Setting Goals and Achieving Them

I’m a lists kind of guy. You know, that means my schedule is covered in little bullet-points, post-its and to-do lists. If I didn’t write it down then it probably won’t get done. I don’t know if this is the right way to go through life or if it’s just a system I’ve adapted to but this is how I accomplish things, and I accomplish a lot.

There is a hierarchy of goals: big dreams (but difficult to accomplish) all the way down to very easy things to accomplish. I try to focus on small, achievable goals because those are the kinds I tend to pull off. If they lead up to a big dream type of goal all the better. But I’m mostly just trying to get a small action down on my calendar that I can do right now. That’s how I get scripts written, ideas executed out to some kind of finish and it’s how I’ve completed all sixteen of my graphic novels.

Making goals that can be accomplished right now that lead to a big dream goal is how those big dream goals get done in my life. I don’t end up going to the gym most weekdays for four years by making a goal like “Go to the gym for four years” I do it by writing a goal out like “set alarm for 4:30am”. I can set an alarm right now. I have no idea if I can do it for four years. I have a dream goal of making twenty graphic novels in ten years. I have no idea if I can pull that off, but I know I can ink two pages today.