Reaching Goals

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By Bruce Campbell

(From the series What Works for Managing ME/CFS and Fibromyalgia)

A simple technique for achieving goals is target setting, which involves translating general goals into specific, doable steps. This article will show you how.

Sample Targets

This technique is remarkably flexible; you can make a target in practically any area of your life. Here are some samples from people in our classes.

Rest every day for 20 minutes in the morning and in the afternoon
Taking scheduled rests is one of the most common and successful targets used by people in our groups.

Go to bed by 10 pm
People often set sleep-related targets. This target is something under a person's control, and thus preferable to making a target of falling asleep by a certain time.

Get off computer after 30 minutes
This is a target that involves setting an activity limit. Targets can be used to help you not do something.

Find a nanny to help with child care
The mother in this family and her daughter both have ME/CFS. The mother thought that by having someone come in several times a week, her daughter would have more companionship and the mother could have some free time.

Talk to my wife about our relationship
The man who set this target was troubled by all the changes brought to his marriage by his illness. He was worried about the extra responsibilities imposed on his wife and wondered how they could handle all the uncertainty created by his ME/CFS.

Recognizing that it can be difficult to talk about these things, he made a commitment to his group to have a conversation with his wife about their marriage.

Read a book for pleasure
This target was used by someone who thought that the demands of family and illness had squeezed all the pleasure out of her life. It may seem paradoxical to schedule pleasure, but it worked.

Targets: Specific & Concrete Plans

The key to a successful target is to translate a general goal into specific, concrete plans. For example, if your goal is to reduce your symptoms, you might you might set one of the following targets:

• rest regularly every day
• set limits on how long you are active
• get to bed by a certain hour
• keep records to help you see the connections between what you do and your symptoms

The idea is to commit yourself to doing something specific that will move you toward your goal. The target you set for yourself should be concrete and measurable. Rather than having a vague intent like "I want to rest more," you should state specific actions that are under your control.

For example, you might say you will rest 15 minutes twice a day (late morning and late afternoon) four days in the next week. Your plan should answer the following four questions:

1. What will you do?
2. How much will you do?
3. When will you do it? and
4. How often?

(Some of the sample targets given above were simplified, but could easily be altered to answer the four questions.)

The rest target answers all the questions:
 

Targets Are Realistic

Your target should be something that you are confident you can do in the near future, typically during the next week. To judge whether your target is realistic, rate you confidence about completing the target on a scale of 0 to 10, where 0 means "not at all confident" and 10 means "totally confident." If the answer is 8 or higher, you are likely to succeed.

If your confidence level is lower, try stating your goal in less ambitious terms. You might reduce the number of times per week. For example, aim to do something 4 or 5 times a week rather than every day. Or reduce the length of time you do something, say from half an hour to fifteen minutes. One purpose of using targets is to build confidence through success.

Learning from Failure

Sometimes we fail to complete the target as planned. Perhaps we were too ambitious or something came up which prevented us from doing what we hoped to do. The wonderful lesson I have learned from such experiences is that I can gain something valuable from not meeting my target, because failure often leads to useful insights.

I have come to view target setting as a series of experiments. Each experience gives me information. If I meet my target, I gain some control over my illness. But I usually learn something even if my results differ from my expectations. By asking myself what lessons I can learn, I can have a positive experience regardless of the outcome.

Getting Started

Now it's your turn. Think of a problem that bothers you. Pick just one; you don't have to fix everything at once. Commit to making a start today. Then brainstorm several things you could do that might help alleviate your problem. After reviewing them, pick one to try in the next week and write your target on a piece of paper.

For a form you can print, see the Target Form on the Logs, Forms and Worksheets page. Your target could be about something you plan to do or about rest or sleep or some other area of your life, whatever you think would be helpful to you at this time.
 

Whatever it is, make your target specific like the examples given earlier. Once you've stated your target, ask yourself how confident you are that you can complete the target successfully. Give your confidence a number between 0 (no confidence) and 10 (totally confident). If your confidence level is less than 8, restate your goal in less ambitious terms. Once you have a target about which you feel confident, you're ready to go

Give your target a try for a week, then look at the results. If you met your target, congratulate yourself. If you didn't, ask what you can learn from the experience.