Ask HN: How do you organize/track your personal goals? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize/track your personal goals?

#111

Post by egypturnash » Tue, Jul 24, 2018, 7:05 AM UTC

monch wrote: post #97

egypturnash wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want to take a mystical angle on it, start reading stuff about one's True Will.

Sounds interesting, can you point me to a little more?

I’m too lazy to do more than drop you in at the deep end: http://www.thelemapedia.org/index.php/True_Will

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize/track your personal goals?

#112

Post by lcall » Tue, Jul 24, 2018, 7:06 PM UTC

I have found it more effective personally to focus more on priorities and habits than SMART goals. To track habits and progress and notes on everything, I heavily use a tool I've mentioned before, which I wrote (after trying org-mode, collapsible outlines in other tools, etc). It uses postgres, and I hope that "sharing" data exchange features are coming (though it already does export to org-mode-like text, and to html). Best code is that in github, though a downloadable .jar is available. Currently keyboard and desktop-only (text-oriented). The most efficient/effective thing I have found for notes/lists/details of all kinds, and should be easy to learn to use, as all the essentials are on the screen. There is a tutorial.

By marking things done or "archived", it also provides a journal feature or personal log, of entries created or archived in any date range (defaulting to "yesterday and so far, today", to help with daily standup reporting).

http://onemodel.org (AGPL)

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize/track your personal goals?

#113

Post by m0llusk » Tue, Jul 24, 2018, 8:12 PM UTC

Peter Drucker style Life List, which oddly enough I fell into doing well before I read any related Drucker material.

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize/track your personal goals?

#114

Post by copperx » Tue, Jul 24, 2018, 8:51 PM UTC

With Beeminder. This is the best application that I've ever use to track and nudge me into incrementally working towards my goals.

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize/track your personal goals?

#115

Post by therealdrag0 » Wed, Jul 25, 2018, 12:10 AM UTC

Plug: I wrote an app to do this in a minimalist way. It's called Casual Planner (https://itunes.apple.com/US/app/id1320558091?mt=8) It has repeating events, and goals for "soon" and "sometime".

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize/track your personal goals?

#116

Post by 9diov » Sat, Jul 28, 2018, 5:12 PM UTC

ihodes wrote: post #40

bergerjac wrote: post #39

On paper. Physically writing stimulates neurology. This then gets embedded into the subconscious. --- And some tidbits on goalsetting which I'd have liked 15 years ago... Goals are - SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Results-oriented, Time-bound) - written in present tense. - stated in the positive. - attached to an identity, or 'self-image'. - expansive. "I will own 30 apartments" (future tense) -> "I own 30…

Might be of interest to you https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/when-smart-goals-are-not...

I think the problem is that the definition of goals is too vague and narrow causing the problem with using SMART system. I believe you need a hierarchy of goals, like so:

- Mission: This could be specific like "bring humans to Mars" or it could be vague like "accelerate space exploration".

- Strategy: This should be the principles and methods used to implement the mission. Example: "Starting up a private company that works on rocket technology. Sell electric cars on the side to make money."

- Roadmap: This should be actionable, measurable and time-based such as "build a reusable rocket by 2016"

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize/track your personal goals?

#117

Post by apicardami » Sat, Jul 28, 2018, 9:02 PM UTC

Over the past few years I've tried: - Checklists, OKRs, Kanban

Currently, I use a goal system with 3 components: (1) long-form essay writing to explore goals, desires, interests. I then capture this into a Google doc for the year and make it the Backlog. (2) Google spreadsheet for logging, tracking and measuring progress. (3) Periodic Reviews and retrospectives in the form of blogposts.

Here's the Goal System Tracker: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1U0ufWHqntVcz89nebyRt...

Here are the Blog Posts (Reviews & Retrospectives) https://apicardami.com/category/goals/

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize/track your personal goals?

#118

Post by stedesign » Sun, Jul 29, 2018, 6:15 PM UTC

OT: achieving the goal is just a temporary pleasure.. remember to enjoy the journey!

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize/track your personal goals?

#119

Post by tokyokawasemi » Tue, Jul 31, 2018, 7:48 AM UTC

mezod wrote: post #100

tokyokawasemi wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use paper too, and have designed a small notebook around this idea of longer term goals with "crumb-size" daily actions: https://twentyweeks.com (shameless plug for my side project)

nice! why 10 week sprints? :P

It mostly came down to math, and that 48 pages is typically the max number of pages for a saddle-stitch book. I explained a little bit more about the design process here if you're curious to know more: https://1rick.com/designing-bluebird.html

Re: Ask HN: How do you organize/track your personal goals?

#120

Post by grzkv » Tue, Jul 31, 2018, 1:41 PM UTC

I use OKRs for personal goal setting and tracking. All best practices that apply to OKRs apply here. See https://amzn.to/2LP9myF and https://amzn.to/2OxEBN1 Keep goals SMART http://bit.ly/2LIQX7z

I use vimwiki https://github.com/vimwiki/vimwiki to organize everything.