Setting and Achieving Goals

Wed, 03/05/2014 - 17:17

Gleb leading the workshop How can we figure out, set, and achieve our goals? A recent workshop at a HCCO sponsored Rationality meeting, led by Gleb Tsipursky, provided some effective strategies for doing so. This post provides a brief summary of the talk with some useful links for additional information. A video of the workshop is linked at the end of this post.

The first of three sections dealt with figuring out overarching goals and values. The workshop helped participants reflect on their personal understanding of an ideal life, connect this ideal to their different life areas, and then link these areas to their vision of how they want to live their values and be the people they want to be.

In the second section, workshop attendees worked backward from their broad vision of an ideal life and figured out the best paths to lead them there. They reflected on their current strengths, baggage, opportunities, and threats, and developed more specific and measurable goals for the next several months.

After helping participants set these concrete objectives for the next few months, the presentation turned to achieving goals. This involves a broad range of strategies, including planning, organization and time management; quantification, evaluation, and assessment; managing emotions relating to goals, emphasizing patience, positive reinforcement, flexibility, and forgiveness; changing unproductive ways of thinking and attitudes, especially using meditation and Cognitive Behavior Therapy techniques; letting go of unhelpful habits, and developing functional habits; finally, social and community support, especially from fellow rationally-inclined people dedicated to self-optimization.

The anonymous feedback sheets passed around after the presentation revealed that audience members gained much from the workshop. For example, one participant stated that s/he "feel[s] empowered to take changes" and another gained "more motivation to start actually setting goals."

Below are some additional resources for goal setting and achievement.

Overviews of goal setting and achievement from LessWrong:

http://lesswrong.com/lw/iue/does_goal_setting_work/

http://lesswrong.com/lw/iwn/goal_setting_and_goal_achievement/

Guide to self-tracking digital tools:

http://quantifiedself.com/guide/

Guide to contract digital tools:

http://blog.beeminder.com/competitors/

Two posts on creating productive habits:

http://www.nirandfar.com/2012/01/your-new-years-resolution-is-bound-to.html

http://www.lifehack.org/articles/productivity/18-tricks-to-make-new-habits-stick.html

TED talk about some situations in which sharing your goals may be counterproductive