The science behind goals

I’m an avid list maker. I have a list for everything, from the mundane to the serious. One of my staples is my daily list of goals, which feeds into my weekly, monthly and quarterly goals. 

I list my goals daily for one simple reason: the human brain is a goal-setting machine. It might be different for you, but I’m not capable of remembering and holding all my goals in my head. So, I put them on paper. 

I believe this sends a signal of intention to my brain, increasing my focus on the resources needed to accomplish my stated goals.

Psychology research shows that people who merely thought about their goals reached them less than 50% of the time. People who wrote goals down and shared progress reports with friends succeeded about 75% of the time.

Did you catch that? By merely thinking about your goals, you increase your odds of reaching them, and even more so by writing them down. I like those odds.

The mere act of writing down your objectives is a motivator. You find yourself visualizing your goals. You become more focused, thereby increasing your productivity.

Goal-setting has all sorts of ancillary benefits. Your Return on Energy (ROE) is directly tied to your productivity. The more productive we are the happier we become. Our mental, emotional and physical states improve along with our productivity. 

The brain understands this and wants to help us get closer to our goals.