When you’re setting goals for self-improvement, you may be wondering where you need to improve—and how you’ll know you’re on the right track. Additionally, you’ll want to make sure that your pursuit of self-improvement doesn’t cause you to deviate from your personal values or your personality.
One strategy for successfully setting self-improvement goals is to reframe them as personal growth. Your personal and professional life can benefit from adopting it.
In order to grow and develop, you need to set achievable goals that will help you develop new skills. This may force you to step out of your comfort zone a bit. Achieving your personal goals requires effort, good habits and focus. Here’s how to get started.
Best Personal Development App
If you want to stay organized and get things done, Any.do promises that and more. Its time management feature keeps you on task. They remind you of scheduled activities that cannot be missed.
Journey App Download Links:
- Download Journy Android App
- Download Journy iOS App
Among the usual features such as due dates, prioritization, automatic reminders, setting recurring tasks, reminders and a drag&drop interface for easy list creation, it has other useful key features:
- Data Sync – Adding a scheduled event to your calendar and syncing it with multiple platforms like Google Calendar and WhatsApp reminders will keep you efficient.
- Offline Access – Knowing you’ll be able to access your tool from anywhere, at any time, gives you great freedom, peace of mind, and the ability to always be on top of things.
- Task Management – Integrating your to-do list with your calendar makes planning and scheduling easy.
- Voice Capture – When you’re on the run, it’s useful to leave a voice message that turns into a note on your to-do list. You never know when you’ll have another great idea!
What are personal goals?
A destination is where you direct your efforts. For example, your goal might be to reach a certain career milestone or a personal best when it comes to your morning run. Personal goals can take place in any area of your life.
And as the name suggests, a personal goal is one that relates to you. You are not competing with anyone but yourself.
Setting personal goals requires a combination of short-term and long-term goals.
Let’s say you want to start getting up at 5 a.m., but you don’t consider yourself a morning person. Going from waking up 10 minutes before your first meeting to a three-hour morning routine isn’t realistic. But waking up half an hour earlier each month gives you a realistic short-term goal that feeds into your long-term goal.
Studies show that goal attainability is more positively associated with well-being than goal importance. Being reasonable about what you can achieve is a more effective way to stay motivated.
You are also more likely to achieve your goal if you are more mindful. Some research suggests that mindful people set better and more achievable goals.
Working to strengthen your mental fitness will sustain you for the rest of your life. And sustainable goals require you to dig in and do the Inner Work. Inner work requires the development of greater self-awareness. Knowing who you really are is the best way to work on improving yourself.
Stop for a moment and appreciate your current abilities. You’re not trying to fix yourself, but you’re helping yourself grow as you go through the different stages of your life.
Your personal goals may be completely different than the person next to you. At BetterUp, our coaches are here to give you advice on whatever goal you have in mind. And if you’re not sure what areas of your life you want to focus on, don’t worry. We can help you.
5 areas for self-improvement
Self-improvement is about developing or improving your skills through your own actions. It’s okay to ask for help, but you are the one who takes the initiative to develop.
You learn how to set goals and achieve them because you want to, not because someone is forcing you to. Self-improvement does not occur even with a fixed mindset. You have to believe and admire what growth can bring you.
Every aspect of your life has the potential for self-improvement. Here are a few to check out:
- Your emotional well-being and how you look after your mental health, including your resilience and self-compassion
- Your physical well-being and overall fitness
- Your personal qualities (meaning: self-confidence and self-esteem)
- Your social health – this means how you behave in your relationships with friends, family members, co-workers and romantic partners
- Your professional and personal achievements, such as getting a promotion or improving your financial health
However, this does not mean that every aspect of yourself can be improved or developed. Some aspects of your identity are fixed. You can’t change who you’re attracted to or what you like. Stay away from trying to impose a completely different identity on yourself. Instead, embrace who you are.
16 examples of personal goals
After reading all of this, you may be wondering: What personal goals can I set? Your personal goals may relate to your professional life, or they may be something specific to your life outside of work. What might be a goal for you might be something that doesn’t resonate with others.
To help you start thinking about what goals you want to set, here are 16 examples of personal development goals:
- Make better use of your time management skills and manage yourself better
- Stop procrastinating
- Limit your use of social media
- Incorporate more self-care practices into your routine
- Get better at public speaking
- Learn how to take better care of your physical health
- Let go of the past and live more present
- Have a better work-life balance
- Build your confidence
- Develop more assertive body language and communication skills
- Practice active listening while at work or at home
- Get up earlier in the morning
- Improve your emotional intelligence for yourself and your relationships
- Strengthen your leadership skills
- Connect more in your field
- Better decision-making thanks to increased self-awareness
examples of personal development goals for work
Setting goals specifically for work can benefit the rest of your career. You may not think much of them now, but down the road you’ll appreciate the time you spent on your job skills. Develop your career and grow as your professional growth requires to grow as a person.
If you’re not sure how your career goals align with your personal development, ask yourself what skills you need to do it. For example, do you want to become a manager and lead the team you are in now? This will require strong leadership skills. The goals of good leadership vary from industry to industry, but self-focus is a common first step.
Here are some examples of personal development goals for work:
1. Be open to learning new things
At no point in your career will you know everything. There are always opportunities to learn and being open to them will help you grow.
2. Network and meet people in your industry
Networking is easy to do remotely. You can video call people or connect with them through social media. However, you feel good about fostering these connections, starting to talk to people for advice and learning more about what they’re doing.
3. Learn to be more resilient
Your job may test you, but developing resilience will help you overcome any challenges. This will also allow you to be a better leader in your work environment.
