Hi friends! Rebecca is sharing a great guest post with us today with fabulous tips on how to stay focused on your goals. Enjoy! XO Christina
How many times while trying to achieve a long-term goal of yours do you start to get unmotivated or off track? Sometimes it is hard to continually have the strong focus you had at the beginning of goal setting, months or years after you start that goal.
My husband and I are currently saving up for a down payment for our first house, so I wanted to share what we do to keep our eyes on the prize even though it’s probably another year and a half away.
While we are very fortunate to rent a pretty new 1 bedroom apartment in my hometown and we have very respectful neighbors and a good landlord, most of our friends are buying houses. Even though it is fun to see them get their first homes and settle in, it is also hard for us since we can’t wait until it’s our turn to move into the first place that will be really “ours”.
Today I’m sharing 4 things we do to stay focused and driven through our long-term goals!
4 Ways to Stay Focused on Your Long-Term Goal:
1. Refocus by communication
A lot of the time we refocus by just sitting for a few minutes together and listing all the things we love about the apartment we live in now, and all the things we are grateful for that have happened because we live there:
- We paid off my car when we first moved into this apartment, making us debt free
- We saved a full 6 month emergency fund
- We were able to pay cash for three little weekend getaways for anniversaries and valentine’s day
- In 6 months we saved a quarter of our total down payment goal
And those are just the financial rewards we have made by living where we are now! By practicing contentment on a regular basis, we are more appreciative for the everyday stuff we have now and can enjoy looking forward to the future, without worry or stress about getting there.
2. Have a printout to visibly track goals
Another thing we use is a printout that hangs on our fridge to help us track every time we put money into the house fund. We fill in each line as our savings increase and it gives us a daily visual of how our goals are moving along as time passes.
3. Have a realistic and fun dream board
It is so much fun to put together a dream/vision/goal board.
We have a place we put pictures of things we would want to have and next to them we put what we need to do to achieve it, how much it costs, activities we need to do, and knowledge we need to reach to obtain it. Currently we just have things on a shared hidden Pinterest board until we can print it out and hang it in the apartment somewhere, but it is so motivating to look at your dreams and start taking small steps to make them your reality.
4. Reward yourself for meeting “mini goals”
As much as you will want to throw every spare penny towards your big savings goal, I’m here to say make sure you plan some fun things to do every few months until then! We went for 5 months without doing much of anything extra and we started to get burned out by doing the same things day in and day out. So this summer we planned to take some time off, do a few extra projects, take a couple local day trips, and take a weekend getaway on our anniversary!
Sure the $1,000 we are spending on these extra things could potentially benefit the overall goal of saving for our house and accomplish it more quickly, but it’s not fun saving for a goal without enjoying life while doing it! 🙂 So pick 1-4 milestones on your journey to achieving your overall goal, and once you reach each milestone, reward yourself by doing something relatively inexpensive that gives you something you look forward to!
These are the things we are doing to keep feeling content where we are in our lives and where we live now, while still working toward the exciting goals we want to achieve in the future.
What are some goals you would like to achieve? What are some fun things you could pick for your “mini goal” rewards?
Rebecca blogs at Live Well Thrive More. She loves sharing about all things personal finance, how to organize your home and life to stress less and have less mess, and everything from DIY projects to traveling around the Pacific Northwest with her husband. You can also connect with her on Pinterest.
Celebrating success along the way is so important. We try to find inexpensive ways to celebrate – like cooking a favorite meal, spending extra time outside, and things like that. Making the journey more enjoyable keeps us working towards our goals.
Hi Penny! It truly is! We found out when we have a reward in place at different “check points” we actually meet them even faster! 🙂
I love that quote, “it’s not fun saving for a goal without enjoying life while doing it.” The only way we are able to keep working on our financial goals is if we reward ourselves now and then. It’s one of the best ways to avoid a burnout. Great post, Rebecca!
Thanks Allison! 🙂 They are words we try to save by! And that’s too true, sometimes when we are intensely focused on a goal, we can get burned out trying to reach it, that’s why I love adding little reward check points along the way it make it seem like we accomplish so much more then just 1 goal that way too!
Having those little goals along the way – and treating yourself, is so important! I’ve learned that the hard way sometimes and it’s always nice to have the reminder!
Hi Alexandra (I love your name by the way! I’m in love with the “old fashioned” names) 🙂 I just get even more inspired and excited to share what’s worked for my husband and I by hearing comments like yours! Thanks for coming by!
I like the idea of rewarding yourself for reaching milestones. I’ve been so focused on the goal that I’m beginning to lose focus of life and the enjoyment of it. I’ll have to incorporate this!
Shirria it’s so easy to get consumed by your goal when you become intense about completing them! I’m guilty of this as well! That’s when we started to add little rewards that wouldn’t hurt the pace of the goal, but would keep us motivated to reach it! 🙂
I love it! Inserting little vents into your project is a fantastic way to stay sane and motivated. I look forward to checking out your site. I dream of checking out the pacific northwest in an RV someday! Oh yeah, the hunt for Bigfoot is on! 🙂
Hi Kay! I’d be thrilled if you swung by my blog 🙂 These little breaks have helped me reach so many things faster! 🙂 Washington is beautiful, but be prepared for some crowding when you get into the I-5 corridor area! 🙂
Rewarding yourself for mini-goals is a great way to stay motivated. My wife and I have some (very) long-term goals that can seem insurmountable at times. Rewarding ourselves for the small accomplishments along the way seem to be a great way to “stay the course.”
That’s great DC! It’s awesome for me to hear about another husband and wife power team! I couldn’t have reached half the goals by myself that me and my husband completed together! 🙂 We have a few long term goals right now that I can agree with you on, they seem like they will take forever to get here! But I know no matter what we can all achieve our goals with some encouragement and support from others!
Celebrating “mini goals” is such a great idea. Some of my goals feel so lofty that I wonder if I’ll ever get there, but little victories are the bite-size chunks I can handle!
I hear you Daisy, We were able to pay off my car and save a full 6 month emergency fund so fast that out newer goals require a lot more patience and time and they feel so far off! But that’s why we started doing little goals because it helps us to feel like we are working fast still! 🙂
Congrats on paying off your car and saving up for the down payment! I really like all of these ideas and I created a vision board earlier this year to help me visualize what I wanted to achieve and stay motivated. I also set mini-goals a lot to make it seem more attainable to reach my big goal.
That’s awesome Chonce! 🙂 I love it! I’d love to know what your big goal is? 🙂 I’m sure you will be able to reach it faster then you expect you seem like a great goal motivator!
That is so wonderful that you and your husband are goal oriented and working so hard together to achieve them. I love your regular routine of gratitude to counter discouragement. Such a great practice! I’ve just started blogging abouty weekly goals to hold myself more accountable! I need to think about longer term goals though as well. Thanks for a wonderful post!
Thank YOU Angela for such kind words! 🙂 I wish you well in your goal setting and I’m sure you will be able to reach any goal you set! It has been a true blessing that my husband and I have been able to work together for everything in our marriage so far! I know not everyone is so lucky so he is a true blessing to me 🙂
I love the dream board suggestion. I’m going to create one soon.
Hi Sara, our dream board keeps us inspired to reach our goal! It is super fun to create too! One day it would be awesome to have one big wall with pictures of the things from our dream board! 🙂
Great tips. Having a visual representation of your progress is a great idea. It definitely helps to *see* your progress and it’s a very effective way to remind yourself why you’re putting in the hard work.
Good luck getting that deposit together!
Thank you Diane! It’s such an affective way to meet goals! 🙂
Thank you, informative and well-spoken. Lots of value!
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