I am heading out of town for vacation next week and plan on getting in some rounds of golf. One of the courses that I am considering playing has a 747 yard, par 6 hole.
That is one of the longest golf holes in the world. This made me think about our approach to goal setting. Picture your long term goal as if you were playing this hole and trying to make it into the cup in 6 shots or less. In my case, it would be trying for 8 shots or less, since I am not a great golfer. You have to have shorter goals along the way.
When you walk up to the tee box, you are trying to hit the ball with your driver and keep it straight down the fairway. It will take you a few shots before you get to the green on this hole. You have to stay focused on the goal to keep it straight down the fairway. One miss hit and you end up in trouble to the right or left.
When you are achieving your goals in life, there are sometimes that things do not go as planned. In golf, it may be a ball that is hit in between some trees. At that point you need to adjust your short term goal. There is nothing wrong with that. As long as you remember your long term goal, you can adjust the short term ones to get you back on track.
In the game of golf, you will need to hit a short shot back into the fairway and then you can aim for the green again. If you have ever played golf, you are aware of what happens when you look up to see where the ball is going before you actually hit it. You do not hit it squarely and it barely rolls forward. This adds more shots to your score to get to the hole.
Sometimes when we are pursuing goals, we get ahead of ourselves and try to accomplish the end result before we accomplish the steps along the way. We normally are not successful in doing this. Do not skip the needed steps along the way to your goals. They are important.
Keep focused on the importance of the ultimate goal, but accomplish it by concentrating on achieving the steps along the way. If you break down the goal into a series of smaller goals, it will improve your success rate.
What are some of the goals that you are pursuing and how are you breaking them down into smaller steps?
