With us now in full swing for summer, it is important to realise that it isn’t always a time for relaxing. Although the weather may suggest so – keeping up with what you want to achieve can’t go a miss.
When it comes to having goals to set for yourself this summer, it is no different to any other type of goal. But, you may be in a place where you have no plans for what you want to accomplish.
Therefore, beginning your goal-setting process this summer will be the perfect way to bring a productive start to the end of your year. Let’s get right into some goals that may fit your list this summer!
Why Should You Set Personal Goals This Summer?
As previously stated, summer can be a magical time – but also a curse at the same time. Travelling, festival events, beaches to go to, etc are just a few of the ways that goals can be overwhelming.
Now, from our point of view, we’re not stating that people will need to work hard and not enjoy themselves at all. Relaxing is important in its own right – however, finding a way to balance both of these actions is crucial.
Giving up one for the other is never the answer when you can achieve both at the same time. Being dynamic and constantly improving is still feasible whilst doing activities that please you the most and take no mental energy.
If you feel as if you waste your whole summer just being completely non-constructive with your time, then setting summer goals may be a way for you to balance out your fun while achieving personal growth simultaneously.
How to Set Effective Goals This Summer
Before you just go and act on your goals, you first need to grasp what it is that you want to attain fully. Trying to achieve your goals without a plan on how you’re going to accomplish them will lead to a lack of direction and focus.
On the flip side, when a goal is written down with clear intentions of where you want to go with it, you will have a benchmark and updates supported towards your progress. Physically seeing progress in front of you is always a huge motivator and makes discipline easier to perform. But, what is an effective strategy you can use to meet these criteria and more?
SMART Goals
An acronym standing for S – Specific, M – Measurable, A – Attainable, R – Realistic and T – Time-Bound – there is a clear structure to planning out your personal development goals. But what does each part of the smart goals acronym do for your goal-setting process, habits and values this summer?
Specific: When creating a goal, it must be specific to the ultimate target that you want to reach. If you have multiple different goals, it becomes harder to be specific and focus. Pick a goal you want to achieve and stick to that one.
Measurable: Setting goals for summer with the help of this acronym – being measurable is the process of tracking each small win towards your goal. If you use a tracking system, this will be even more effective for recording each small goal hit towards the ‘end goal’.
Attainable: Having attainable goals and mini-goals that add to your progressive trajectory is necessary. If you’re looking too far ahead and something isn’t attainable at all, then tailoring it to a goal that you can achieve is essential.
Realistic: Due to the ups and downs of life constantly impacting our lives, we have to be realistic about something that can be attained – thinking ahead to potential problems that could harm our progress. Using ‘common sense’ about your situation will help plan these realistic goals.
Time-Bound: Having deadlines in place for your small goals and the ultimate goal – whether it be for a small business, setting personal goals/ life goals or even career/ work goals is important. Of course, external influences can affect this along the way – but, having a timeframe in mind will help push you to your limit with how hard you work toward this goal.
Goal Ideas: Your Most Productive Summer
Now that you can grasp how to set an effective goal, if you’re struggling with intentions this summer – we may have a few ideas and proposals that could spark a new interest in your daily life. Here are a few ideas that we have for you:
Spending Time Outdoors With Friends and Family
Goals do not always have to be around building businesses from scratch. Sometimes, going back to your roots and realising what you have can rejuvenate the relationships you forgot were so important in the first place when together.
Planning weekly or monthly times to meet up and do something is important for relationship health and just remembering the love and care you have for one another. No matter the duration, even little outgoings will keep the mood positive between you and your family or you and your friends.
Productive Mornings
Every morning can be hard to bring some enjoyment and routine too. However, with these being the first actions of your day, ensuring that you’re doing something that will be positive for your mood and energy is vital.
Whether this is a gym session, reading a book, learning a new skill, etc – the choice is yours. Setting these personal growth goals will definitely increase the success of your output of work throughout the day. Starting the day off with a tough task that you previously have never done will automatically make everything else in your day feel like less effort.
Practice Yoga on Your Local Beach (or Holiday Beach)
Upon learning these relaxing movements, you can perform them at sunrise or sunset depending on your preference. The stretching and breathing practices during this exercise will certainly boost your mood.
Executing this on the beach also will help you to feel your surroundings more as it will be eerily peaceful and quiet. If a beach isn’t feasible, then you could try an open field of grass or sit next to trees, plants, etc.
Mark is a multi-award winner in business networking and relationship building. He is passionate about coaching and mentoring business owners and professionals through 1-1 & group coaching, team performance workshops and group mastermind sessions.