you right now. Perseverance is different from being stubborn about something that was never quite right.

The tricky bit is knowing which one you’re doing. Check in honestly with yourself. Does this still feel genuinely important, or are you just continuing because you announced it to people and backing down now feels embarrassing?

Change your mind if you need to. Get it wrong first time. Figure it out as you go rather than rigidly committing to a plan you made in a completely different mental state three months ago. Sometimes adjusting to the course you’re actually on is smarter than stubbornly sticking to the one you imagined back in January when everything felt possible.