Is mind mapping software a tool that you might use for goal setting? Well – yes and no. Depending on your definition it might be a tool to accomplish the whole process or just some of it.

What is goal setting

Many people have suggested that mind mapping is great software for goal setting. Usually titles like “Using mind maps for goal setting” leave me a bit puzzled, with a slight dash of “no way”.

After a closer reading however, I realize, that I agree with the author of said generic article, it’s just that our terminology is a bit different.

For me – goal setting should be set of actions that might include:

• Evaluating the current state of your life
• Brainstorming how it differs from the things you want
• Building up the motivation to bring your life up to par with your expectations
• Setting up a specific, measurable action plan
• Coming up with and putting up safeguards that make sure you follow through in those times when you might be tempted to quit.

“Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler.”- Albert Einstein

What mind mapping does

So what’s the problem with mind mapping? It only offers the means to brainstorm the actions/ideas needed to accomplish the above steps. You should use mind mapping software to overcome the logical restraints of ideas, for example – to come up with situations in which you would have to struggle to follow through with your plan. Also – you could come up with the actions you should take.

Ideas, however good they might be, will not get you all the way to your desired outcome.

This is why mind mapping is a terrific start, but in my book software that is used for mind mapping does not qualify as goal software per se. Use it to come up with good ideas and strategies, but use other systems to implement these.

Side note: If you do like mind mapping software, don’t use it exclusively – keep a stash of crayons and markers at hand ( and/or a whiteboard) and use them – you will have different ideas when mapping with different tools.

Related posts:

1. Goal software 101: The ultimate goal setting system?
2. Goal software 101: Trait #1: Systems approach
3. The best daily goal setting system ever

Goal setting process - objectively

First impressions are promising. You can dive right in into "Learning" a goal, which is the Goalbot equivalent of setting said goal. You can choose from one of the popular goals or enter your own. If your goal is one of the popular ones (like "Lose weight" or "Start my own business") you will have a summary page that gives you some information about how to achieve it. The software will also present you with resources (books, websites, related goals) that will help you get more information and get you on your way.

The next step: "Plan" allows you to define steps for your goal. Each step can have a due date (or repeating schedule). If you want more options for planning - you picked the wrong service. Steps and due dates are all that Goalbot has to offer in this department.

The next section might very well be the distinguishing characteristic of Goalbot - the "Connect" section allows to share ones progress (in Twitter-like fashion), look for or ask questions regarding the goal and connect with other people with similar goals. Now isn't that fun?

The last part - the "Coach" section allows you to search for mentors that you can pay to help you with your goal. Just type in your goal and your location and you're set - if you're living in the right place and have a sufficiently standard goal that is.

Those were the facts - how does all this work put together?

Impressions

The basic assumption behind all social powered services is that there is someone that shares our interests and tastes. In this case this idea seems just a tad too far fetched for me. If your goal is non standard, Goalbot will just be a dead simple goal and step organizer with no particular advantages over pen and paper.

I also took the time to trace through how helpful would Goalbot be in the standard goal category. These would include the goals that you probably considered doing at one time or another. These would include:

• Lose Weight
• Start a Business
• Reduce my caloric intake
• Create an exercise plan
• Drink more water

The problem is - those goals already have vast amounts of attention from other media. There are numerous sites that address each of these issues in depth. Why then would I want to use the information and tools that GoalBot has to offer to "Lose weight", when there are terrific community websites loaded with tools (SparkPeople to name just one).

My first impression about Goalbot was that the most valuable tools would be the goal research stage, but when I wanted something less standard than weight loss, the results were pretty disappointing. Why would I want to replace my search engine with Goalbot? I can't think of a reason.

In my view, the only chance for Goalbot is to cover as much topics as possible and add resources, so it becomes sort a hub for goal setting research - but it would have to be really complex and good for me to replace the search engine.

Having said all that about the general concept of the service I would like to point out that, as a software developer, I really think the website is really well done. The interface is very intuitive and much work has been put in to not bug the user with anything superfluous. At the same time, all the features are neatly packed into spaces that they need to be (appearing when hovering over a linked item for example). In overall - the technical side of GoalBot is some fine programming and interface design woven into a user-friendly piece of software.

Web-sociopath disclaimer

It has to be stated here that I am probably not the target audience for Goalbot - I have yet to be motivated into following through with any goal by a Web-based social group. I do value the accountability boost and support that comes from my friends and family, but that's it. Therefore, the most distinguishing feature of Goalbot is pretty much useless to me - your experience may vary and you may want to give Goalbot a try - it doesn't cost you anything but a bit of time.

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I've been interested in self-help and personal achievement for about a decade now, an I enjoy giving advice to those of my friends who want to accomplish something. By trying to help them I often realize my own shortcomings in some areas. This is a story of one the most insidious and prevalent ones.

Coaching someone (including yourself) into doing something will probably get you a lot of resistance if you did not prepare for the process appropriately. You might know that change requires you to have a lot of reasons to beat the status quo and that these should include both the positive (what will I gain by doing X) and negative (what will I lose if I don't do it).

You might also be aware that a new goal will be made a lot easier by destroying the beliefs that you have that are not supporting the new goal and creating some that will.

Now this is where most of the resistance will emerge with two possible scenarios:

• Your friend doesn't have the ability to distinguish between belief and fact. This can be diagnosed by the quizzical look when you ask a question like "What opinions do you have in this area that might be relevant to this goal"?. Obviously - the questions will be based on the goal, but the look should be easy to spot. This situation is quite troublesome and this post is not designed to help you.

• Your friend (or you) is hesitant to destroy the beliefs and install some new ones because "That's just not me".

The second is quite the conundrum and it really pains me to write about it, remembering that I've been trapped in that cage for so many years.

Just be yourself

What does that even mean? It's one of those sayings that can be broken down into a subset of expectations that are placed upon your actions. Those might include:

• Do not think, act or say anything that might be inconsistent with what you already did in the past.

• Do not let anyone influence you in any way (for that would greatly contaminate the "yourselfness").

Even when you ignore the obvious paradox that these rules are actually controlling you and limiting your freedom - they make absolutely no sense. They imply that at one moment, your personality formed totally from scratch, and should never change. If you look back at your life and find this to be true - write a book - I would be fascinated by such a tale. Most of us however can identify with the long process of learning and changing - looking back at all the stupid stuff we did and now now we are all the wiser because of it.

Why are we lying to ourselves?

The answer is so simple I was almost embarrassed when I realized it - I am afraid of change. All the lessons I have learned came at a price of pain - the time taken, the emotional costs... and so on.

The brain is a powerful organ, but it is hard-wired to evade pain. By doing something new we take the risk in order to grow.

This is a hard thing to accept, so we create a belief that at one time the things we want will just come to us, with no effort on our part. This is a lie and deep down we all know it.

The situation in our life is (more often than not) created by who we are and what we believe in. The people that win come into possession of wealth with no effort usually lose all of after 1-3 years. If we want to get somewhere - we have to become the person that would be there.

How to overcome this egocentric mentality

Recognize the fluidity of your being - embrace it. More adequately - come to terms that your beliefs of "being yourself" are an elaborate form of self deception that will cause you nothing but pain if you do not change them.

Embrace change as the powerful force driving all life and realize that stability is an illusion marketed to you by people who want to sell you something, or can benefit from you staying in your comfort zone.
Looking at this from an evolutionary perspective - those who risk survive - those who innovate and create change lift humanity up.

Subtle mindhack to avoid the trap:

Think in terms of who you want to become, not what you want to accomplish or what you want to posses - this subtle change of perspective will accustom you to the idea of changing yourself and not passively waiting for something to come to you.

It also jumps the aforementioned self-image hurdle up front and leaves you with a far superior mindset.

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Have you ever felt your brain rewire? This sore muscle that you can't quite place, but you know something is happening? This is how I've felt throughout my trip. Snowboarding is a demanding feat for the brain to get accustomed to - you force your body into using muscles and catching balance in ways that you never did before. The brain and nervous system are trying to make sense of it all.

You kind of feel the inner voice telling you "I don't know why you chose to tie yourself to a wooden board and go downhill, but I'll do the best I can to help you with that".

Snowboarding is just one of the great things you can do to keep your brain entertained and is quite extreme. You'll get similar results just by switching hands, walking in the dark or trying to draw music. Whatever you do - don't leave it up to chance - plan for what you are going to do right now. Put it on your to-do list and stick with it.  If you're not quite clear what you can do to start, "Keep Your Brain Alive!" is a great start.

Now go and freak out.

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This is the time (day? week?) of year when most people take a brief look at their lives, form a sentence that is supposed to destroy whatever vice that first popped into mind, and go on with their lives as usual. If you're like that - I will not be able to help you.  If however you're more serious about your resolution - read on.

I used to think that a statement such as "I will jog for 60 minutes every other day by the end of February" is a goal. This statements adheres to the S.M.A.R.T. guidelines, but it has several flaws:

• It doesn't recognize the need to achieve goal incrementally - starting small and building momentum to achieve ultimate effect. This can be fixed by phrasing the goal like "I jog every other day, increasing the time by 2 minutes daily and ultimately running 60 minutes by the end of February".
• It doesn't really convey any benefits (on it's own). If someone were ignorant of the health benefits of jogging, this single statement would not mean anything. If we want to be motivated to do something we must keep the benefits constantly in mind - a goal like the above might be hard to accomplish because we tend to loose track of the ultimate reasons for achieving the goal (the desired end result).
• It would be hard for me to integrate this into my self-image.
• Why are you jogging? To get fit? To get strong? Increase stamina? Lose weight?
• What if jogging doesn't work out? You could develop knee problems, be attacked by dogs on a regular basis or having a really uninteresting neighbor join you. What then - do you drop the whole goal and quit?

All of these are result of mistaking actions for goals.

• A goal is an end state in which your life changed in a desirable way, consistent with your self image.
• A goal is achieved by setting up:
  • reasons (why do I want this),
  • an action plan (how will I achieve this).

The immediate practical applications could be:

• Suppose we change
  "I jog every other day, increasing the time by 2 minutes daily and ultimately running 60 minutes by the end of February"
  to:
  "I am fit enough to allow me to jog for 60 minutes by the end of February"
  
• If something happens to disrupt your jogging schedule, you can work on your fitness levels in other ways. Also - you will be less likely to get bored this way because you are not limited to jogging.
• Maybe you will find a better way to get fit if you gain more knowledge about fitness in general. You can experiment with different training programs and measure which one works best for you.
• "I am fit and full of energy" seems to fit  better into my self image than just being a jogger.

Change actions to goals

This is a fairly easy process:

1. If your resolution is an action, look for the ultimate goal, write it down. The previous action will become part of your action plan.
   or
   If your resolution is already a goal (losing weight for example) don't do anything with it yet (maybe phrase it to be SMART)
2. List all the reasons for achieving the goal. This should be two lists: 10 benefits of achieving your goal and 10 painful consequences of not reaching it. This step is really important - ever since I started to integrate a list of reasons into my goal setting routine I've achieved far more than without them. The key is to really feel into the good (and bad) feelings that these hypothetical situations elicit.
3. Get some knowledge about the subject in question and formulate an action plan. Your first item might be already there.
4. Have daily habits to track the actions, revisit goals and action plans. Change them according to results. You may find a low tech way to keep track of goals in my previous post.

Do you have examples of transformed resolutions or other ways to better them? Let me know in the comments.

Related posts:

1. Goal software 101: Trait #3: Measurable actions
2. The best daily goal setting system ever

Related posts:

1. The power of measuring goal progress

• Knowledge - I knew enough about exercise but lacked the essential knowledge regarding energy balance and nutrition. This made my plan effective in terms of increasing overall health (which was quite satisfying), but did not lead to weight loss.
• A plan with (easily) measurable daily actions.

Improving the plan goal achievement process involved the following:

• Reading somewhat about it. Since weight loss is a limitless sesspool in desinformation, I skimmed throught a few books and sticked to those that made sense and did not promise to make me lose 5 kgs overnight. I stuck with "The body fat solution", by Tim Venuto. Also - I got some great mantra type articles from ZenHabits: example.
• I've already had a measurable goal, but I did not set up a plan for the measurements and alas - they failed. Armed with that knowledge I framed the simplest measurement schedule I could think of:
  • Phase 1 (first 21 days). Using a pocket notepad and pen.
    • Write down everything I eat with the amounts
    • Weight myself in the evening.
    • If doing any exercises, write them down.
  • Phase 2. All the data went into a database for progress measurement.
    • Count daily calorie intake and protein percentages of the foods
    • Weight myself at least once a day (preferably in the morning and in the evening)
    • Make an exercise plan and follow it.

I started simple and a month later am still building my way up. This is the natural progress of the goal measuring process. Begin with lo-tech low maintenance logging tools. This may even be all you need. I am currently on my way of building my own custom weight and calorie tracker (built for my specific needs), but mainly as a means to improving my programming skills.

The effect is that the goal of losing 1kg/week is steadily coming along, and I have full control over all of the variables, which is very gratifying.

Because I have some spare time and some goals, I'm going to resume testing goal setting software suites for those of you that do not have the luxury or the ability to write your own app Stay tuned.

Related posts:

1. HabitShaper review in progress

• ANY reasonable goal setting system will work
  Yes - the mere fact that you are actually setting goals and giving them some sort of attention will secure a reasonable amount of success - my aim is to find out which of these work best.
• the optimal goal setting system is dependent on our desired end result
  Example: the goal of "achieving a weight of xx kgs" and one which has an end result of "thinking positive thoughts" will require different exercises and different trains of thought.
• the personality of the goal setter is a major factor
  Some people are motivated more by pleasure, some by pain. It is up to the goal software to find out which is better for the particular person to maximise the effects of goal setting.

These varying factors is why I personally use several goal setting systems (and variations) including but not limited to:

• Techniques of Raymond Hull
• Techniques of Tony Robbins
  
• Concepts taught by David Allen (in particular the 6 levels of focus)
• various visualization systems of esoteric orders

It is also why the ideal goal software should take some time to get to know it's user and adjust his goal systems accordingly. Ultimately the user could pick the methodology of his choosing (with appropriate help of course and maybe suggestions based on the choice of other users) to every goal he wishes to work on.

Related posts:

1. Goal software 101: Trait #2: Automated steps
2. Goal software 101: Trait #1: Systems approach
3. Goal software 101: Trait #3: Measurable actions

Some software systems will tell you that they are accessible any time, provided you carry your personal laptop anywhere with you, and that's a bit of a stretch. Others will provide you with portable software ready to be put on your USB drive. That's a bit better but not good enough for me - goal setting software must be able to provide you with the ability to store data online and access them with anything that can display a web page. Bonus points if you have offline access.

Related posts:

1. Goal software 101: Trait #2: Automated steps
2. Goal software 101: Trait #1: Systems approach
3. Goal software 101: Trait #3: Measurable actions

In other news:

• The best daily goal setting system ever is working out to be great for everday work. However, I am still putting together a system for a more strategic approach to goals that can be done on a weekend. I'll try to have this finished as soon as possible but my thesis deadline is closing fast. Anyway - it you haven't tried the system yet - give it a go. It's just a few minutes daily.
• The next few posts are going to be a return the the goal software 101 series, sprinkled with some helpful chunks of general goal setting information.

No related posts.