There is a common saying
“Excess of everything is bad”.
Do you agree with this? I think everyone should agree on this argument! What if your utmost struggles go to waste just because of that excessive burden of multiple goals and stress?
Have you ever faced such a situation? If so then why don’t you think about the smaller steps to create a successful path for the future?
I hope you got the point!
So, How many goals should you have at once? Be easy! I have the answer to your question.
Before diving into the solution it’s necessary to know the problem first let’s have a look at the disadvantages of setting too many goals.
Drawbacks Of Setting Too Many Goals
Goal-setting is the prior thing for personal development and an accomplished career.
If you want to achieve success to make your future bright you need to spend some time on goal setting to build your focus toward your life goals.
You know what, setting too many goals and especially the big goals creates the hard part of making progress rather than development.
Therefore, before setting goals be specific about the number of goals and focus on how many goals to set otherwise due to setting too many goals at once, you can be a victim of the following situations!
1) Setting Unrealistic Goals
Much research has been made on one-year goal achievement and the average success rates are less than 20% among the people who set big goals for one year.
Setting unrealistic goals is one of the reasons for this failure. So, always avoid this wrong strategy while setting goals to accomplish success.
2) Overwhelmed
Goal setting can make you overwhelmed if you ignore the fact of how many goals to set and create a planner with too many goals in it and start working by leaps and bounds at starting without knowing your capabilities and strengths to make your career successful.
The stress of achieving many goals makes you dull and disappointed in your goals and eventually you become overwhelmed and feel burned out.
3) Hitch
I think the biggest drawback of setting a large number of goals is to hitch the plan again and again due to the overburden of goals.
These situations tend to break the focus from the goals and arises a sense of disappointment toward making progress in life.
4) Focusing on quantity over quality
Setting many goals lacks quality and is the wrong way to develop a realistic goal plan to achieve success in your career and life.
Quality is more important than quantity, it’s up to you to decide to own goals with quality or quantity!
5) Break down of values
During Setting many goals you might avoid certain things and other goals to work on, for example, due to the pressure of achieving more goals maybe you are ignoring your important goal i.e., to make your career successful you are setting back your health.
Unrealistic achievements lead to a new habit of using unfair means and unethical sources to complete the task to feel accomplished.
Isn’t it dangerous to set too many goals in this way?
How Many Yearly Goals Should You Set?
It’s time to answer the question of how many goals should you set at once! Or how many goals should you set in a year to make your goal-setting life easy?
While setting goals for the year always try to avoid the wrong way of setting many goals to feel fancy rather than be smart and set fewer goals by being specific about the number of goals for the year.
Set one to three goals for a year as it will help you to be realistic and active to accomplish your goals.
I am not against setting multiple goals but setting too many goals at once leads to burnout and stress and make your life tough.
While achieving goals working consistently for short-term goals is better than quitting just because of the fear and burden of achieving a big goal!
Do you want to be a slave to your goals? or want to be smarter to make your career by accomplishing success?
Decide what works better for you! Don’t be fascinated by the life of self-help experts as it is not always the case that fits your circumstances.
Avoid following the self-help experts rather just get the ideas for personal development and set goals according to your capabilities and trust your own experience to accomplish success.
Why Are Big Goals Not recommended In a Yearly Goal Setting
Setting big yearly goals is a complete fuzz.
If you have decided on a big goal that is unrealistic to achieve this year, you will have to spend a great time on it irrespective of caring for your health and money and it will be a hard part of your life that will affect your next year too.
There are more chances of distraction when we are achieving big goals in a short time.
For example, if you are looking to accomplish a company this year and it is your biggest goal of the year. What will you do about it?
Well, when we set big goals for the year we mostly start looking at the end irrespective of setting small goals that are the building blocks of that one goal.
Goal Translates Into Habit, And Creating Habit Needs Attention A goal is an ultimate destination that gives the route to your successful life.
But it is not enough to just set goals to feel achieved, rather you have to pay the cost to accomplish those many goals. How?
To achieve life goals you need to build new habits to get out of your comfort zone. Creating a new habit needs consistency that comes with the completion of every task.
It is ok if you cannot complete the task every time but you can try to complete it and gradually you will finally be successful to complete the task.
This process will assist you in creating new healthy habits for personal development and focusing on life goals.
Setting a proper schedule for your big goals or some other goals and focusing on one goal at a time will give you fruitful results for sure.
Make it your habit to be disciplined during every task.
If you own goals, own habits too!
Habit-Orientated Goals
Setting a new habit every month can make your process of progress easy and it is an indication sign of success in your life.
Here are some habit-oriented goals that can help you achieve your number of goals which can be short-term goals or long-term goals.
- Get up early
- Review your to-do list in the morning
- Reduce overuse of phone
- Always focus on important things first
- Come out of your comfort zone
- Own goals rather than empty thoughts
- Practice personal development
- During goal setting avoid setting too many goals instead set realistic goals
- Always think about how many goals you can achieve easily
So How to Find That One Goal?
Among the company of many goals, it is quite hectic to think of the one goal that is going to save your life this year.
But it is foremost to select the one goal with a high impact index on your life and try to focus on that one goal at a time. Here are some tips to select one goal from many goals.
Breakdown your goals
Never focus on the end of the goal instead break down your number of goals into short-term goals and start working on the fewer goals that are important according to the need.
Make a should-do and could-do list
Review your goal list and pick up the goals to create a should-do and could-do list. Think about the should-do task and decide to complete it first.
It can be a certain thing about your health maybe you wanted to lose weight and need to work on it on daily basis or it can be about quality time for your company.
Selection of a prior goal from many goals will become easy if you practice this habit.
Chose the goal with high impact
Focusing on that one big goal among too many goals gives the surety of success the most. If you are confused to select that one big goal from too many goals, you don’t need to worry.
You can make your life easy by thinking about the goal that is going to influents your life the most. It can be the personal development area of your life to spend more time on.
Make mind to bear the pain
After setting goals and finding your major goal make your mind ready to pay the cost.
For example, if you are looking forward to improving your health by losing some weight then you have to sacrifice your favorite meals and adopt a new habit of exercising.
If you are planning your dream vacation with friends next year, you will need to spend money on it for sure. It is the rule of life. So,
“the more you struggle the more you get”
Set Realistic Goals
Setting goals is not the big deal despite being realistic during goal setting matters the most.
If you want to make progress in life avoid setting many goals and always prefer to set realistic goals and specifically short-term ones.
Time-bound goals can be achieved easily and are a valid sign of progress. Setting smart goals is a proven way of progress in life.
Goals with Deadlines: Long-Term Goals vs. Short-Term Goals
A time-bound goal can be a short-term or long-term goal. Short-term goals are building blocks of long-term goals as they need a short-term period to complete.
Both short-term goals and long-term goals can be smart goals too.
It’s you to decide how many goals you need to set whether short-term or long-term goals for making progress in life.
For Example, establishing a shoe company is an example of a long-term goal. More goals relate to long-term goals i.e.,
- Getting promotion
- Buying a house
- Lose weight
Some examples of short-term goals.
- plan dream vacation with friends
- Decide a dinner party
- Clean home
How to Set the Right Number of Goals This Year
How many goals to set this year or what is the perfect number of goals? The answer to these questions is not certain because goal setting acts differently for different people.
It depends upon many factors discussed below.
What are your life goals?
During goal setting think about your major life goals first and evaluate their time to achieve realistically.
What are your important goals?
Always give preference to your most important goals during goal setting and focus on the worth and quality of your goals.
How many goals you can achieve?
Decide the number of goals that you can achieve easily and set goals according to your capabilities.
How long will it take to achieve one goal?
Set goals according to the time required to reach one goal and prefer smart goals that are short-term as well.
Conclusion
So, when it comes to setting goals think about how many goals should you set once and avoid setting many goals rather focus on your objective to set smart goals to make your goal-setting life effective.
All the best!
FAQ’s
How many goals should you have at any one time?
Setting many goals at one time is not feasible to achieve rather you should set only one goal at any one time and focus on that one goal with your utmost energy to accomplish the short-term goal.
What is the ideal number of goals?
Besides setting the ideal number of goals try to set a quality and realistic number of goals.
Setting 1-3 goals per year is the best number of goals to accomplish in a balanced way without feeling the burden.
How many goals can a person have at once?
One can set multiple goals at once around 3-5 goals but focusing on only one goal at one time and working for the rest of the goals on their turn is the best strategy to achieve the goals effectively.
Can you have multiple goals at once?
Definitely yes! But the point to ponder is to focus on just one goal at once to make the process easy to complete your task.
How Many Goals Should I Set At Once?
Decide your one important goal and focus on only that one goal at once and further move to the next goal.
Give priority to the important goal and develop a proper focus to achieve your goal.