Short and long term goals

[Planningahead74]

What are yours??

I don't seem have any. 🤷‍♀️ as money was a problem. Now I've got a stable job, its still not 100% but 50% better than the past 10 years. 🤦‍♀️

Mine are mostly linked.

Continuous long-term goal is contentment. Split into a job I enjoy, healthy friendships, a good family life, a healthy body, a beautiful house, fulfilment in hobbies, travelling.

I then break this down into smaller goals, e.g. health:

Lose 4st - realistically, that's a medium-term goal and I am aiming for 2st by the end of the year. Which means around 1.5lb a month, which is more than doable.

Aim for 1 take-away a month rather than one a week.

Drink less alcohol - I already cut down from drinking daily to only Fridays and Saturdays, so now I am looking to change the type of alcohol from spirit to wine, which will bring the units down even further. Next step is 0-1 days a week, then only reserved for special occasions or the occasional night out.

Drink more water and herbal tea. I have a stash of the latter here and usually only drink one type, but since we're in the January health craze everyone has bought my favourite variety up and I am now using up the many others I have in my cupboard. I also insist on drinking water while working now.

Take up exercise - I am waiting for things to get a little quieter before I start hitting the paid-for activities; it tends to get back to normal levels by the end of January, so I will aim to go back then and use my home equipment in the meantime. My new job that I will work in shortly also means I can now cycle to work again rather than having to drive.

More time outside - my garden is my big project this spring and summer and I am itching to get going on it.

Less stress - I am a planner and do what I can in advance so I can right any cock-ups in good time. I have started reading again; there is no definite number, but I'd like to encorporate evening reading as routine again. For that I need a few extra large cushions, because the headrest on my bed is really uncomfortable.

None of these are huge goals, but they do mean a big lifestyle change when I put them all together.

Hiya....thanks so much for your post as it give me more of an idea now. But yours is good. A good clear picture of the small goals

So, @Planningahead74 , what would your perfect life look like and is there a part of your life that doesn't meet that? Some goals take a while to fulfil, for example the job thing:

I hated my job last year. Hated it with a passion. But once I figured out why I hated it so much, I was able to change things. I looked at a role in my organisation I thought would improve my life and give me back my love for the job itself.

So I asked my big boss what that role entailed for her and what I'd need to do to get there. Turns out big boss was a bitch and would never have given me the role (for personal reasons, not professional ones), but she explained what she was looking for really well. I updated my CV and Linkedin, booked myself into courses, did some reading around the subject, pushed for "volunteer work" in aspects of the role I wanted, put that on my CV, too and applied for a few roles while at the same time getting in contact with recruiters. Got to interview stage a few times but got shot down on account of lacking experience, so I ensured I got more experience and re-ran the last few steps.

One of the employers that had rejected me the first time around now hired me.

It's not my dream job, but I can't afford to do my dream job, so I volunteered with an employer in my dream job for a while and at least got to experience the job. One day I might be in a position to train up for it, though I doubt it - I just can't afford the drop in wages. But I can still read, volunteer and make connections, because you never know when some opportunity comes along.

So what would you need to do to get to 100% in your job?

Better doing baby steps than none...is that right? So sounds like you're going the right direction to do what you would like to do. "Rome wasnt built in a day".

I'm at my dream job now as a childminder as i started back in April with 1 child, now I've got 2...slowly getting there. Prefer 3-4 children..... but it took me 4 years to get to this point of having no experience in childcare (apart from being a mum) to become a childminder. I joined in lots of agencies to gain that experience (and also volunteered for over a year before i decided to work with children along the side of my part time job in a cafe).

Now Xmas is out of the way....i can start saving up properly. (But my dh's job is shit but thats another story for another time).

My perfect life would look like weve sold the house finally, buy another house, maybe smaller to have a garden, my business would be successful, my kids are happy rn, and my husband have a regular paid full time job.

Is that too much to ask?!?

Of course not, none of it is and bar you're husband's job it is all in your hands to change course into the right direction.

Take stock of your "here and now" situation, put your dream goals up on a sheet and map out a road of how to get there. Then do the steps you're identified and it will all fall into place eventually 🙂

*your... I can spell, I swear!

Dont worry about the spellings. I havent noticed! 😁

I like the idea of 'here and now'......but i don't have any dream goals...... I'm 50 next year....is that not normal?? Or am i too tired to think ahead???? 🤔

I'm leaving my current job soon(ish).

Short term goals;

• complete some training I've been doing outside work. I need to complete two courses by the end of March and I'm about halfway through them.
• brush up my CV and sign up with some recruitmen agencies and try to find some work to have some income to add to the savings I will be living off for a bit

Medium term;

• I've signed up for another training course online which I want to complete. Added to the others, this might help me find some work which I can do remotely

Long term;

• My DH is asking if work will let him WFH full time and if they say yes, we are going to try and move somewhere we love. Where we live is nice, but we don't love it. We are only really here for DH job

My goals for the year are:

Apply for DCs EU passports ( expensive because need official translations of documents and something else always comes up to use £400ish on.

Cook more varied dinners/eat more healthily as a family

Long term goal is to buy a house with a garden and maybe have one more DC (have 2 atm)

Very short term goals:
Pay off the mortgage by 1st April and leave 20k in savings as a buffer.
See both DDs through to the summer without debt i.e. top up if necessary.
Get away-UK-for Easter so we can hit the ground running in time for busy pre-summer for DH and I and exams DD1 and DD2
Short term:
Meet DD2 in the country she is working in this summer.
Give DD2 london base for her placement year if she gets London 🤞🏻
Give DD1 London base for F1 and F2
Long term:
Well funded retirement for DH and I
Homes owned for DD1 And DD2

This is so interesting and everyone got very different goals too. So I've got more of an idea what to write so I'm whipping out my pen and paper rn. As I've got a few short term goals, 1 or 2 medium goals and 1 or 2 long term goals. I like it where its short, medium and long goals.

Thank you so much everyone as i appreciated it 😊

Good thread @Planningahead74

There are lots of books & YouTube videos on goal setting. Michael Hyatt has a book called Your Best Year Yet & it gives steps for goal setting.

Life by Design is a YouTube film to help you set goals.

Good luck.

Thank you. I'll have a look now 😊