essay writing for goal

Essays About Goals: Top 5 Examples Plus 10 Prompts

Goals could be a one-time event or a lifelong growth process. Write effectively with the help of our essays about goals and writing prompts in our guide. 

Having goals helps us have a sense of purpose. We find our determination, discipline, and strategic thinking tested to their limits. The road toward any goal, especially ambitious ones, is full of thorns and spikes. Some walk away and accept that these goals are not destined for them. Some, however, keep pressing forward, determined to achieve these goals. Gaining confidence in writing can help you achieve your goals by putting pen to paper and starting a plan.

5 Essay Examples

1.  are you goal or growth conscious by katherine beneby, 2. how to help an employee figure out their career goals by dorie clark, 3. no goals: why is it so hard to do something for enjoyment’s sake by jenny valentish, 4. get inspired: how four hikers accomplished their 2021 hiking goals by anna roth , 5. does sharing your goals on social media make you more likely to achieve them by kristan russell, 1. my goals in life, 2. travel goals, 3. the goal of forming better study habits, 4. climate goals: are we progressing, 5. importance of fitness goals, 6. fiscal policy goals, 7. failing at your goals, 8. setting lofty vs. light goals, 9. poverty reduction goals, 10. my academic goals.

“The difference between goals and growth is that goals are seasonal, while growth is lifelong. Goals focus on a destination while growth focuses on a journey.”

In this essay, the writer discusses how achieving our goals may be possible if we reframe our minds to think of them as a growth process. This essay enumerates the difficulties of achieving our objectives and offers guidance on what will help put structure in how we formulate our growth plans. You might also be interested in these essays about bad habits .

“It’s not always possible to help the people we supervise identify and work toward their career goals… [S]o when we can assist our employees in getting there, it’s a meaningful way we can make a difference in their lives and their professional success.”

As per our list of topics to write about , this essay looks at how managers must realize their critical roles in the lives of the employees they handle. Their biggest contribution to the development of their employees is helping them achieve their tasks at work while ensuring these victories lead to their broader career goals. You might also be wondering, why write goals down?

“Once, to stave off depression, I set myself the goal-tastic mission of doing something new every day for a year – from flying in a glider to blowing things up – and blogging about it. Right from day one, the sense of focus lifted my mood, and there was frankly no time to overthink.”

In this essay, the writer looks at how atelic activities, or those we do for fun, positively influence our outlook. Our goal-driven world, however, hinders us from seeing the pure joy of doing things without goals. You might be interested in these essays about dream jobs .

“Last year, she set a goal to simply go hiking at all. And she’s thrilled to have made it happen, saying it was one of the best things she could have done for herself and her family during such a challenging year.”

This writer describes points to inspire people to start hiking and to set personal fitness goals. Look no further and turn to the inspiring stories of people who have targeted to hike across states, hike for the first time, hike once a month for health purposes, and hike a hundred miles yearly. For more inspiration, check out these essays about achievement .

“Wellness gurus and fitness bloggers seem to be divided between whether sharing goals on your social media sabotages you or holds you accountable.“

This essay revolves around a nascent study that aims to see if sharing your goals on social media make them more attainable. While initial results show that those who posted made significant progress compared to people who did not post, more questions need to be explored. You might be inspired by these essays about success .

10 Prompts on Essays About Goals

In this essay, delve into your short-term, medium-term, and long-term goals. Before anything else, elaborate on what drew you to set these goals. Then, share your action plans to make them a reality. Discuss the obstacles you’ve faced and how you’ve conquered them. 

What is the one destination you dream of? For this essay, daydream about your travel goals. Direct that excitement and write your travel itinerary, the duration of your stay, where you will be staying, and what daring activities you will dare yourself to plunge into. You can also talk about whom you would like to be with when you fulfill your travel goals or if you prefer going solo.

It is a challenge to hit the books when we live in a world with unlimited distractions. In this topic prompt, share effective study habits to help students focus on their studies. One helpful tip, for example, is designing your environment to be conducive to a habit change. In the case of study habits, this means temporarily eliminating access to social media and other digital distractions. Cite more tips and conclude your essay with a few words of motivation.

Under the Paris Agreement , the landmark international agreement to fight climate change, countries must jointly strive to arrest global warming and cap it to 1.5 degrees Celsius by 2030. The question is: is this goal still on the table? Read recent news articles on how countries are following through on their Paris Treaty pledges. Listen to what environmentalists say about national efforts and tackle what more must be done to attain the climate goals. 

Fitness is a common new year’s resolution but try convincing your readers to start their fitness goals today. First, help your readers explore the right dietary program and workout schedule based on their daily demands. 

Then, underscore the importance of a fitness goal for gaining self-esteem and improving physical and mental health. Entice them with the idea of gaining a new exciting skill from a new workout activity and motivate them to start unlocking the fit version of themselves today. 

In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, several countries recorded ballooning debts as governments spent heavily to fight the pandemic and also support struggling sectors. So first, determine whether your country is in a tight fiscal space. 

The fiscal space assessment framework created by the International Monetary Fund may help you identify the metrics and data to gather. Then, shed light on your government’s fiscal policy goals to address debt while spending in sectors that guarantee an economy’s long-term health, such as education and social services. 

How do people receive failures? Write about people’s attitudes and actions when they fail at their goals. Can people develop depression, and how can they recover from the fall? Try to answer these and share your experience of failing at your goals. 

Ask yourself: How did you move forward after that? Then, share your opinions on whether a failure signifies that it would be best for someone to find a new goal altogether or try again with stronger determination and a better-calculated strategy. 

Which is better: aiming for a lofty goal that opens risks of failure, which many fear, or light goals that might do little in stretching out your potential? Answer this by listing the pros and cons of each. Then help readers strike the optimum balance between a loft or light goal. Cite examples of lofty and light goals to help your readers better differentiate the two.

For this essay, take a deep dive into the poverty reduction efforts of your government. First, give an overview of an ongoing flagship poverty reduction program and uncover its outcomes since its implementation. Read through government reports about the breakthrough goals of the program and which ones are gaining momentum. 

Then, look at the other side of the fence by listening to what critics say about the program. Take note of their laments about bottlenecks in the program and what more can be done to attain poverty reduction goals swiftly. 

Start with a descriptive paragraph detailing your academic goals. Writing about it vividly, as though it is the reality, is a creative way to show readers how much you have played out the scenarios of success in your head while helping your readers fully understand your goals. Then snap back to reality and discuss your action plan to realize these goals.

For related topics, you may check our essays about dreams in life . Don’t forget to proofread your essay with the best grammar checkers .

How To Write A Powerful Essay On Achieving Goals (+ Example)

Goal setting is a useful strategy to get the most out of life and set yourself up for success. However, there are many things to remember regarding proper goal setting and achievement. When writing a blm argumentative essay , it’s important to provide context on the history of the Black Lives Matter movement and the issues it seeks to address. This can help the reader understand the significance of the essay’s thesis and arguments. Let’s get to grips with the process of goal setting and come up with a powerful essay on achieving goals.

Structuring Your Essay on Achieving Goals:

How to write an introduction, how to write the main body of your essay.

There should be a minimum of three paragraphs in your essay. Each one is a ‘mini-essay with an introduction, body, and conclusion. Each should include:

How to Write a Conclusion

Example of an essay about achieving your goals.

So, let’s put all this information together and check an example essay on achieving goals: Effective Methods to Increase the Likelihood of Goal Achievement Achieving goals can be extremely rewarding and result in a more satisfying and successful life. Many people set goals yet cannot achieve them. However, there are ways to avoid or reduce the likelihood of missing the mark. By ensuring that goals are SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound), using visualization techniques, and rewarding goal attainment, the chances of success increase. First, ensure your goals are SMART. This means that goals should be specific and measurable in terms of outcomes, e.g., test scores . Goals should be achievable and realistic to the person’s capabilities and resources available. Also, a goal should apply to the person’s work, education, hobbies, or interests and include a deadline. If there is no specificity of outcome, there’s no real way to see how someone has improved—or how they might be falling short. And if goals are not SMART, they are more difficult to achieve. Second, by imagining and visualizing the feelings and outcomes of achievement of the goal , the likelihood of high achievement increases. The imagination can be a powerful tool. Imagining the feelings of accomplishment helps to increase self-efficacy and motivation. A Canadian study found that imagery skills moderate the effect of mental practice on self-efficacy. The effects of visualization techniques are valuable in goal achievement. Third, once the goal has been accomplished, a reward is required. Getting a reward for hard work will increasingly motivate an individual to set and achieve the next goal. The offer of a reward gives employees and students an extra boost of motivation. Rewards help the cycle of goal setting and goal achieving to continue. In summary, by ensuring the goals set are SMART, visualizing and rewarding success, goal achievement becomes more likely. Achieving goals is a cyclic process that’s possible to master if the right method is in place.

The Basics of Setting and Achieving Goals

Goals should be specific and free of generalizations, or they are unlikely to get done. Instead of stating that your goal is to improve your English skills, make it more specific by stating that your goal is to learn and use one new word every weekday to boost your English vocabulary.

A goal should be measurable because you need to keep your finger on the pulse and know where you’re at. For instance, a test or assessment score can provide evidence that you have reached your goal.

A goal needs to be possible to achieved. If it’s beyond your capabilities or requires resources you cannot access, then you will set yourself up for failure.

You must set a completion date for your goal. If you do not set a deadline, you may lack the motivation to reach it. Once you have your SMART goal, record it clearly on paper or a mobile device and then visualize the outcome of achieving that goal. Imagine how happy you will feel when you achieve it. This vivid mental imagery will provide you with the extra motivation to go for it. Finally, when you reach your goal, it’s time to celebrate! Reward yourself with a trip, an item you desire, relaxation time with friends, or whatever else that will make you feel happy.

Ready to write an essay about achieving goals?

Hopefully, the information in the article has given you the basics to help you write a powerful essay on achieving goals. I also hope that this article has helped you think about how you can work toward achieving your own goals. There are many great books about the science of goal achievement. I especially recommend ones written by Brian Tracy , as they have helped me a great deal in my pursuit of happiness . You can also create an engaging presentation about achieving goals and objectives using this  goal presentation template . Next up, you may want to explore an ultimate guide to writing expository essays .

Rafal Reyzer

Hey there, welcome to my blog! I'm a full-time entrepreneur building two companies, a digital marketer, and a content creator with 10+ years of experience. I started RafalReyzer.com to provide you with great tools and strategies you can use to become a proficient digital marketer and achieve freedom through online creativity. My site is a one-stop shop for digital marketers, and content enthusiasts who want to be independent, earn more money, and create beautiful things. Explore my journey here , and don't miss out on my AI Marketing Mastery online course.

How Do I Write An Essay About Achieving My Goals?

Introduction.

Writing an essay about achieving your goals can be a powerful exercise in self-reflection and motivation. Whether you are writing for a class assignment, a college application, or simply for personal development, this article will guide you through the process of creating a well-structured and compelling essay on this topic. By breaking down the steps involved and providing helpful tips, you’ll be equipped to express your aspirations, outline an action plan, and highlight the significance of achieving your goals.

Step 1: Set Clear Goals

Achieving your goals starts with clearly defining what you want to accomplish. Take some time to reflect on your aspirations and think about what truly matters to you. Your goals may include academic achievements, career aspirations, personal growth, or any other area of your life that you wish to improve. Ensure that your goals are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART goals). By setting clear goals, you will be able to better articulate your vision in your essay.

Step 2: Plan Your Essay Structure

Before diving into the writing process, it’s essential to plan the structure of your essay. This will ensure that your ideas flow smoothly and logically, engaging the reader from start to finish. Generally, an essay consists of three main parts: an introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion.

The Introduction: Begin your essay with a captivating introduction. Grab the reader’s attention with an anecdote, a relevant quote, or a thought-provoking question. Clearly state your goals and the significance they hold for you. Conclude the introduction with a concise thesis statement that presents the main focus of your essay.

Body Paragraphs: The body of your essay offers an opportunity to elaborate on your goals and the steps you are taking or planning to take to achieve them. Divide your body paragraphs based on the subtopics or themes you want to discuss. For each paragraph, present a specific goal, provide relevant details, and explain why it is important to you. Consider incorporating examples, personal experiences, or research to support your statements and make your essay more persuasive.

The Conclusion: Wrap up your essay with a strong conclusion that reinforces the main points you have discussed. Avoid introducing new information here. Instead, highlight the potential impact of achieving your goals and leave the reader with a final thought or call to action.

Step 3: Conduct Research

If your essay requires factual information or expert opinions, conducting research will provide you with valuable insights to enhance your writing. Utilize reputable sources such as scholarly articles, books, or credible websites to gather information that supports your aspirations. When referencing sources, make sure to cite them properly using the appropriate citation style (e.g., MLA, APA).

Step 4: Draft and Revise

Now that you have a plan and have conducted research, begin writing the initial draft of your essay. Start with the body paragraphs, as they contain the core content of your essay. Ensure each paragraph follows a logical flow and connects back to the main focus of your essay.

Once you have completed your draft, take time to review and revise. Pay attention to grammar, spelling, and sentence structure. Ensure that your ideas are presented clearly and cohesively. Consider seeking feedback from others, such as teachers, family members, or friends, to gain different perspectives and improve your essay even further.

Step 5: Add Personal Reflection

In addition to presenting your goals and action plans, be sure to include personal reflections throughout your essay. Explain why achieving these goals is meaningful to you and how they align with your values and aspirations. By sharing your personal insights and emotions, you will create a more engaging and authentic essay.

Step 6: Edit and Proofread

Before submitting your essay, it is crucial to edit and proofread your work. Review your essay for any errors, both grammatical and typographical. Ensure that your ideas are coherent and logical, and that your writing flows smoothly. Consider using online grammar checkers or seeking assistance from a professional editor if needed.

Writing an essay about achieving your goals allows you to reflect on your aspirations, establish a concrete plan, and demonstrate your determination to succeed. By following the steps outlined in this guide, you can create a compelling essay that effectively communicates your goals and motivates both yourself and your readers.

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How to Write an Essay About My Goal: A Comprehensive Guide

In the ever-evolving journey of life, setting clear objectives and ambitions is crucial. Whether these goals are short-term or stretch into the far reaches of our future, they act as guiding lights in our journey. This guide will assist you in articulating and expressing these ambitions effectively, especially when it comes to writing them down.

Understanding the Importance of Goal Setting

Setting life goals is a combination of introspection and foresight. It demands an understanding of one's current standing and a clear vision for the future. By penning down your goals, you not only provide yourself a clear road map but also make a commitment to yourself to achieve them.

How To Write An Essay About My Life Goals

• Introduction : Initiate with an engaging hook—be it a quote, question, or anecdote—that aligns with your goal.
• State your main goal : Elucidate on what your primary life objective is. Be it professional success, personal achievement, or societal contribution, clarify your aim.
• The 'Why' behind the goal : Delve into your motivations. Discuss the driving forces behind this ambition.
• Steps to achieve : Provide a roadmap. Enumerate the steps you'd undertake to transform this goal into a reality.
• Potential Challenges : Highlight potential obstacles and your strategies to navigate them.
• Conclusion : Summarize and re-emphasize your dedication towards your objective.

Career Goal Essay Definition

It's essential to differentiate between life goals and career goals. While the former encompasses broader objectives, a career goal essay underscores your professional aspirations, detailing why they matter and how you plan to attain them.

How Long is a Professional Goal Statement?

A professional goal statement's length can vary but should be concise. Ranging typically from 500 to 1000 words, it should capture your aspirations succinctly. Always adhere to specific guidelines if provided.

What to Avoid While Writing Your Career Goal Essay

• Ambiguity: Always be specific. • Unsubstantiated lofty goals: Your ambitions should be grounded in reality. • Neglecting personal growth: Showcase how your past has shaped your future. • Reiteration: Stay succinct and steer clear of repetition.

My Future Goals Essay: 12 Models

• Entrepreneurial Aspirations : Launching a sustainable fashion startup by 2030.
• Technological Goals : Developing an AI-driven community healthcare system.
• Educational Objectives : Attaining a Ph.D. in Quantum Physics.
• Artistic Pursuits : Holding a solo art exhibition in a renowned gallery.
• Societal Contributions : Establishing a foundation for underprivileged children's education.
• Scientific Aspirations : Contributing to renewable energy research.
• Medical Goals : Becoming a pediatric surgeon and researching rare childhood diseases.
• Travel Objectives : Visiting every UNESCO World Heritage site.
• Sports Ambitions : Completing an Ironman Triathlon.
• Literary Goals : Publishing a trilogy of fantasy novels.
• Environmental Aims : Pioneering a city-wide recycling initiative.
• Leadership Aspirations : Becoming the CEO of a Fortune 500 company.

Articulating one's life and career goals requires introspection, clarity, and foresight. This guide offers a structured blueprint to ensure your essay not only adheres to academic standards but genuinely resonates with your aspirations and dreams. Whether you're grappling with questions like "what should I write in my college essay?" or "how to draft a goal statement?", this guide is here to light the way.

Frequently Asked Questions

• What is the ideal structure for a future career essay? Start with an engaging introduction about your aspirations. In the body, detail the steps you plan to take, experiences that have guided you, and why you chose this career. End with a conclusion summarizing your determination and future vision.
• How do I ensure my career goals essay stands out? Incorporate personal stories or experiences that shaped your goals. Be specific about your aspirations and how you plan to achieve them.
• How can I relate my past experiences to my future career in the essay? Highlight skills, lessons, or challenges from your past and demonstrate how they have directed or prepared you for your future career.
• What should I avoid when writing an essay about my career goals? Avoid being too vague about your goals. Steer clear of clichés, and ensure your goals are realistic and grounded.
• How long should my essay about my goal be? This depends on the requirement. Usually, personal statements are between 500-700 words. Always adhere to the specified word limit.
• Can I include short-term and long-term goals in my essay? Absolutely! Detailing both shows planning and vision. Highlight how short-term goals will pave the way for long-term objectives.
• How do I conclude my essay about my goals effectively? Reiterate your dedication to these goals, reflect on the journey ahead, and end with a note of optimism and determination.

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Happy 2024! We hope this year will be full of writing for you—and if you’re like us, you’ve even got writing goals among your New Year’s Resolutions.

One thing to consider is that not all goals are created equal . Goals can be fuzzy (“I want to write more”), over-ambitious, or have lots of other issues.

To help, people who think about this sort of thing have come up with a great system for goal-setting: SMART. Based on that system, here’s some simple advice for the goal-setting writer in each of us.

If you’re serious about your writing in 2024, check out our online writing courses . They’ll keep you accountable to concrete writing goals, with the mentorship of award-winning instructors, and in a supportive community of like-minded and passionate writers. They’re the perfect environment to get your best writing done.

SMART is an acronym, and it’s one of those cool acronyms where the word it forms describes the thing the acronym is about.

SMART is a good acronym. Not like this one.

What “SMART” Stands For

SMART is all about the properties of a good (“smart”) goal.

It stands for:

• Specific. Make your goal or objective as specific as possible. Say exactly what you want to achieve in clear, concise words.
• Measurable. Include a unit of measure in your goal. Be objective rather than subjective. When will your goal be achieved? How will you know it has been achieved?
• Achievable. Be realistic. Ensure that your goal is feasible in terms of the resources available to you.
• Relevant. Your goals should align with your values and long-term objectives.
• Time-bound. Give yourself a deadline within a year. Include a timeframe such as a week, month or year, and include a specific date if possible.

( See here and here for more on these descriptions.)

A Few Examples of Non-SMART Writing Goals

Here are some draft goals (or resolutions) that might not fit within the SMART framework:

• “I really want to finish my novel.” (Not specific.)
• “I’ll write lots more this year.” (Not measurable.)
• “I’ll write 20,000 words every week this year.” (Not achievable???)
• “I feel like I should start writing again.” (Why?)
• “I hereby commit that I’m going to work on my memoir until it’s finished.” (When? Not time-bound.)

A Few Examples of SMART Writing Goals

And here are some examples of draft goals or resolutions that would fit within the SMART framework:

• “I will finish my novel manuscript by the end of the year.”
• “I’ll set aside 15 minutes in the morning to write, at least 5 days a week.”
• “I’ll have an outline of my memoir completed by July 1.”

A Few Thoughts on “Relevant” (the R in SMART Goals)

Each of these feel like good goal-setting elements in general, but what really stands out to me is R, Relevant. This is a chance to ask: What does this writing goal, resolution, project, or process mean to me ? How is it part of the life I wish to live?

This is certainly worth reflecting on. In my experience, knowing why I write can help a huge amount with the how and when.

Our reasons for writing will—of course—be different for each of us. With that in mind, I’ll offer that, in my view, having the chance to share our humanity with one another through written language is one of the great gifts of life. So whatever your reason is, I know it’s a good one.

Here’s to a wonderful and writerful 2024!

Frederick Meyer

Writing truly an amazing way to give life in the form of tangible memories or basic ideas…therapeutic for sure…to the ones conveying and the ones receiving it…my blood my brows sweat the ink to my pen!!! The countless pages in the form of sheets of many types..from paper bags to napkins to the parts of my skin for my canvas that waits to be outlined into the intensity of a kaleidoscope of emotions dying to come out…to be viewed to be felt in ensuring all types of waking UP’s inside and out every side..especially the parts that are crippled locked jammed in sick stillnesses out of fear of scaring all away leaving us in an awkward mess for doubts set out to stop anything from becoming something!!I would love to leave y’all with something I came across a year in my 3 years and 3 month prison term…when nothing could console me..the losses from being free to be a mother to my beautiful three daughter’s aja and naynay and jady..from being able to have the freedom to know I could be free even while incarcerated ..a blessing in disguise because I was dying!!! I’d lost my physical freedom my rights my luxuries.. To just be in my life’s moment’s.. In a Bible a year after not knowing how to deal with all I wanted to get back to… My life!! My girls!! This was in a separate piece of paper within the pages of the only book of life worth referring towards.(THE BIBLE)..this is what the small piece of paper said and I quote!!!” Sometimes you have to let go of all you think you cannot live without in otderTO BE ABLE TO HOLD ONTO WHAT YOU STILL GOT”end quote…it was then..right at that moment that I realized how wise words are imperative&vital and, crucial…how FREEING and helpful they can be .why its important to learn to want to understand… So its wisdom and valuable lesson’s won’t pass you by…words!!! Turned into knowledge for the very power that fuels Gods hope in order to find your way out of the bondage for pessimistic thoughts that have been like a plague…a form of cancer ..poison to your mind’s abilities& capabilities,and capacity to break out and awayyyyyy..!! and see all through!!! Yea…its not how much you write its what you write about and owning your own style of how to go about!!! Write on!!!! Right on!!! Sincerely Gypsy skigh blue!! Aka Noemi cazares MY NEW YEARS RESOLUTION… TO BE ABLE TO GIVE LIFE THROUGH WORDS TO ALL IVE EXPERIENCE… SURVIVED WHILE HAVING TO BECOME MANY COOL AND INSANE SAVAGE CHARACTERS IN order TO FINALLY FIND MY WAY TO MY THROWN IN WAITING… A CHAIR IN FRONT OF A DESK OR TABLE WHERE I MAY FINALLY SIT DOWN AND SHARE MY unbelievable MISSIONS IN LIFE!! BECAUSE ITS NO LONGER A JOURNEY.. ITS MY LIFE!! I FINALLY VALUE IT AND UNDERSTAND THE UNSPEAKABLE THE UNREFINED THE rawness OF IT ALL THATS BEEN EVER SO DEEPLY SENSITIVE… LEADING ME MANY TIMES ON THE DEFENSES MAKING IT EASY TO BELIEVE I MUST BE CRAZY… IM NOT BUT WHAT WAS DONE to me and mine AND LATER SAID AGAINST ME TO DECLARE ME FOR SURE insane !!! GOD FORBID THEY LISTEN TO ME…YEA…THAT WAS TRULY CRAZY THEY WERE UNHINGED… BUT SOME HOW THROUGH THE graceful GRACE OF GOD… I SURVIVED IT…SO PEN TO PAPERS…and this is how it soon will go…..God help me always… I’m your mess…I’m not any less….I’m More, more than I allowed myself to become… Thank God!! I’m never alone especially when I was…AMEN!! Amen!!/Amen!!

Everyday I come up with the day’s to-do list and i’ll make sure the followings feature on the list: (a)writing at least two flash fictions (b) editing an old story (c) reading online magazine ,at least two magazines (d) listening to an audio story , at least two short stories

As one who also like programming, i’d including coding as well. is this a clear SMART violation?

I have never really thought about writing stories or anything else related, I just happened to by pass this website but I’m actually considering taking it in for my goals in this coming year.

So thank you for the inspiration and happy new year!

We hope you start writing, Nshuti! Happy New Year!

SMART goals were a part of my life throughout my career as a school administrator. I had forgotten about them until I read this article. More than four years ago, I made the goal of writing every day. Not entirely smart but it is one that I have achieved. As January 1, 2024 approaches, I will got back to my roots and create my SMART goal for the year. Thanks for refreshing my memory.

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Your chance of acceptance, your chancing factors, extracurriculars, how do i write a college essay about my future goals.

I have some pretty clear goals for my future, and I think writing about them in my college essay might help me stand out. How can I approach this topic in a way that's engaging and doesn't sound like I'm just listing my ambitions? Thanks for any suggestions!

Hey there! Writing about your future goals is a great idea for a college essay, and it can definitely help you stand out. The key is to tell a story that highlights your goals while also showcasing your personality and experiences.

Start by reflecting on your past experiences and achievements that have led you to these goals. You could talk about a specific moment or event that inspired your ambition, and then explain how it has driven you ever since. This helps to show your passion and dedication towards your goals.

Next, focus on your present efforts to work towards these goals. You could mention any relevant extracurricular activities, internships, or projects you've been involved in that align with your future aspirations. This demonstrates your commitment and hard work.

Finally, discuss your future goals in a way that ties everything together and shows the admissions committee how you plan to make a positive impact in the world. Remember to be authentic and genuine in your writing, and don't be afraid to show some vulnerability. Good luck with your essay!

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5 Tips for Setting Writing Targets and Recovering from Unmet Goals

Gina Edwards

In this productivity-oriented culture, goal setting is expected for nearly everything we do. But many writers struggle with setting goals around a writing practice and then lose their way if they don't meet their targets.

A typical goal-oriented question from writers is “Should I write every day?” When I posed that question to a famous published author, she responded without hesitation: “Absolutely.” For years afterward, this whorled in my own writer brain and I couldn’t be open to any other answer. This woman was published, after all; she had to know. And since I wasn’t putting words down in every 24-hour time block, I couldn’t possibly call myself a writer.

I now know how absurd it was to bestow this author with unearned power over MY writing practice. Uncovering the fallacy of her guidance cost me years of writing time; it took decades of trial-and-error to develop a writing practice that allowed for my ever-changing schedule, still gave a sense of momentum, and didn’t leave me with guilt when I wasn’t writing. This required learning to set goals that were right for me .

No one should impose their way of working upon another writer; you’re the only one with the authority to direct and dictate your writing practice and process. So I hope these five things I’ve learned can help you set writing goals that are right for you .

1. Different Methods for Different Writers

2. keep it visible, 3. make it attainable and sustainable, 4. have a recovery plan, 5. review, adjust, reflect, bonus tip: devotion over discipline.

There’s no single “correct” way to set a writing goal, but there are two basic methods:

Method 1: a goal paced for the purpose of completing a project, i.e. project-oriented

To feel a project is progressing, some writers need to see climbing word counts. Indeed, daily or weekly word count goals are the goals writers most commonly set. Another writer might aim for finishing one short story a month regardless of length. Both are project-oriented writing goals; the primary emphasis is the amount of production to complete the project.

Method 2: a goal that works within the confines of available time, i.e. time-focused

A time-focused goal, such as writing for fifteen minutes every morning or thirty minutes during your lunch break, might work better for a busy mom or a writer with a full-time job.

Look at your current situation to decide whether a project-oriented goal or a time-focused goal would work best for you. Whichever goal-setting tactic you use now, remain open to changing it (see #5).

Setting the goal is the easy part. Remembering to do it is another, especially if you’re caught up in a frenzy of responsibilities.

So write your goal on an index card or type it out large. Then put it on your bathroom mirror, stick it to your computer monitor or beside the coffee pot—anywhere you’ll see it every day even if your goal isn’t a daily one.

At writing retreats, I have to check in with new attendees who declare they’ll write for four or five hours a day when, back home, they hadn’t been writing for even one hour a day—or at all. Make sure your goal is reasonable and attainable, and know that you might need to build up to it over time. There’s value in starting small to create momentum.

Your goal should be sustainable, too. If you meet your word-count goal seven consecutive days but find it so grueling that you can’t continue doing it, then what’s the use in having that as your goal? Don’t set yourself up for failure. Your goals should be achievable but also something you can comfortably sustain, at least for the duration of a given writing project.

Sometimes we simply cannot or do not write—for more reasons than there’s space here to list. When fallow times happen, they can seem devastating to our goals. But since they’re a natural and expected part of the writing process, doesn’t it make sense to create a Recovery Plan before we actually need one?

Productivity philosopher and Start Finishing author Charlie Gilkey asserts that we need a mix of creation, connection, and consumption to do our best work. This principle holds keys for resuming an interrupted writing practice and provides a blueprint for an effective Writer’s Recovery Plan.

Let’s apply Gilkey’s principle to the writer’s life:

Creation represents our focused writing time, as well as any other creative activity that refreshes us. If you’re stuck or need to ease back toward your goals, try some new or different act of creation, especially if writing is your primary or only creative activity. Drawing, painting, jewelry-making, sewing, woodworking, gardening, model-making—the possibilities are endless and the crossover effect on your writing can be astounding. Don’t take my word for it though. Try it.

Consumption refers to acquiring knowledge about our writing craft. Both passive and active learning can motivate us toward our writing goals. Opening a great novel or watching a classic movie always inspires me. Writing workshops and conferences provide new knowledge that I’m driven to incorporate into my writing when I return. When I can’t leave home, I look to my bookshelf or local library for a good book on writing. Seek out and build into your Recovery Plan opportunities to learn more about our craft.

I saved Connection for last since it takes a bit more explanation but can be the most effective means to recover from a non-writing period. Gilkey’s definition of connection addresses being in relationship with others, both online and in person. Mine, too, includes connecting with family and friends, as well as other writers. But I've expanded on that definition to incorporate connections that, when accessible to us, can be vital for writers: connections with nature, ourselves (physically and spiritually), and perhaps most importantly, an ongoing connection or a re-connection to our purpose and passion for writing. These could translate into a Writer’s Recovery Plan in the following ways.

Being in, and connecting with, nature can provide quiet time to get the chatter of others out of your head, to calm your mind, and to contemplate your own ideas. So go sit under a tree or stare at a lake.

Physical activity, especially walking but also playing with children, yoga, running, and other types of exercise have a positive effect on creativity and ideation . Connect with your body through movement to enhance your creative thinking.

Spirituality, in the context of this article, has no religious connotation and refers to a search for meaning and understanding. Conveniently, writing and other forms of creativity are some of the best tools for understanding ourselves as well as the complex, ambiguous, beautiful world we live in . The interrelationship between spirituality and creativity and their effects on the human potential are just beginning to be studied. But clearly, tools for spiritual growth such as meditation, prayer, yoga, breathwork, even listening to podcasts on personal development can complement and enhance our growth as writers and strengthen our connections to ourselves and our creativity. Consider experimenting with a few spiritual tools to see what might work for you. Then, if they’re not already part of your routine, include them in your Recovery Plan.

Finally, connection includes reminding ourselves of the “why” for our writing. Every writer has his/her own motivations for writing and being a writer. But sometimes in the throes of striving, we forget what lies at the heart of our purpose and passion for it. When I’m discouraged, confused, or lack motivation to aim for my writing goals, I pull out a journal and write about my writing. To be clear, this isn’t doing the work of the project-in-progress, but rather an exploration in my heart and mind of why I want to do the project in the first place and, on the larger scale, why I want/need to write. It’s an invaluable reminder of why it’s worth it and always directs me back to the work itself. Pull out your journal and write about your writing to connect and reconnect with your project, and with your purpose and passion for writing.

Create a Writer’s Recovery Plan for getting back to your writing practice, no matter the reason for getting away from it. A Recovery Plan can reorient you to your goals and ease you back into your practice with less anxiety and more grace.

Set aside time to periodically review how you’re doing toward your goals. Your situation might change so that your original project goal no longer works. Or the project might evolve into something you didn’t anticipate, so the goal might require adjustment.

Realize, too, that the goal for one project might not be relevant for the next one. Writing 150 words a day might seem reasonable for a writer focusing on short stories, but that pace may feel too slow if s/he shifts to writing a novel. Be willing to experiment with your goal-setting methods and levels.

Your goals review could occur weekly, monthly, or quarterly. The intention isn’t to beat yourself up if you haven’t matched the goal but to shine light on whether you need to make adjustments—up or down. Look carefully at why you’ve exceeded the goal or fallen short, and adjust as needed. End-of-project evaluations are helpful too as they provide perspective for future goal setting.

Finally, don’t forget to reflect; this might seem like the same thing as “review,” but it isn’t. Reflection is a long-range look at your overall writing practice rather than a focus on immediate or current projects. Reflect on what you’ve learned over time about your writing goals so you can continue to get better at setting and meeting them. Carry forward lessons learned and any new techniques you’ve developed.

We sometimes forget to revel in our successes, so also reflect on your achievements. Despite romanticized notions of the writer’s life, writing isn’t easy or glamorous so it’s important to recognize how far you’ve come and to acknowledge the heart and the work you’ve put into those words on the page. You deserve to celebrate what you’ve done.

Rather than imposing discipline around your writing practice, cultivate a devotion for it. Gentle, consistent love and attention might take you farther than rigid, scheduled structure.

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Check every email, essay, or story for grammar mistakes. Fix them before you press send.

Gina Edwards is a writer, retreat leader, certified creativity coach, and editor. Through retreats, group coaching, and the community Women Writing for CHANGE, she provides safe spaces for women writers—aspiring and published—to claim their voices, write their stories, and leave their legacies. Gina, her clients, and her writer-friends are on a collective mission to positively impact the world through their written words.

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• A step-by-step guide to the writing process

The Writing Process | 5 Steps with Examples & Tips

Published on April 24, 2020 by Jack Caulfield . Revised on December 8, 2023.

Good academic writing requires effective planning, drafting, and revision.

The writing process looks different for everyone, but there are five basic steps that will help you structure your time when writing any kind of text.

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Table of contents

Step 1: prewriting, step 2: planning and outlining, step 3: writing a first draft, step 4: redrafting and revising, step 5: editing and proofreading, other interesting articles, frequently asked questions about the writing process.

Before you start writing, you need to decide exactly what you’ll write about and do the necessary research.

Coming up with a topic

If you have to come up with your own topic for an assignment, think of what you’ve covered in class— is there a particular area that intrigued, interested, or even confused you? Topics that left you with additional questions are perfect, as these are questions you can explore in your writing.

The scope depends on what type of text you’re writing—for example, an essay or a research paper will be less in-depth than a dissertation topic . Don’t pick anything too ambitious to cover within the word count, or too limited for you to find much to say.

Narrow down your idea to a specific argument or question. For example, an appropriate topic for an essay might be narrowed down like this:

Doing the research

Once you know your topic, it’s time to search for relevant sources and gather the information you need. This process varies according to your field of study and the scope of the assignment. It might involve:

• Searching for primary and secondary sources .
• Reading the relevant texts closely (e.g. for literary analysis ).
• Collecting data using relevant research methods (e.g. experiments , interviews or surveys )

From a writing perspective, the important thing is to take plenty of notes while you do the research. Keep track of the titles, authors, publication dates, and relevant quotations from your sources; the data you gathered; and your initial analysis or interpretation of the questions you’re addressing.

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Especially in academic writing , it’s important to use a logical structure to convey information effectively. It’s far better to plan this out in advance than to try to work out your structure once you’ve already begun writing.

Creating an essay outline is a useful way to plan out your structure before you start writing. This should help you work out the main ideas you want to focus on and how you’ll organize them. The outline doesn’t have to be final—it’s okay if your structure changes throughout the writing process.

Use bullet points or numbering to make your structure clear at a glance. Even for a short text that won’t use headings, it’s useful to summarize what you’ll discuss in each paragraph.

An outline for a literary analysis essay might look something like this:

• Describe the theatricality of Austen’s works
• Outline the role theater plays in Mansfield Park
• Introduce the research question: How does Austen use theater to express the characters’ morality in Mansfield Park ?
• Discuss Austen’s depiction of the performance at the end of the first volume
• Discuss how Sir Bertram reacts to the acting scheme
• Introduce Austen’s use of stage direction–like details during dialogue
• Explore how these are deployed to show the characters’ self-absorption
• Discuss Austen’s description of Maria and Julia’s relationship as polite but affectionless
• Compare Mrs. Norris’s self-conceit as charitable despite her idleness
• Summarize the three themes: The acting scheme, stage directions, and the performance of morals
• Answer the research question
• Indicate areas for further study

Once you have a clear idea of your structure, it’s time to produce a full first draft.

This process can be quite non-linear. For example, it’s reasonable to begin writing with the main body of the text, saving the introduction for later once you have a clearer idea of the text you’re introducing.

To give structure to your writing, use your outline as a framework. Make sure that each paragraph has a clear central focus that relates to your overall argument.

Hover over the parts of the example, from a literary analysis essay on Mansfield Park , to see how a paragraph is constructed.

The character of Mrs. Norris provides another example of the performance of morals in Mansfield Park . Early in the novel, she is described in scathing terms as one who knows “how to dictate liberality to others: but her love of money was equal to her love of directing” (p. 7). This hypocrisy does not interfere with her self-conceit as “the most liberal-minded sister and aunt in the world” (p. 7). Mrs. Norris is strongly concerned with appearing charitable, but unwilling to make any personal sacrifices to accomplish this. Instead, she stage-manages the charitable actions of others, never acknowledging that her schemes do not put her own time or money on the line. In this way, Austen again shows us a character whose morally upright behavior is fundamentally a performance—for whom the goal of doing good is less important than the goal of seeming good.

When you move onto a different topic, start a new paragraph. Use appropriate transition words and phrases to show the connections between your ideas.

The goal at this stage is to get a draft completed, not to make everything perfect as you go along. Once you have a full draft in front of you, you’ll have a clearer idea of where improvement is needed.

Give yourself a first draft deadline that leaves you a reasonable length of time to revise, edit, and proofread before the final deadline. For a longer text like a dissertation, you and your supervisor might agree on deadlines for individual chapters.

Now it’s time to look critically at your first draft and find potential areas for improvement. Redrafting means substantially adding or removing content, while revising involves making changes to structure and reformulating arguments.

Evaluating the first draft

It can be difficult to look objectively at your own writing. Your perspective might be positively or negatively biased—especially if you try to assess your work shortly after finishing it.

It’s best to leave your work alone for at least a day or two after completing the first draft. Come back after a break to evaluate it with fresh eyes; you’ll spot things you wouldn’t have otherwise.

When evaluating your writing at this stage, you’re mainly looking for larger issues such as changes to your arguments or structure. Starting with bigger concerns saves you time—there’s no point perfecting the grammar of something you end up cutting out anyway.

Right now, you’re looking for:

• Arguments that are unclear or illogical.
• Areas where information would be better presented in a different order.
• Passages where additional information or explanation is needed.
• Passages that are irrelevant to your overall argument.

For example, in our paper on Mansfield Park , we might realize the argument would be stronger with more direct consideration of the protagonist Fanny Price, and decide to try to find space for this in paragraph IV.

For some assignments, you’ll receive feedback on your first draft from a supervisor or peer. Be sure to pay close attention to what they tell you, as their advice will usually give you a clearer sense of which aspects of your text need improvement.

Redrafting and revising

Once you’ve decided where changes are needed, make the big changes first, as these are likely to have knock-on effects on the rest. Depending on what your text needs, this step might involve:

• Making changes to your overall argument.
• Reordering the text.
• Cutting parts of the text.
• Adding new text.

You can go back and forth between writing, redrafting and revising several times until you have a final draft that you’re happy with.

Think about what changes you can realistically accomplish in the time you have. If you are running low on time, you don’t want to leave your text in a messy state halfway through redrafting, so make sure to prioritize the most important changes.

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Editing focuses on local concerns like clarity and sentence structure. Proofreading involves reading the text closely to remove typos and ensure stylistic consistency. You can check all your drafts and texts in minutes with an AI proofreader .

Editing for grammar and clarity

When editing, you want to ensure your text is clear, concise, and grammatically correct. You’re looking out for:

• Grammatical errors.
• Ambiguous phrasings.
• Redundancy and repetition .

In your initial draft, it’s common to end up with a lot of sentences that are poorly formulated. Look critically at where your meaning could be conveyed in a more effective way or in fewer words, and watch out for common sentence structure mistakes like run-on sentences and sentence fragments:

• Austen’s style is frequently humorous, her characters are often described as “witty.” Although this is less true of Mansfield Park .
• Austen’s style is frequently humorous. Her characters are often described as “witty,” although this is less true of Mansfield Park .

To make your sentences run smoothly, you can always use a paraphrasing tool to rewrite them in a clearer way.

Proofreading for small mistakes and typos

When proofreading, first look out for typos in your text:

• Spelling errors.
• Missing words.
• Confused word choices .
• Punctuation errors .
• Missing or excess spaces.

Use a grammar checker , but be sure to do another manual check after. Read through your text line by line, watching out for problem areas highlighted by the software but also for any other issues it might have missed.

For example, in the following phrase we notice several errors:

• Mary Crawfords character is a complicate one and her relationships with Fanny and Edmund undergoes several transformations through out the novel.
• Mary Crawford’s character is a complicated one, and her relationships with both Fanny and Edmund undergo several transformations throughout the novel.

Proofreading for stylistic consistency

There are several issues in academic writing where you can choose between multiple different standards. For example:

• Whether you use the serial comma .
• Whether you use American or British spellings and punctuation (you can use a punctuation checker for this).
• Where you use numerals vs. words for numbers.
• How you capitalize your titles and headings.

Unless you’re given specific guidance on these issues, it’s your choice which standards you follow. The important thing is to consistently follow one standard for each issue. For example, don’t use a mixture of American and British spellings in your paper.

Additionally, you will probably be provided with specific guidelines for issues related to format (how your text is presented on the page) and citations (how you acknowledge your sources). Always follow these instructions carefully.

If you want to know more about AI for academic writing, AI tools, or fallacies make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples or go directly to our tools!

• Ad hominem fallacy
• Post hoc fallacy
• Appeal to authority fallacy
• False cause fallacy
• Sunk cost fallacy
• Deep learning
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• Supervised vs. unsupervised learning

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Revising, proofreading, and editing are different stages of the writing process .

• Revising is making structural and logical changes to your text—reformulating arguments and reordering information.
• Editing refers to making more local changes to things like sentence structure and phrasing to make sure your meaning is conveyed clearly and concisely.
• Proofreading involves looking at the text closely, line by line, to spot any typos and issues with consistency and correct them.

Whether you’re publishing a blog, submitting a research paper , or even just writing an important email, there are a few techniques you can use to make sure it’s error-free:

• Take a break : Set your work aside for at least a few hours so that you can look at it with fresh eyes.
• Proofread a printout : Staring at a screen for too long can cause fatigue – sit down with a pen and paper to check the final version.
• Use digital shortcuts : Take note of any recurring mistakes (for example, misspelling a particular word, switching between US and UK English , or inconsistently capitalizing a term), and use Find and Replace to fix it throughout the document.

If you want to be confident that an important text is error-free, it might be worth choosing a professional proofreading service instead.

If you’ve gone over the word limit set for your assignment, shorten your sentences and cut repetition and redundancy during the editing process. If you use a lot of long quotes , consider shortening them to just the essentials.

If you need to remove a lot of words, you may have to cut certain passages. Remember that everything in the text should be there to support your argument; look for any information that’s not essential to your point and remove it.

To make this process easier and faster, you can use a paraphrasing tool . With this tool, you can rewrite your text to make it simpler and shorter. If that’s not enough, you can copy-paste your paraphrased text into the summarizer . This tool will distill your text to its core message.

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Caulfield, J. (2023, December 08). The Writing Process | 5 Steps with Examples & Tips. Scribbr. Retrieved July 8, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/academic-writing/writing-process/

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Setting Writing Goals

What this handout is about.

This handout will help you set incremental, weekly goals that will help you complete your major writing projects. It’s important to put your goals in writing and to measure your success at the end of the week. Try the SMART approach for goal-setting.

Write goals that are:

The more clearly you articulate exactly what you need to do, the more successful you will be. Vague aims are your enemy. “Write a lot” or “just get this done” are a good intentions, but those aims are not specific goals. Determine exactly what will you write, when will you write, where will you write. Make decisions rather than hoping something good will happen.

Your goal needs to be observable. Something tangible that another person can see, count, acknowledge. Define your goal in numerical terms—the number of pages you’ll produce, hours you’ll stay on task, concepts you’ll address. Putting your goals in this form will help you gauge progress and help motivate you to move through the process. Take inventory at the end of each work session to begin to develop a sense of what you can produce in a defined period of time when you are on task. How many pages can you write in an hour? How long does it take to format a table? How much time does it take you to revise/rework something?

Consider the size of your goals this week. Set goals that you can realistically achieve in the time available. Determining what’s achievable may be challenging if you haven’t worked consistently to this point. If you haven’t worked with targets before, think in small, defined increments. If you reach your goal earlier than you expect, use the remaining time to work toward your next goal.

When writing, goal-setting may be useful for a variety of purposes—producing texts, developing work habits, improving your writing style or knowledge. Consider which goals seem most productive and important for you at the moment and set goals accordingly. Are you trying to develop work habits? Experiment with new writing techniques? Produce pages? Choose.

Time-limited

In order to assess how well you are meeting your goals, set an endpoint when you will review, evaluate, and set your next targets. You’ll be most successful if you set small weekly or daily goals that lead toward your ultimate goal—a complete draft of your writing project. Systematically evaluating what’s working for you and what’s not will help you celebrate, troubleshoot, and stay engaged with the task.

A few other tips

• Set goals you control . If your goals depend on the actions of others, have Plan B or shift focus to a goal you can control. So, if the book you’re awaiting doesn’t come through from interlibrary loan, move on to another aspect of the project. If you advisor is late returning comments on a chapter, shift to writing or revising another section.
• State your goals in positive terms . Write what you want to happen not just what you want to avoid.
• Prioritize . After you’ve made a list of goals, identify your top 3. Focus energy there.
• Work backward . Not sure where to begin setting an appropriate goal? Start with the end result and work backward step by step. What do you need to achieve by this date? Then move backward on the calendar until the current date.
• Revisit your goals regularly . Treat your goal sheet as a living document. When you achieve a goal, indicate that with a visual reminder of your success–cross it off, add stars, highlight it green–whatever helps you see your progress most happily. If you’re not achieving a goal as quickly as you’d anticipated, break it down into smaller tasks you can achieve in a shorter time.
• Practice . Goal-setting is learned behavior, not something you automatically do well, should know how to do, or will “just happen.” The self-awareness you develop in the process of setting, measuring, and achieving goals will support you in your future career.

You may reproduce it for non-commercial use if you use the entire handout and attribute the source: The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

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How to Write an Essay About Your Future Goals

What Is the Meaning of Educational Planning?

Explaining where you see your life in five,10 or even 20 years requires thought and planning. Writing an essay about your future goals helps you get a clear vision of what you want to accomplish. In order to clearly communicate your life plans, take time to identify your passions and interests before you begin writing. Doing so, will make structuring the essay a lot easier.

Select three specific goals you wish to accomplish within a certain time period. Explain in the introduction of your essay why you selected those goals and how they are related to one another. Provide a brief and general explanation of how you will accomplish your goals.

Write one to two paragraphs specifically explaining each goal. Describe the rationale for each goal and how the idea originated. Mention individuals and personal experiences that inspired you to set these goals. Discuss how far or close you are to reaching each goal.

Include facts and research information about what it will take to reach each goal. Research should include the steps you need to take in order to accomplish your goal. This research can be standard information acquired from documents. For example, if going to college is one of your future goals, identify which college and include information about admission requirements you must meet. Your research information can also be based on interviewing other people who have reached the goal for which you are presently striving.

Conclude your paper by restating your goals and why they are important to you.

Read your essay to a friend to make sure it's easy to understand. Review and proofread thoroughly if you are submitting your essay for a grade.

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• Baylor University: The Five Step Personal Essay Writing: Academic and College Goals

Kai Ingram has over 15 years of experience as a professional writer. She writes on a wide range of topics related to entrepreneurship, international affairs and health and spirituality. She has written for various publications and websites such as the "Atlanta Tribune," The Ms. CEO show and "New Vision in Business" magazine. Ingram has a Bachelor of Arts in social policy and journalism.

Essay on Goals in Life

Students are often asked to write an essay on Goals in Life in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

Let’s take a look…

100 Words Essay on Goals in Life

Introduction.

Goals in life are like a compass, guiding us towards our desired destination. They provide a sense of direction and purpose, helping us focus and organize our efforts efficiently.

Importance of Goals

Goals are important as they motivate us to strive for success. They make us resilient, enabling us to overcome obstacles and challenges that may come our way.

Types of Goals

Goals can be short-term or long-term. Short-term goals are achievable quickly, while long-term goals require time and persistent effort.

In conclusion, setting goals is essential for personal growth and success. Always remember, a goal without a plan is just a wish.

250 Words Essay on Goals in Life

The importance of setting goals.

Setting goals is integral to our growth and progress. They serve as a blueprint for our future, guiding our actions and decisions. Goals foster resilience, as they urge us to persevere despite setbacks. They also encourage self-development, pushing us to acquire new skills and knowledge.

Goals can be broadly classified into short-term and long-term goals. Short-term goals act as immediate milestones, while long-term goals shape our vision for the future. Balancing both is crucial, as short-term goals often pave the way to long-term accomplishments.

Goal Setting and Achievement

Effective goal setting requires specificity, measurability, attainability, relevance, and timeliness (SMART). This approach ensures our goals are realistic and achievable. Moreover, consistent evaluation and adjustment of our goals is essential, as it allows us to stay aligned with our evolving aspirations and circumstances.

In conclusion, goals are fundamental to our life’s journey. They provide direction, foster resilience, and encourage personal growth. Balancing short-term and long-term goals, along with effective goal-setting strategies, can lead us to success. Ultimately, it is through setting and achieving our goals that we write our own life story.

500 Words Essay on Goals in Life

Goals are the compass that guides us through life, providing direction and purpose. They are the stepping stones towards achieving our ultimate dreams and aspirations. Goals, whether personal, professional, or academic, are significant as they shape our lives, fuel our ambition, and give us a sense of accomplishment.

Goals also foster resilience, as they often require sustained effort and dedication. They teach us the value of perseverance, as the journey towards achieving them is usually filled with obstacles and setbacks. However, these challenges serve to strengthen us, enhancing our problem-solving skills and fostering personal growth.

Goals can be broadly categorized into short-term and long-term goals. Short-term goals are immediate objectives that can be achieved within a relatively short timeframe. These could range from completing a project, passing an exam, or learning a new skill.

Goal Setting Strategies

Effective goal setting requires thought and planning. One popular method is the SMART framework, which stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. This approach encourages us to set goals that are clear and precise, have a defined timeline, are realistically attainable, and align with our broader life objectives.

Another crucial aspect of goal setting is maintaining flexibility. Life is unpredictable, and circumstances can change unexpectedly. Therefore, it’s essential to be adaptable and open to modifying our goals as needed.

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How to Write a “How Will This Scholarship Help You Achieve Your Goals” Essay

Zach Skillings is the Scholarships360 Newsletter Editor. He specializes in college admissions and strives to answer important questions about higher education. When he’s not contributing to Scholarships360, Zach writes about travel, music, film, and culture. His work has been published in Our State Magazine, Ladygunn Magazine, The Nocturnal Times, and The Lexington Dispatch. Zach graduated from Elon University with a degree in Cinema and Television Arts.

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Caitlyn Cole is a college access professional with a decade of experience in non-profit program and project management for college readiness and access organizations.

Maria Geiger is Director of Content at Scholarships360. She is a former online educational technology instructor and adjunct writing instructor. In addition to education reform, Maria’s interests include viewpoint diversity, blended/flipped learning, digital communication, and integrating media/web tools into the curriculum to better facilitate student engagement. Maria earned both a B.A. and an M.A. in English Literature from Monmouth University, an M. Ed. in Education from Monmouth University, and a Virtual Online Teaching Certificate (VOLT) from the University of Pennsylvania.

When applying for scholarships, you may be asked to write an essay describing why you’re the right candidate for the award. One of the most common prompts for this type of essay is “how will this scholarship help you achieve your goals?” In this guide, we’ll talk about how you can put together an outstanding essay and win the scholarship of your dreams. 

Also see: Top writing and essay scholarships

Tips for writing a scholarship essay

There’s more than one way to write an essay like this, but an effective response usually does the following things: 

• Clearly defines your goals and how you plan to achieve them
• Provides some background context on your goals 
• Explains why you are a quality candidate for the scholarship 
• Close your essay in an effective way 

As long as you touch on these three areas, feel free to structure your essay however you see fit. Let’s talk about how you can address each of these components and put together a stellar essay. 

1. Define your goals 

Scholarship providers want to hear about your vision for your future self and how you plan to get there. As such, you should write about what you want out of your college education and beyond. It’s totally okay if you’re undecided about your major or career path since most scholarship providers won’t expect your plan to be set in stone at this point. However, you should still point to the fields of study or professions you’re considering right now. When talking about your plan for the future, explain how the specific scholarship is a key part of your path forward. And don’t forget to let your passion shine through when writing about your goals!

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2. provide background context .

Your essay should not only outline your goals, but explain how you arrived at them as well. One of the best ways to do this is by sharing a personal story. You may even want to lead with a personal story to immediately grab the attention of your reader. For this type of essay, you should share an anecdote that’s relevant to the scholarship you’re applying for. 

If you’re applying for an engineering scholarship , for instance, you could describe how your love of engineering was sparked by your involvement in robotics club. Students pursuing art scholarships may talk about the most meaningful project they’ve ever created. Whatever the case may be, find a way to connect your background to your goals and the scholarship. You’re much more likely to stand out when you demonstrate who you are and what you care about. 

Don’t miss: What’s the best scholarship essay format?

3. Make a case for yourself

Now that you’ve outlined your goals and the inspiration behind them, it’s time to explain why you’re the perfect candidate for this scholarship. Tie everything together by describing how the scholarship is a crucial piece of the puzzle. The goal here is to sell yourself while avoiding coming across as boastful or arrogant. Try to strike a tone that’s self-assured but also appreciative. You want to convey your gratitude and respect for the scholarship, while also demonstrating why you’re the right candidate for the award. 

If the scholarship is specific to a certain college or university, it helps to weave in your excitement for the school. Talk about unique aspects of the school such as courses that interest you or faculty members you’d like to work with. Ultimately, you want to do everything you can to leave a lasting impression on your reader. 

4. Close your essay in a memorable way

It was important to grab your reader’s attention in the beginning of your essay response, now it’s time to close your essay in a memorable way! This can be done in different ways, including ending it the way you began it, asking a rhetorical question, or summarizing your previous points in one tidy paragraph. Ultimately, it is up to you to decide what format is the best to end your essay in order to leave a lasting mark on your reader. 

Closing your essay in a catchy and memorable way will allow your scholarship response to be well liked and remembered. This can help significantly increase your chances of being selected for a scholarship! Therefore, be sure to brainstorm before writing your essay in order to make sure it flows nicely and you finish your essay with a bang! Learn how to end your scholarship essay in five steps and leave a lasting impression on whoever reads it! 

Also see: How to write an essay about yourself

Remember, an effective scholarship essay answers three main questions:

Questions to consider.

• What are your goals for your college education and career? 
• What life experiences led you to arrive at these goals? 
• How will this scholarship help you unlock your goals, and why are you the right student for the award?

By answering those three questions, you can write a compelling “how will this scholarship help you achieve your goals” essay and put yourself in contention for the scholarship. Just make sure your essay is free of spelling and grammatical mistakes. It’s a good idea to have a teacher or mentor read over your essay before submitting. Good luck!

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Key Takeaways

• An effective essay response includes defining your goals, providing background context, making a case for yourself, and concluding your essay in a memorable way
• Leading with a personal story is a great way to immediately grab the attention of your reader
• It is important to highlight how the scholarship will help you personally reach your goals and succeed 
• Be sure to end your essay in a memorable way to help increase your chances of being selected for the scholarship

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More From Forbes

How not to write your college essay.

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If you are looking for the “secret formula” for writing a “winning” college essay, you have come to the wrong place. The reality is there is no silver bullet or strategy to write your way to an acceptance. There is not one topic or approach that will guarantee a favorable outcome.

At the end of the day, every admission office just wants to know more about you, what you value, and what excites you. They want to hear about your experiences through your own words and in your own voice. As you set out to write your essay, you will no doubt get input (both sought-after and unsolicited) on what to write. But how about what NOT Notcoin to write? There are avoidable blunders that applicants frequently make in drafting their essays. I asked college admission leaders, who have read thousands of submissions, to share their thoughts.

Don’t Go In There

There is wide consensus on this first one, so before you call on your Jedi mind tricks or predictive analytics, listen to the voices of a diverse range of admission deans. Peter Hagan, executive director of admissions at Syracuse University, sums it up best, saying, “I would recommend that students try not to get inside of our heads. He adds, “Too often the focus is on what they think we want.”

Andy Strickler, dean of admission and financial aid at Connecticut College agrees, warning, “Do NOT get caught in the trap of trying to figure out what is going to impress the admission committee. You have NO idea who is going to read your essay and what is going to connect with them. So, don't try to guess that.” Victoria Romero, vice president for enrollment, at Scripps College adds, “Do not write about something you don’t care about.” She says, “I think students try to figure out what an admission officer wants to read, and the reality is the reader begins every next essay with no expectations about the content THEY want to read.” Chrystal Russell, dean of admission at Hampden-Sydney College, agrees, saying, “If you're not interested in writing it, we will not be interested when reading it.” Jay Jacobs, vice provost for enrollment management at the University of Vermont elaborates, advising. “Don’t try to make yourself sound any different than you are.” He says, “The number one goal for admission officers is to better understand the applicant, what they like to do, what they want to do, where they spend the majority of their time, and what makes them tick. If a student stays genuine to that, it will shine through and make an engaging and successful essay.”

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Don’t Be Artificial

The headlines about college admission are dominated by stories about artificial intelligence and the college essay. Let’s set some ground rules–to allow ChatGPT or some other tool to do your work is not only unethical, it is also unintelligent. The only worse mistake you could make is to let another human write your essay for you. Instead of preoccupying yourself with whether or not colleges are using AI detection software (most are not), spend your time focused on how best to express yourself authentically. Rick Clark is the executive director of strategic student success at Georgia Institute of Technology, one of the first institutions to clearly outline their AI policy for applicants. He says, “Much of a college application is devoted to lines, boxes, and numbers. Essays and supplements are the one place to establish connection, personality, and distinction. AI, in its current state, is terrible at all three.” He adds, “My hope is that students will use ChatGPT or other tools for brainstorming and to get started, but then move quickly into crafting an essay that will provide insight and value.”

Don’t Overdo It

Michael Stefanowicz, vice president for enrollment management at Landmark College says, “You can only cover so much detail about yourself in an admission essay, and a lot of students feel pressure to tell their life story or choose their most defining experience to date as an essay topic. Admission professionals know that you’re sharing just one part of your lived experience in the essay.” He adds, “Some of the favorite essays I’ve read have been episodic, reflecting on the way you’ve found meaning in a seemingly ordinary experience, advice you’ve lived out, a mistake you’ve learned from, or a special tradition in your life.” Gary Ross, vice president for admission and financial aid at Colgate University adds, “More than a few applicants each year craft essays that talk about the frustration and struggles they have experienced in identifying a topic for their college application essay. Presenting your college application essay as a smorgasbord of topics that ultimately landed on the cutting room floor does not give us much insight into an applicant.”

Don’t Believe In Magic

Jason Nevinger, senior director of admission at the University of Rochester warns, “Be skeptical of anyone or any company telling you, ‘This is the essay that got me into _____.’ There is no magic topic, approach, sentence structure, or prose that got any student into any institution ever.” Social media is littered with advertisements promising strategic essay help. Don’t waste your time, energy, or money trying to emulate a certain style, topic, or tone. Liz Cheron is chief executive officer for the Coalition for College and former assistant vice president of enrollment & dean of admissions at Northeastern University. She agrees with Nevinger, saying “Don't put pressure on yourself to find the perfect, slam dunk topic. The vast majority of college essays do exactly what they're supposed to do–they are well-written and tell the admission officer more about the student in that student's voice–and that can take many different forms.”

Don’t Over Recycle

Beatrice Atkinson-Myers, associate director of global recruitment at the University of California at Santa Cruz tells students, “Do not use the same response for each university; research and craft your essay to match the program at the university you are interested in studying. Don't waste time telling me things I can read elsewhere in your application. Use your essay to give the admissions officer insights into your motivations, interests, and thinking. Don't make your essay the kitchen sink, focus on one or two examples which demonstrate your depth and creativity.” Her UC colleague, Jim Rawlins, associate vice chancellor of enrollment management at the University of California at San Diego agrees, saying “Answer the question. Not doing so is the surest way we can tell you are simply giving us a snippet of something you actually wrote for a different purpose.”

Don’t Overedit

Emily Roper-Doten, vice president for undergraduate admissions and financial assistance at Clark University warns against “Too many editors!” She says, “Pick a couple of trusted folks to be your sounding board when considering topics and as readers once you have drafts. You don’t want too many voices in your essay to drown you out!” Scripps’ Romero agrees, suggesting, “Ask a good friend, someone you trust and knows you well, to read your essays.” She adds, “The goal is for the admission committee to get to know a little about you and who better to help you create that framework, than a good friend. This may not work for all students because of content but helps them understand it’s important to be themselves.” Whitney Soule, vice provost and dean of admissions at The University of Pennsylvania adds, “Avoid well-meaning editorial interference that might seem to polish your writing but actually takes your own personal ‘shine’ right out of the message.” She says, “As readers, we connect to applicants through their genuine tone and style. Considering editorial advice for flow and message is OK but hold on to the 'you' for what you want to say and how you want to say it.”

Don’t Get Showy

Palmer Muntz, senior regional admissions counselor at the University of Alaska Fairbanks cautions applicants, “Don’t be fancier than you are. You don’t need to put on airs.” He adds, “Yes, proofread your work for grammar and spelling, but be natural. Craft something you’d want to read yourself, which probably means keeping your paragraphs short, using familiar words, and writing in an active voice.” Connecticut College’s Strickler agrees, warning, “Don't try to be someone you are not. If you are not funny, don't try to write a funny essay. If you are not an intellectual, trying to write an intellectual essay is a bad idea.”

Anthony Jones, the vice president of enrollment management at Loyola University New Orleans offers a unique metaphor for thinking about the essay. He says, “In the new world of the hyper-fast college admission process, it's become easy to overlook the essential meaning of the college application. It's meant to reveal Y...O...U, the real you, not some phony digital avatar. Think of the essay as the essence of that voice but in analog. Like the completeness and authenticity captured in a vinyl record, the few lines you're given to explain your view should be a slow walk through unrestrained expression chock full of unapologetic nuances, crevices of emotion, and exactness about how you feel in the moment. Then, and only then, can you give the admissions officer an experience that makes them want to tune in and listen for more.”

Don’t Be A Downer

James Nondorf, vice president and dean of admissions and financial aid at The University of Chicago says, “Don’t be negative about other people, be appreciative of those who have supported you, and be excited about who you are and what you will bring to our campus!” He adds, “While admissions offices want smart students for our classrooms, we also want kind-hearted, caring, and joyous students who will add to our campus communities too.”

Don’t Pattern Match

Alan Ramirez is the dean of admission and financial aid at Sewanee, The University of the South. He explains, “A big concern I have is when students find themselves comparing their writing to other students or past applicants and transform their writing to be more like those individuals as a way to better their chances of offering a more-compelling essay.” He emphasizes that the result is that the “essay is no longer authentic nor the best representation of themselves and the whole point of the essay is lost. Their distinctive voice and viewpoint contribute to the range of voices in the incoming class, enhancing the diversity of perspectives we aim to achieve.” Ramirez simple tells students, “Be yourself, that’s what we want to see, plus there's no one else who can do it better than you!”

Don’t Feel Tied To A Topic

Jessica Ricker is the vice president for enrollment and dean of admissions and financial aid at Skidmore College. She says, “Sometimes students feel they must tell a story of grief or hardship, and then end up reliving that during the essay-writing process in ways that are emotionally detrimental. I encourage students to choose a topic they can reflect upon positively but recommend that if they choose a more challenging experience to write about, they avoid belaboring the details and instead focus on the outcome of that journey.” She adds, "They simply need to name it, frame its impact, and then help us as the reader understand how it has shaped their lens on life and their approach moving forward.”

Landmark College’s Stefanowicz adds, “A lot of students worry about how personal to get in sharing a part of their identity like your race or heritage (recalling last year’s Supreme Court case about race-conscious admissions), a learning difference or other disability, your religious values, LGBTQ identity…the list goes on.” He emphasizes, “This is always your choice, and your essay doesn’t have to be about a defining identity. But I encourage you to be fully yourself as you present yourself to colleges—because the college admission process is about finding a school where your whole self is welcome and you find a setting to flourish!”

Don’t Be Redundant

Hillen Grason Jr., dean of admission at Franklin & Marshall College, advises, “Don't repeat academic or co-curricular information that is easily identifiable within other parts of your application unless the topic is a core tenant of you as an individual.” He adds, “Use your essay, and other parts of your application, wisely. Your essay is the best way to convey who your authentic self is to the schools you apply. If you navigated a situation that led to a dip in your grades or co-curricular involvement, leverage the ‘additional information’ section of the application.

Thomas Marr is a regional manager of admissions for the Americas at The University of St Andrews in Scotland and points out that “Not all international schools use the main college essay as part of their assessment when reviewing student applications.” He says, “At the University of St Andrews, we focus on the supplemental essay and students should avoid the mistake of making the supplemental a repeat of their other essay. The supplemental (called the Personal Statement if using the UCAS application process) is to show the extent of their passion and enthusiasm for the subject/s to which they are applying and we expect about 75% of the content to cover this. They can use the remaining space to mention their interests outside of the classroom. Some students confuse passion for the school with passion for their subject; do not fall into that trap.”

A Few Final Don’ts

Don’t delay. Every college applicant I have ever worked with has wished they had started earlier. You can best avoid the pitfalls above if you give yourself the time and space to write a thoughtful essay and welcome feedback openly but cautiously. Don’t put too much pressure on yourself to be perfect . Do your best, share your voice, and stay true to who you are.

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Goal Getting

Setting life goals: the path to fulfillment and success.

Have you ever felt like you’re drifting through life, unsure of where you’re headed or what you’re working towards? If so, you’re not alone. Many of us find ourselves caught up in the day-to-day hustle, losing sight of our bigger aspirations and dreams. But what if there was a way to change that? What if you could chart a course for your life that not only gives you direction but also fills you with purpose and excitement?

Enter the world of goal-setting . It’s more than just a self-help buzzword or a corporate strategy – it’s a powerful tool that can transform your life. By setting clear, meaningful goals, you’re not just planning for the future; you’re actively shaping it. You’re telling yourself and the world, “This is what I want to achieve, and I’m committed to making it happen.”

“The trouble with not having a goal is that you can spend your life running up and down the field and never score.” – Bill Copeland

Table of Contents

A roadmap for your life, measuring progress and personal growth, personal and professional goals, financial and lifestyle goals, the smart framework and beyond, visualization and documentation, accountability and support, the power of small steps, celebrating wins and building resilience, uncovering your core values, the art of goal-value alignment, the power of regular self-assessment, key takeaways, your turn: crafting your goal-setting masterpiece, parting thoughts: your journey awaits, the importance of goal-setting.

But why is goal-setting so important? Well, imagine trying to build a house without a blueprint. You might end up with four walls and a roof, but it probably won’t be the dream home you envisioned. In the same way, setting life goals gives you a blueprint for your future. It provides:

• Focus: Helping you concentrate on what truly matters
• Motivation: Giving you a reason to push forward, even when things get tough
• Direction: Providing a clear path to follow in life’s journey

Goals provide a roadmap for your life. They help you answer the big questions: Where am I going? What do I want to achieve? Without goals, you might find yourself drifting, reacting to life rather than proactively shaping it.

“If you don’t know where you are going, you’ll end up someplace else.” – Yogi Berra

This quote perfectly captures the importance of having a direction in life. Goals give you that direction, helping you make decisions that align with your long-term vision.

One of the most satisfying aspects of goal-setting is the ability to measure your progress. Goals provide benchmarks against which you can assess how far you’ve come. Think of it like a video game. The joy of playing comes not just from the final victory, but from leveling up along the way.

Regular reflection on your goals promotes personal growth. By assessing your progress, you can:

• Identify areas where you’re excelling
• Recognize skills you need to develop
• Adjust your strategies as needed
• Learn from both successes and setbacks

Types of Goals: Crafting a Well-Rounded Life

When it comes to setting goals, one size doesn’t fit all. Just as your life is multifaceted, your goals should span various aspects of your existence. Let’s explore different types of goals you might consider, helping you create a balanced and fulfilling life plan.

Personal goals are all about you – your growth, your happiness, and your well-being. They’re the foundation for everything else in your life. Consider setting goals related to:

• Health and wellness (e.g., regular exercise, improved diet, better sleep)
• Hobbies and self-care (e.g., learning a musical instrument, reading more)
• Personal growth and learning (e.g., learning a new language, taking courses)

Professional goals focus on your career and work life. They can include:

• Career advancement (e.g., earning a promotion, starting a business)
• Skill acquisition (e.g., mastering new software, improving public speaking)
• Networking and professional relationships (e.g., attending industry events, finding a mentor)

Financial goals are crucial for long-term stability and opening up opportunities. Consider goals like:

• Building an emergency fund
• Saving for major purchases or investments
• Managing and reducing debt

Lifestyle goals encompass your relationships and life experiences. These might include:

• Building and maintaining meaningful relationships
• Travel and new experiences
• Personal challenges and milestones (e.g., running a marathon, writing a book)

Remember, you don’t need to set goals in every category right away. Start with areas that resonate most with you or where you feel you need the most improvement. The key is to create a balanced set of goals that reflects your values and aspirations.

Strategies for Goal-Setting: Turning Dreams into Reality

Now that we’ve explored different types of goals, let’s dive into how to set them effectively. The right strategies can turn vague wishes into concrete, achievable objectives.

One of the most popular and effective goal-setting strategies is the SMART framework. SMART is an acronym that stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. This framework helps transform vague intentions into clear, actionable goals.

Let’s break this down with an example. Instead of a vague goal like “I want to get fit,” a SMART goal would be: “I will run a 5K race in under 30 minutes by the end of this year.” This goal is:

• Specific: It clearly states what you want to achieve (run a 5K race)
• Measurable: You can track your running times
• Achievable: Assuming you’re in reasonable health, this is attainable with training
• Relevant: It aligns with a desire for better fitness
• Time-bound: You have a deadline (the end of the year)

Visualization is a powerful tool in goal-setting and achievement. It involves creating a clear, detailed mental image of your desired outcome. Spend time each day visualizing yourself achieving your goals. Make it as vivid as possible: What does success look and feel like? Who is there with you? What emotions are you experiencing?

“If you can dream it, you can do it.” – Walt Disney

This practice not only motivates you but also helps your brain recognize opportunities that align with your goals. Consider creating a vision board as a visual representation of your goals. Place it somewhere you’ll see it daily to keep you focused and motivated.

Writing down your goals is another crucial strategy. There’s something powerful about putting pen to paper. It makes your goals more tangible and increases your commitment to achieving them. When writing your goals, be clear and concise, use positive language, and phrase them in the present tense as if you’re already achieving them. Review your written goals daily to keep them fresh in your mind.

Sharing your goals with others can significantly increase your chances of success. Tell a friend, family member, or mentor about your goals. This makes your commitment more real, provides external motivation, and creates a support system.

Consider finding an accountability partner or joining a group of like-minded individuals. Regular check-ins can help you stay on track, get advice when you’re stuck, and celebrate your progress. Remember, the people you surround yourself with can have a big impact on your success. Choose wisely!

Keeping the Fire Burning: Motivation and Obstacle-Busting

You’ve set your goals, and you’re raring to go. But let’s face it: the path to success is rarely a smooth ride. You’ll hit bumps, face detours, and sometimes feel like you’re running on empty. Don’t sweat it—that’s all part of the journey. Let’s explore some strategies to keep your motivation tank full and navigate around those pesky roadblocks.

Ever heard the saying, “How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time”? The same goes for your goals. Take that big, audacious goal of yours and slice it up:

• Identify your end game
• Map out the major milestones
• Break each milestone into weekly tasks
• Set daily mini-goals

This approach is like a motivation hack: it keeps overwhelm at bay, provides a clear roadmap, and serves up frequent doses of accomplishment. Focus on conquering today’s mini-goal, and before you know it, you’ll be looking back at a mountain of progress.

Celebrating your wins , no matter how small, is crucial for maintaining motivation. Each step forward deserves recognition. It boosts your confidence, reinforces positive behavior, and provides motivation to continue.

“The more you praise and celebrate your life, the more there is in life to celebrate.” – Oprah Winfrey

Building resilience is key to overcoming obstacles. Here are some strategies:

• Reframe setbacks: Instead of “I failed,” try “I found a way that doesn’t work”
• Practice self-compassion: Talk to yourself with kindness and understanding
• Develop a growth mindset: See challenges as opportunities to learn and grow
• Stay flexible: Be willing to adjust your approach if something isn’t working

Remember, every successful person has faced obstacles. It’s not about avoiding challenges, but about how you respond to them.

Aligning Your North Star: Self-Reflection and Goal Harmony

You’ve set your goals, you’re working on staying motivated, but there’s one more crucial piece to this puzzle: making sure your goals truly resonate with who you are and what you value. Let’s dive into the art of self-reflection and goal alignment – it’s like giving your ambitions a compass check to ensure you’re heading in the right direction.

Before you can align your goals, you need to know what you’re aligning them with. Enter: your core values. Here are some exercises to help uncover your values:

• The Desert Island Test: Imagine you’re stranded on a desert island. Besides basic survival needs, what would you miss most?
• The Eulogy Exercise: Imagine what you’d want people to say about you at your funeral. What qualities and achievements would you want them to highlight?
• The Peak Experiences Analysis: Think about the times in your life when you felt most alive and fulfilled. What were you doing? Who were you with? What made these experiences so meaningful?

Your values are like the roots of a tree – they provide stability and nourishment to everything above ground. When your goals align with your values, you’re more likely to feel fulfilled as you pursue them, motivation comes more naturally, and decision-making becomes clearer.

Now that you’ve got a handle on your values, it’s time to see how your goals measure up. Take each of your major goals and ask:

• How does this goal reflect my core values?
• Will achieving this goal bring me closer to living my values?
• If there’s misalignment, how can I adjust the goal to better fit my values?

When your goals and values are in sync, you’ll feel a deeper sense of purpose, the journey becomes as rewarding as the destination, and you’re more resilient in the face of obstacles – your ‘why’ is crystal clear.

Goal-setting isn’t a “set it and forget it” deal. It’s more like tending a garden – it needs regular care and sometimes, a bit of pruning. Schedule regular check-ins with yourself. Maybe it’s monthly, quarterly, or on your birthday. During these sessions:

• Review your goals and progress
• Reflect on how you feel about each goal
• Consider any changes in your life or values
• Adjust your goals as needed

Remember, this isn’t about perfection. It’s about progress and creating a life that feels authentically yours. As you work through this process, be kind to yourself. You’re doing the deep work that many people never attempt.

The Grand Finale: Your Roadmap to a Life Well-Lived

We’ve explored the nooks and crannies of goal-setting, from understanding why it matters to aligning our ambitions with our deepest values. Now, it’s time to tie it all together and send you off with a roadmap for your own goal-setting adventure.

• Goals are your life’s GPS: They give you direction, purpose, and a way to measure your progress.
• Variety is the spice of life… and goals: A well-rounded life needs a well-rounded set of goals.
• SMART goals are, well, smart: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound goals are your best bet for success.
• Visualization and writing help: See your success in your mind’s eye and put it down on paper.
• Accountability is your secret weapon: Sharing your goals can give you the extra push you need.
• Break it down to build it up: Tackling your goals in small, manageable chunks keeps overwhelm at bay.
• Celebrate the small stuff: Every step forward deserves recognition.
• Resilience is your superpower: Setbacks are just setups for comebacks.
• Align for the win: When your goals match your values, you’re unstoppable.

Now, it’s time for you to take the reins. Here’s a step-by-step guide to kickstart your goal-setting journey:

• Dream big: Set aside time to imagine what you want your life to look like in 1 year, 5 years, and 10 years.
• Get SMART: Transform your dreams into SMART goals.
• Write it out: Put your goals down in vivid detail.
• Break it down: Identify the first three steps for each goal.
• Find your cheerleaders: Share your goals with supportive people.
• Schedule check-ins: Set reminders for regular self-assessment.
• Create a vision board: Make a visual representation of your goals.
• Start now: Choose one small action you can take today towards one of your goals.

As we wrap up, remember this: goal-setting isn’t about creating a rigid, unchangeable future. It’s about giving yourself a direction, a purpose, and a way to grow. Your goals will evolve as you do, and that’s not just okay – it’s fantastic. It means you’re learning, adapting, and becoming more YOU.

There will be days when you feel like you’re conquering the world, and days when you wonder why you started this journey in the first place. Both are normal, both are valuable, and both are part of the beautiful mess we call personal growth.

So, as you step out into your goal-setting adventure, keep this in mind: you’ve got this. You have the tools, you have the knowledge, and most importantly, you have the power to shape your life into something extraordinary.

Now, go out there and start turning those dreams into goals, and those goals into reality. Your future self is cheering you on, and so are we. Here’s to your success, your growth, and the amazing journey ahead.

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Guest Essay

ChatGPT vs. Me: Who Will Write a Better Beach Read?

By Curtis Sittenfeld

Ms. Sittenfeld is the author of the novel “Romantic Comedy” and the forthcoming story collection “Show Don’t Tell.”

What makes a beach read a beach read? Is it an escapist subject matter? A frothy tone? Or is any book you read on a beach automatically a beach read?

I’m the author of seven novels and one short-story collection, and I have no idea what the answer is to these questions. But in an attempt to figure them out, I’ve agreed to participate in an experiment, and I hope you’ll join me.

I’ve put together a list of some of my favorite elements of summer, along with other topics I like to write about. Please vote on which items you would most want included in a summery short story — your ideal beach read — and submit your own suggestion, too. I’ll then write a story that includes the top three vote getters and two elements I choose from readers. And because it’s 2024 and life is now weird all the time, so will ChatGPT. Which will help us answer another pressing question: What’s the difference between human and machine writing?

Both stories will be the same length (1,000 words), and both will incorporate the same five prompts. ChatGPT, which will be told to write in my style, will complete its story in a few seconds; I’ll complete mine in a few weeks.

I’m curious about whether, in its current iteration, ChatGPT can write fiction I’d want to read or aspire to write. Can it write like me specifically? What does writing like me even mean? I’m one of the many fiction writers whose novels were used, without my permission and without compensation, to train ChatGPT. (I confess that I was offended in one way that five of my books were used and offended in a different way that two of them — the two that sold the least and received the worst reviews — weren’t.) Groups of fiction writers have sued OpenAI, which developed ChatGPT, for copyright infringement. The New York Times has sued Microsoft and OpenAI over the use of copyrighted work.

So it may go without saying that in this contest, I’m rooting for myself; I’m Team Human, and I’m hoping to honorably defend my species. But as with the steel-driving John Henry and the chess-playing Garry Kasparov before me, the outcome is unknown in advance. Maybe fiction writers’ jobs are in danger, or maybe there’s some ineffable quality, similar to the transcendent quality of a beach read, that still separates a story told by a person from a story told by a computer.

Beach Read Ingredients (Take Your Pick):

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Why I Write Movies

A few words on screenwriting from Robert Towne, author of Chinatown and Shampoo , script doctor on Bonnie & Clyde and The Godfather .

Several years ago my five-year-old daughter bounced into my study and found me hunched and miserable over my typewriter, feeling like a housewife who couldn’t get her stove to boil water. Kate wanted to know why I wouldn’t play with her. “Because I’m stuck.” She wanted to know why I was stuck. “Because it’s hard.” She thought about this for a minute and said, “Then why do it, Dad? Why don’t you cease this activity and become an artist?”

By artist she meant painter, of course, but despite its surprising diction, her question was not an unfamiliar one. It was, in fact, a question I’d heard posed all my life, and not just to me. Writers in every generation since screenplays went off the cuff of the director and onto paper have been asked to respond to it. Generally they have done so with wit, shame, and cynicism—the wisdom of wags and writers from Anita Loos and Ben Hecht to Fitzgerald and Parker has been distilled and codified into Woody Allen’s phrase about screenwriting: Take the money and run. Write the great American novel, the Pulitzer Prize-winning play, live well, and don’t take screenwriting too seriously. Like parking-lot attendants and waiters in Los Angeles, do it on the way to being an actor or a grown-up or an artist, do it as a means to an end—but never as an end in itself. This is a continuing attitude about screenwriting. As Vincent Canby observed not long ago, “I can’t imagine why any person who took himself seriously as an artist would pursue it for more than five minutes.”

.css-f6drgc:before{margin:-0.99rem auto 0 -1.33rem;left:50%;width:2.1875rem;border:0.3125rem solid #FF3A30;height:2.1875rem;content:'';display:block;position:absolute;border-radius:100%;} .css-bugj92{margin:0rem;font-size:1.625rem;line-height:1.2;font-family:Lausanne,Lausanne-fallback,Lausanne-roboto,Lausanne-local,Arial,sans-serif;}@media(max-width: 48rem){.css-bugj92{font-size:1.75rem;line-height:1.2;}}@media(min-width: 64rem){.css-bugj92{font-size:2.375rem;line-height:1.2;}}.css-bugj92 em,.css-bugj92 i{font-style:italic;font-family:inherit;}.css-bugj92 b,.css-bugj92 strong{font-family:inherit;font-weight:bold;}.css-bugj92:before{content:'＂';display:block;padding:0.3125rem 0.875rem 0 0;font-size:3.5rem;line-height:0.8;font-style:italic;font-family:Lausanne,Lausanne-fallback,Lausanne-styleitalic-roboto,Lausanne-styleitalic-local,Arial,sans-serif;} I think movies best communicate whatever I have to say and show; or to put it another way, when what you want to show is what you have to say, you are pretty much stuck with movies as a way of saying it.

There is only one other thing I can recall being treated with anything like the amusement and contempt and condescension reserved for screenwriters—and that is the city of Los Angeles itself. Since I can remember, it’s been called crass, cultish, “the nowhere city,” full of vegetation and people and architecture from any- and everywhere else on earth. Some called it “southern cafeteria” because of the proliferation of eating establishments where the old and the odd and the ill would sit tray-by-tray, spooning their Waldorf salads and dreaming about the future they had come to seek. No one, I suppose, embodied the spirit of contempt and frustration and loathing about Los Angeles more dramatically than Nathanael West. In him, love and hate for Los Angeles collided and finally died in a head-on traffic accident at Sunset and Sepulveda—or so I had been brought up to believe. (Actually, West died on the highway in El Centro, just north of Tijuana, purportedly in a hurry to make it to L.A. in time for his buddy Scott Fitzgerald’s funeral.) Whether it’s Nathanael West or David Susskind or Woody Allen, the varying skills of the observer notwithstanding, the observation is likely to be the same: The only good thing about Los Angeles is that you can turn right on red (but not always, and particularly not at Sunset and Sepulveda).

This confluence of opinion about Los Angeles and screenwriting—bogus representations of life and literature, respectively—is something I remember vividly about growing up in that city. The Santa Anas brought hot air from the desert, ocean breezes brought cold air from the Pacific, and the prevailing wind from the east brought the same message over and over: I lived in a world that was, if possible, phonier than the movies it produced.

Even as a child—especially as a child—this name-calling bothered me. I knew that the fishermen I would watch going out to sea in San Pedro were not phony. Their beards would scratch your face, there was red wine on their breath, and they made you feel safe when they lifted you off the boat and onto the docks before they cast off into the open sea. They were very real.

The only good thing about Los Angeles is that you can turn right on red (but not always, and particularly not at Sunset and Sepulveda).

At the same time, certain things in the movies I watched while growing up began to strike me as increasingly unreal. For instance: I’d never been to New York, but I found it unlikely that you could pull up in front of the Waldorf-Astoria at any hour of the day or night and find a parking space; I would get faintly indignant that no one waited for change when they paid a check in a restaurant; I found it hard to swallow that every married couple slept in twin beds, that the husband always wore pajamas and the wife always woke up without her lipstick smeared; I knew it was a flat-out lie when the movie was set in Los Angeles and the men wore hats and overcoats. This misrepresentation of native dress was a serious violation of reality. It rankled me the way James Fenimore Cooper’s Indians rankled Mark Twain—when six of them jump out of a sapling barely six feet tall and somehow miss a barge 150 feet long passing beneath them at less than one mile an hour. Moreover, these hats in L.A. weren’t merely noted on the printed page; they were being shown on a huge screen, the offending item much larger than life. I’m sure I figured somewhere back then that sooner or later, when I grew up, I would try to do it differently. I’d make it “real.” Particularly because I grew up in a place outsiders claimed was unreal, and because I looked at representations of that world onscreen that I thought were unreal, I suppose I saw movies as a way of redressing a wrong. I would use one illusion—movies—in order to make another illusion—Los Angeles—real.

But then why not address and redress these views of Los Angeles through novels and plays? Why choose screenwriting, so often spoken of as a collaborative business? In this context, collaboration is akin to what happened in occupied France, and business means that you sell whatever writing skills you have for whatever money you can get.

I guess it’s like I said to my daughter, I really am stuck....There are no novels or plays I’m itching to write and there never have been. I love movies. I think movies best communicate whatever I have to say and show; or to put it another way, when what you want to show is what you have to say, you are pretty much stuck with movies as a way of saying it.

Consider this: In Lawrence of Arabia , Lawrence, in flowing white robes, sits on a truck in the middle of the desert giving a press conference. He’s ten feet tall on the screen and overwhelmingly immaculate. He faces a grimy-looking reporter who scratches his beard and asks snidely, “Just what is it, Colonel Lawrence, that attracts you to the desert?” Lawrence glances distastefully at the dirty reporter and offers a three-word reply: “Because it’s clean.” It is not the text but the context that gives this reply its full force. Those three words in a novel or even on the stage would be mildly amusing at best, but on the screen the effect is as overwhelming as the figure of Lawrence and the desert looming behind him. Those three words are the scene. There is no speech, long or short, about Lawrence’s need to seek remote places of the earth in order to avoid the corruption inevitably found in its more populated areas. Only a clean man, a dirty reporter, a big desert, and three little words—“Because it’s clean.”

It’s a movie. What else do you need?

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Tips on Detecting & Improving AI-generated Text

As generative AI tools become increasingly sophisticated and widely used, the ability to distinguish between AI-generated and human-written text has become a hot topic. While AI can be an incredibly powerful tool for writing and research, it’s important to understand its strengths, limitations, and potential “tells” that may indicate its use. Below are some tips for detecting AI-generated text and, more importantly, how to improve and personalize AI-assisted writing to make it truly your own.

Last week’s Inside Higher Ed offers tips on how to distinguish AI-generated text from human-written text.  The author, a literature professor, generated 50+ essays with AI and compared them to characteristics she had come to expect from text written by humans.  Her findings are in bold below, supplemented by my own experience.

• AI-generated essays are often confidently wrong.

Oh yes, I’ve found the confidence thing to be absolutely true.  Generative AI is like the world’s biggest people pleaser.  It tells you what it thinks you want to hear and goes all in on its response. But it’s worth noting that many times, it’s confidently right .  So here’s my first tip, and it’s a big one: It’s up to you as the user to do your due diligence in vetting the response.

• AI essays tend to get straight to the point and AI-generated essays are often list-like

Yeah, these two can be AI “tells,” but they also point to one of the major strengths of generative AI:  organization of ideas.  I frequently use AI to refine my own writing to help me order my thoughts and cut to the chase.

Sometimes it organizes its responses into lists.  So, here’s my 2nd tip – and it’s a theme I’ll be repeating throughout:  if you don’t want a list, then ask it to put it in narrative or some other format.  Generative AI is really good at following directions so tell it exactly what you want.

• AI-generated work is often banal,  AI-generated essays are often repetitive, the paragraphs of AI-generated essays also often begin with formulaic transitional phrases , and AI-generated text tends to remain in the third person

Yes, I’ve seen all these things in AI-generated writing.  Out-of-the-box, it can be formulaic and fairly bland.  But I’ve also seen it generate some really wild and creative stuff when I’ve asked it to do so.

So, I’m going to repeat my 2nd tip: If you don’t want it to be banal, repetitive, formulaic, or in the third person, then tell it that.  Be descriptive enough in your prompts to direct it to do what you want.  Tell it who you are, who your reader is, and what tone you’re looking for.  Think of the responses it provides as suggestions for you to take or leave.  In exchanges with AI, I’ll often say something like, “No, I don’t like that.  Try this instead.”  Or “Yes, that’s what I was thinking of.  Give me more of that.”

And remember that 1st tip again: AI may have helped you or even fully generated the text, but if you’re putting that text out into the world, you better make sure that you’re comfortable and confident having your name on it.  Always vet the content.

• AI-produced text tends to discuss “readers” being “challenged” to “confront” ideologies or being “invited” to “reflect” on key topics

Yeah, using flowery, sophisticated-sounding words is something I’ve observed.  In fact, there’s a new study from Cornell that explores “excess word usage” as a way to detect generative AI use in academic texts.  The authors examined abstracts in PubMed from 2010-24 and found that there was an “unprecedented increase in excess style words” in recent scholarship which they attribute to ChatGPT usage.

Per the article, the following real 2023 abstracts illustrate this ChatGPT-style flowery excess language:

By meticulously delving into the intricate web connecting […] and […], this comprehensive chapter takes a deep dive into their involvement as significant risk factors for […]. A comprehensive grasp of the intricate interplay between […] and […] is pivotal for effective therapeutic strategies. Initially, we delve into the intricacies of […], accentuating its indispensability in cellular physiology, the enzymatic labyrinth governing its flux, and the pivotal […] mechanisms.

So, going back to tip 2, if you don’t want it to use these types of flowery, sophisticated-sounding excess words, then prompt it to put it in another tone.  You’d be amazed at the many different tones and voices it can give you, such as 1st-year law student, new associate, or experienced attorney.  You can also ask it to put it in the tone of a specific Supreme Court Justice or well-known author.  Whether this raises IP issues is another ball of wax.

I recommend reading the full Inside Higher Ed article for further discussion of each point.

As someone who uses AI almost every day and teaches law students about the ethical and effective use of generative AI, I believe it’s valuable to be aware of these potential “tells” while also recognizing their limitations. While there are indeed characteristics that may hint at AI-generated content, it’s important to remember that they are not foolproof indicators.

The key is not to focus solely on detection, but rather on how to use AI effectively and ethically as a writing tool. By providing clear, specific prompts and actively refining AI-generated content, we can use the power of AI while maintaining our unique voice and ensuring the final product reflects our own thoughts and insights. This approach transforms AI from a potential shortcut into a valuable writing assistant, much like spell-check or grammar tools.

Remember, the goal is not to outsource our thinking to AI, but to use it as a tool to enhance our own abilities and productivity. As we continue to explore the possibilities and challenges of AI in research and writing, I encourage you to experiment with these tools responsibly and always prioritize your own critical thinking and analysis.

And by way of full disclosure: I used Claude.AI to help me organize my ideas and suggest phrasing for this post.  Can you tell?

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Writing a Paper: Why Set a Writing Goal

Why set a writing goal.

Before jumping into to setting a writing goal, consider why setting a clear writing goal is important. Establishing goals is a common practice within professional and educational communities; however, setting writing-specific goals can have their own unique benefits.

Writing goals help you to:

• articulate connections between current writing projects and broader professional skills.   When writing a paper, it is hard to see the impact of that project beyond its immediate grade or completion. By setting clear writing goals, you can identify what core competencies you would like to possess and start to make progress toward developing those skills as a writer, scholar, and professional.  
• overcome reservations and build confidence about your writing abilities.   Perhaps you have received writing feedback in the past and are doubting your abilities. Writing goals can help you face those concerns head on and discover newfound confidence as you conquer those writing anxieties one by one. In other words, setting strong writing goals encourages you to imagine what type of writer you want to be and what skills are needed to make that identity a reality.  
• establish a manageable path to success.   Writing goals are more than objectives you hope to achieve; they are a road map to your writing success. Writing goals break down the abstract process of becoming a stronger writer into smaller, more tangible steps. You identify specific skills you want to enhance and then map out projects and resources to help you along the way. However, you don’t have to work toward these goals alone. Make a paper review appointment with our writing instructors to receive individualized feedback on your goal progress. Students who made three or more writing appointments per term showed statistically significant gains in grades, persistence, and retention (Irvin, 2014) as well as motivation (Robinson, as cited in Irvin, 2014). Set up a paper review appointment today! Set up a paper review appointment today .  
• develop motivation and reinforce focus.   Writing is a process that takes practice and patience. It is easy to lose focus as you get deeper into a writing project or course work. For many, writing goals become sources of inspiration. They offer motivation to get started and keep writing as well as reinforce your purpose when your energy is low or you start to veer off track. They serve as little reminders of why your writing project matters and how it positively impacts your future.  
• build self-efficacy as a scholarly writer and professional.   Part of becoming a stronger writer is the ability to assess your own writing. It can be difficult to step away from the research of your current project and consider how your presentation of information impacts readers. However, when you set clear writing goals and track your progress, you cultivate an awareness of how to evaluate your writing. This self-efficacy will prove invaluable as you progress to larger, more independent projects, including your program’s capstone.  
• create opportunities to celebrate success.   Often overlooked in the writing process is the importance of celebrating your progress and success. Rarely in writing do we experience an overnight transformation of our skills as writers. Writing more often is characterized as a process filled with small victories and progressions. Setting a writing goal creates the means for tracking these accomplishments. So why not establish a writing goal? You deserve to celebrate your success!  

Irwin, L. L. (2014). What a difference three tutoring sessions make: Early reports of efficacy from a young writing center. Writing Lab Newsletter, 39 (1–2), 1–5. https://wlnjournal.org/archives/v39/39.1-2.pdf

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