How to Create a Goal Setting Journal

Many times in life, the prospect of making an important decision can feel overwhelming. There can seem to be a million different options for what to do, where to live, and who to befriend.

“Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom,” Soren Kierkegaard once wrote, and he was right! When the freedom of options becomes crippling, we need to have ways to overcome our stress and process our choices productively.

Enter journaling—specifically, goal setting journals. These are a great way to brainstorm your options, desires, responsibilities, personal strengths, creative ideas, and more.

Below, this blog post explains three parts every effective goal setting journal should have. To start, you’ll want to divide your journal into three sections:

Gratitude lists
Goal planning
Simple to-do lists

By including each of these in your journal, you can get a clearer picture of how to go about meeting your goals.

Goal Setting Journal Section 1: Gratitude

We’ve all heard them. The quotes about the power of gratitude. The calls from celebrities to make a thankfulness list. The reminders from friends to count your blessings so you’ll be happier. We might roll our eyes at them.

But you know what? A thankfulness list really works! William Arthur Ward once famously said, “Gratitude can transform common days into thanksgivings, turn routine jobs into joy, and change ordinary opportunities into blessings.”

Many of us want to feel more thankful, more often. Certainly all of us want to feel happier. Yet these things don’t always happen automatically, and that’s alright! Training our minds to feel gratitude requires work. It is an intentional practice.

Cultivating gratitude beneficially resets our perspective as we think about the future. We can see where our abundance lies and where to set our priorities. It has to be the first step in our goal planning journal because it lays the groundwork for a positive mindset going forward.

How to Write a Gratitude Journal Entry

Start the first section of your goal setting journal by writing a list of, say, 30-50 things you’re currently grateful for, big or small. That may sound like a lot, but push yourself! With a little effort, you’ll realize that doesn’t even scratch the surface of things to be grateful for. Then you can continue this section by writing a few things you’re thankful for each day. Here are a few tips for gratitude journaling:

Don’t feel the need to rewrite the same things. Even if you are thankful for your family every day, you are not compelled to write it out daily. Once you’ve written it once, it’s there to stay.
Don’t forget personal growth. Keeping track of personal growth shows your future self how you’ve worked on your weaknesses, as well as where your strengths lie. It also reduces anxiety about challenges you have yet to face. And it reminds you how certain blessings outside of yourself shaped you and allowed you to grow, like a mentor’s wise advice or moving into a healthy living space with a supportive roommate.
Be grateful for any support system. Maybe you realize that you are especially thankful for nature when work gets busy. Maybe you remember that specific friend who knows just how to see you through a particular difficulty.

Review your list every so often. A long list is powerful to see. It’s moving to watch the list of blessings in your life grow from page to page. Gratitude can reshape your perspective on many a day when the future seems overwhelming. This long list is an excellent reminder that the past has had its positives, and there will be more good things to come!

Goal Setting Journal Section 2: Goal Planning

With your gratitude mindset in place, it’s time to dream, both big and small. This section is where you’ll get specific about your goals.

Anyone can profit from journaling about goals. We all have near-term goals, like to get into grad school or join a running club, but it’s often nice to see these in combination with long-term goals like “become a college professor” or “become a Cezanne expert.”

Goal planning is especially great for thinking about the big picture. It can also be taken a few different directions. Let’s look at the possibilities for this process.

Start at the Beginning

To start this part of your goal setting journal, write something to the effect of “My Goals” at the top of its first page.

Next, write out all of your goals, each on a separate page. Order by top to lowest priority for your preferred time frame—we’d recommend this year or the next six months, but if you want to be really specific, you could even do within the next month. Then, underneath each goal, list any and every step that needs to happen for you to achieve it.

For instance, your goal might be, “Have my first art show.” Maybe you include a specific dream location: “in the gallery on 2nd Street.” Next, jot down any preliminary step that comes to mind: “Make 10 more pieces of art. Send email to an Aunt with connections to gallery owners. Make art website.”

You may realize there are steps within steps! Don’t worry, just jot down those too. Maybe to make an art website, you need to “Take photos of art,” “Write artist bio,” and “Contact Peter for help with building the site.” Keep going—you’ve got this! Once you have it all written down, you will be able to plug away little by little. It’ll feel good to have a clear vision of your steps and know that you are making progress toward your goal!

Here, we’ve written this part out as a template:

A Short Goal Planning Template

NAME YOUR GOAL HERE

Write your first step (or any early step) here…
1. Sub-step 1
2. Sub-step 2
…And another step here (they don’t have to be in order)…
Etc.…

Goal Setting Journal Step 3: To-Do Lists

With your mindset and goals on paper, the next step is to set up the steps to move toward your goals.

Do you ever write up a grand to-do list, only to realize that by the end of the day, you’ve checked off just one, or maybe two, of your items? The next day rolls around and you make another list; pretty soon you’ve got multiple lists floating around.

Give yourself one central place to write your to-do lists so that you can clearly see what you have accomplished and what still needs to be done. Create a few mastermind to-do lists to help push you toward your goals.

Here are a few tips for the To-Do List portion of your journal:

Categorize your To-Do Lists.

For example, write a list of “Job Search Tasks.” Who should you call? What websites to peruse? Think of versions of your resume to create, and networking calls to make.
Make one for “Around The House”—hanging some pictures, washing the windows, or replacing the furnace filter.
Have another for “Fun Activities,” i.e., go to Monticello, play tennis with Drew, get drinks with the girls, explore the riverfront, etc.
“Appointments To Schedule” is another great one to have on there, especially when doctor and dentist visits become supplemented by haircuts, counselor visits and physical therapy, oil changes for your car and more.

Refresh your Lists Weekly.

At the end of each week, look back on your To-Do lists and make note of anything that didn’t get done. Instead of rewriting every incomplete item from the day before, this will give you a buffer period to catch up on those items without losing track of them.
This will help you start each week with a clear vision of your tasks for the week.

Celebrate all that you accomplished.

Take a moment to flip through your lists from the week and remind yourself of the wins of each day. It can be easy to feel as though we did not accomplish “anything” this day or this week. By jotting down your to-dos in one location, you’ll easily be able to change that narrative to one of success.

Keep Yourself Moving Forward

These three types of journaling “lists” can bring structure and hope to your planning process. The future holds many great opportunities. There’s not always certainty in the road ahead, but thinking, planning and journaling can help you walk ahead confidently.

Step into your future using these three easy journaling tasks and know that you are investing in your future self! Check out our full-grain leather journals to get started.