People should look up 'SMART' goals. Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time-Related. I think the time-related part speaks to this article where in someone's career they might set an attainable goal every quarter.
Disclaimer: I hope I didn't somehow misunderstand the purpose of the original blog post. Also, don't look at my chess rating. I never had reasonable plans for my chess other than "I'll do a bunch of tactics to improve a bit". My experience with goals is from other areas.
First, we need to understand what setting a long-term goal actually means. If we don't understand that, we will obviously have to go for the short-term ones.
Besides that, a short-term goal is probably almost always a part of a long-term one. You obviously have some kind of a vague long-term goal if you are willing to set short-term ones. Why would you bother setting anything up otherwise? Then, once you understand that you're not just randomly doing stuff, why not set up a long-term goal with something a bit more specific in mind?
If you set up (for instance) a five-year plan for yourself, it's something attainable, and if you really want to achieve it, the plan will help. If it doesn't work exactly the way you imagined it, it will still guide you on far better than something like "I'll do this for a couple of weeks and do other stuff then if I feel like it".
Also, when it comes to attracting media attention, calling something malarkey...
First, we need to understand what setting a long-term goal actually means. If we don't understand that, we will obviously have to go for the short-term ones.
Besides that, a short-term goal is probably almost always a part of a long-term one. You obviously have some kind of a vague long-term goal if you are willing to set short-term ones. Why would you bother setting anything up otherwise? Then, once you understand that you're not just randomly doing stuff, why not set up a long-term goal with something a bit more specific in mind?
If you set up (for instance) a five-year plan for yourself, it's something attainable, and if you really want to achieve it, the plan will help. If it doesn't work exactly the way you imagined it, it will still guide you on far better than something like "I'll do this for a couple of weeks and do other stuff then if I feel like it".
Also, when it comes to attracting media attention, calling something malarkey...
@Medavas said in #2:
> People should look up 'SMART' goals. Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time-Related. I think the time-related part speaks to this article where in someone's career they might set an attainable goal every quarter.
Especially critical here are:
- Attainable
- Relevant
A "long-term goal" is the opposite of a smart goal.
> People should look up 'SMART' goals. Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time-Related. I think the time-related part speaks to this article where in someone's career they might set an attainable goal every quarter.
Especially critical here are:
- Attainable
- Relevant
A "long-term goal" is the opposite of a smart goal.
Yeah right. Simple as that. What if it turns out later that even short-term goals are so stupid that we shouldn't have any? This post of yours would look almost as silly as those about long-term goals, then.
In fact, I think I'll cut straight to the chase myself: all goals are malarkey.
Other than that, I would love to have some GM:s tell us if they became GM:s or even FM:s without long-term goals. Anyone?
If nobody takes that up, I can point you to Jon Tisdall (author of Improve your chess now) who did set up a long-term goal for himself and became a Grandmaster.
Synthesis: one Grandmaster at least has succeeded by following the completely pointless idea of a long-term goal.
(I suppose he said "Alea Jacta Est" when he began and "Veni, Vidi, Vici" when he was done. Then he looked back and realized it had all been malarkey, but he could still be happy about being a Grandmaster.)
In fact, I think I'll cut straight to the chase myself: all goals are malarkey.
Other than that, I would love to have some GM:s tell us if they became GM:s or even FM:s without long-term goals. Anyone?
If nobody takes that up, I can point you to Jon Tisdall (author of Improve your chess now) who did set up a long-term goal for himself and became a Grandmaster.
Synthesis: one Grandmaster at least has succeeded by following the completely pointless idea of a long-term goal.
(I suppose he said "Alea Jacta Est" when he began and "Veni, Vidi, Vici" when he was done. Then he looked back and realized it had all been malarkey, but he could still be happy about being a Grandmaster.)