How To Generate Daily Movement On Your Goals
How can I track my daily advancement towards my goals? I want to prove to myself (and the world) that I am moving closer to a goal by actively tracking my progress and also showing that I am applying whatever tools and skills I need to on a regular and consistent basis.
What simple ways can I use to track growth in a distinctive, simple and above all motivating way?
When I was growing up I used to watch two television shows broadcast in the UK, one was Magpie and the other one was Blue Peter (of course, I also would watch other nonsense such as TISWAS but that’s a completely different story). On these two popular childrens’ shows they would often have monetary appeals that were tracked with each broadcast by a totaliser of some description.
I remember vividly the “progress bars” that were used, attached to the wall, that would trail all the way around the inside of the studio, down corridors and all over television centre where the particular programme was hosted. These progress bars provided a huge motivation to the audience to donate to the charity as there was a highly visible and easily interpreted measure of how far the appeal had progressed.
By having the progress bar winding through the television studios it gave the viewing audience a peek behind the scenes as the presenters went walk about through the corridors with a mobile camera crew to show how well the appeal was doing.
Quick & Simple Is Important
For the longest time I used similar progress bars, though on a much smaller scale, that tracked my movement towards a particular goal. There was an acute problem with this though, if you don’t know how far you have to go, how can you track how far you’ve come? You can try and put some arbitrary time limit on the goal, and measure the days, but how do you know if you have consistently done a minimum amount of work to move you towards the goal on a daily basis?
How do you know you’ve done all that you can to move yourself closer to your goal?
If you are tracking something simple, such as a quantity of money, it’s pretty easy; just count up how much you’ve got at the end of the day. But what if you want to track whether you are increasing your productive output to ensure you make more money in 24 months time rather than today?
Not so easy?
How about tracking whether you are funnier if your goal is to become a comedian? (One of my own goals back in the early ‘90s.)
How about tracking whether you can converse in French? French is a skill I’ve lost because I haven’t practised since I was 16 years old. One of my goals last year was to learn a foreign language (I failed due to time commitments). How can I track whether I am committing enough time to the goal?
There are a lot of different tracking systems but many of them require distinct techniques and skills. Many of the systems can be burdensome to update on a regular basis and few of them offer strong visual and motivational feedback.
Updating the movement towards your goals can be difficult to do in a quick and simple fashion that doesn’t require cumbersome software or spreadsheets.
There is a tool for this.
Check off grids to the rescue.
A check off grid allows you to track on a daily basis your forward progress as you move towards your desired goals. I use them frequently for goals that I want to work on, on a daily basis. You can also use check off grids to track weekly or monthly tasks but they don’t quite have the same impact that a daily grid has. For weekly or monthly tracking I recommend a different tool such as a journal, thermometer, or a personal profit-loss balance sheet.
When I see a check off grid I am motivated to fill it in. It is simple, it is quick, it is visual and it is readily available. Also, when I go a day or more without checking off a box I become more motivated to get back on the horse and try again. Those empty boxes call out to be filled in.
The key to a check off grid is to generate the longest unbroken chain of achievement that you can. If your goal is to learn a foreign language and your task calls for daily practice of at least 30 minutes, you can easily create a check off grid to be filled in each day for the day by day activity. Your aim with a check off grid is to create the longest line of unbroken markers as is possible.
If you are OCD you will naturally want to do this. If you are a completionist, which many of us are, you will naturally be drawn to completing a month. A blank or partially filled check off grid speaks to two of our most basic psychological desires: fill in the little blanks and ensure a neat and orderly world.
The primary feature I like about check off grids is the mass of empty boxes begging to be filled in. It drives me to want to get out and start working on my goals right now. It’s like an inverse advent calendar. Those empty little boxes are especially motivating when I put up a new sheet next to a previously filled in sheet for the same goal because now my brain is telling me “fill in those boxes, we’re failing already!”
I have found the absolute best way to track my daily progress is on a wall mounted day by day year planner that shows an entire 365 days in a single grid for the year. If I am trying to track my goal over a time period of more than a couple of months these are the absolute best solution as they provide the greatest amount of visual feedback. I’ve found that I can purchase pre-printed paper day planners from local office supply locations such as OfficeMax, Staples or Office Depot in the US for about $15 for a pack of six. They aren’t reusable so at the end of your goal, especially if you are only tracking a goal for a few weeks or months, it makes the paper based full year planner a bit of a waste.
If you want to use the yearly day planner you can also purchase reusable versions. They are usually printed for that particular year, but you can also find ones that require you to fill in the dates yourself and go from there. The reusable planners are cheaper in the long run but can be spendy when initially purchasing them, especially if you want to track several goals at once.
The main problem I have with the year long day planners is the amount of real estate they take up on the wall. The smallest usable ones I have found that encompass an entire year are around three feet by two feet. The larger sizes are four feet by three feet, and some are even larger than that. The larger formats can also be unwieldy to move around and require proper attachment to a vacant wall which you might not want to do. And if you are like me, you don’t have a vacant wall available that doesn’t have a storage option attached to it to maximize storage space inside of your home. I can purchase quarterly day planners but if I’m going that route I might as well print out my own from a custom design.
Printing my own I also get the colour scheme and design I want, not what someone else wants. Dull office grey, what the day planner publisher generously refers to as “silver” but reminds me of Government Issue Office Blandness(tm). Or I can get nasty pastel purple or government institution putrid snot green.
Such choice!
These colours do not really work in my living space.
If you do decide to go with the reusable planners make sure you get the appropriate set of pens to write on them. And also make sure your pens don’t have a habit of walking away from the location where you need them. An absence of pens means you won’t be able to quickly update your goal tracking for the day and writing on the planner with anything other than "approved pens" is a sure way of destroying the surface when it comes to erase it in a year’s time.
I use a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet to create my check off grids. I simply alter the date on the “settings” sheet of the spreadsheet which updates the main page, type in my intention that will move me to my goal and then hit print. Everything else is automatically done for me. It’s designed for an 8.5” x 11” printer too so it should work fine on both US and UK printers.
How To Use
Whichever method you choose for tracking your progress, monthly grids or entire year planners, the usage is very simple. Either directly after completing the intention, or at the end of the day, just fill in an empty box on each grid that represents each goal.
I have found that check off grids, especially when starting out on a new goal, are a great motivator. They aid me in building up a habit. Using a check off grid strengthens my resolve to achieve the goal. Check off grids reinforce a daily self-discipline to always make me move forward.
The motivation comes from not breaking the chain of crosses on the check off grid. Each day there’s a new cross checking off the intention. Each day the chain of crosses gets longer. Pretty soon I have a chain of crosses stretching back weeks or even months. I can feel myself getting closer to my goal. When I break that chain, I’ve let myself down.
Sometimes it is inevitable I’ll break the chain, either for one day, or more often than not, three or four or five days if I am travelling to a conference. It is unfortunate and I feel mentally anguished when I do it. I feel motivated to immediately start working on building the next longest chain when I return. This anguish I feel from breaking the chain is constructive negative feedback and is as valuable as the positive feedback of making the chain of crosses in the first place.
In the past I’ve used gold and silver stars to track my progress. Yes, it can feel a bit childish. Yes, it makes me feel like I’m back in junior school. But getting that long line of stars on my daily intention as I move closer to my goal is a huge charge of motivational energy. I would use both gold and silver stars for tracking, the different colours meaning different things.
I used silver stars to indicate that I fulfilled my intention for the day. I would make use of gold stars to signify that I had exceeded my intention for that day. Perhaps I jogged for 25 minutes instead of 20 minutes or maybe I jogged at 5.1MPH instead of 5MPH. The gold stars meant I went beyond the baseline requirement, even if beyond was only by a few seconds, a few extra words, a little more effort.
Sometimes I’ve limited myself to only awarding a gold star if I put in at least 10% more effort, 10% more time, created 10% more words, but then I had to mentally calculate the percentage of the extra effort and track throughout the day whether I had exceeded the particular intention. I have enough clutter in my brain that I don’t need to worry about those extra details and with optimizing my life I am aiming to reduce mental muddle, not add to it.
And of course, it goes without saying, if you didn’t work on your intention that day, if you didn’t move yourself closer to your goal, you don’t get any stars at all.
I’ve also tried at times using different coloured stars for underachievement. I worked on my intention but didn’t achieve it totally. Maybe I went to the gym but only managed ten minutes on the treadmill instead of twenty. Perhaps I sat down to write but only stared at a blank page for two hours, producing nothing worthwhile. I found this “other colour of star” to not actually motivate me that much. I felt like I was acknowledging poor performance in a positive way.
The goal of the check off grids is to say “Yes, I did this!”
When I fail to achieve my intention for the day, I shouldn’t check off the day.
I blew it, it’s over.
The chain is broken.
Suck it up and try again tomorrow.
You have to be hard on yourself, you only get a big red cross, or a star if you met your intention for that day, anything less is not worth acknowledging.
I’ve also tried the differing colour of markers instead of stars, but I’ve found the most gratifying solution is to pick one colour of marker and stick with it through all of my check off grids and all of my intentions.
I’ve been using check off grids for years now and I have to say it is one of the most powerful tools I’ve found for tracking progress towards my goals. It’s like the flat bladed screwdriver, claw hammer or Philips screwdriver in your toolbox. It’s simple, it’s easy to use, you don’t need any kind of special instruction on what to do with it, anybody can pick it up and make use of it in mere seconds, and it’s obvious what it is for. It’s a foundation tool in your personal development toolbox.
Simple Tracking To Your Goal
Check off grids provide one of the simplest, quickest, most motivating tools there are for tracking progress. There are other equally simple tools available for tracking your goals but none of them are quite as universally applicable to a whole lot of scenarios. I can only think of three or four goals in my life that I have not been able to use check off grids to track.
I use separate check off grids for different intentions. I never, ever attempt to combine more than one intention on a single check off grid.
One check off grid.
One intention.
That’s how it works.
If you track multiple intentions on a single check off grid you will sabotage yourself.
Let’s say for example that you are tracking “Walk for 20 minutes at 2.5MPH on treadmill” and “Bathroom grooming for 5 minutes” on a single check off grid. You’ll notice that some days you don’t make it to the gym. That one day you didn’t have time between waking up and dashing out the door to the office to stop and groom yourself properly. Your unbroken chain will have missing links because you didn’t fulfil you daily obligation to one of your intentions.
But it will appear that you did.
You’ll look at your chain of crosses or stars and think you’re doing okay, but under closer examination you’ve been neglecting the exercise for the past two weeks! How did that happen? But it’s okay, right? Because your ear hairs and nasal hairs are perfectly manicured.
Don’t do it.
Don’t track multiple intentions on a single check off grid.
One intention.
One check off grid.
I cannot emphasise it enough.
Remember: You look good in that tight t-shirt you’re wearing to the club tonight, it really shows off your six pack, shame about the half inch of really dark nose bush.
You absolutely must keep your old sheets for any goal you are tracking, especially if the goal is taking place over an extended period of time or you are having difficulty gaining traction in trying to make forward progress and somehow failing. The older check off grids allow you to see how you have improved from the first day you started when perhaps you were skipping days or only partially achieving your projected daily intention.
At the end of the year you can throw out the old sheets except for the December sheet which you should keep to pair up with the January sheet for the new year so that you don’t break the chain. I keep all of my previously filled in check off grids in a binder along with my goals. Should my goals change I can throw out the old check off grids.
Think about it: if you track five years of a goal on a daily basis with a check off grid you only have sixty pages of paper to deal with. That’s a trifling amount of paper and you can always, if you are OCD, transfer the information from the paper sheets to a microscopic digital version that holds an entire year on a single page.
The best place for your check off grids is attached to a wall where they can be clearly seen as often as possible. If you keep them in a binder in your desk drawer then they are out of sight and out of mind. The powerful message they carry is no longer available to you. Should the check off grids be kept amongst a pile of other papers on your desk, they are going to get lost in the paper shuffle and eventually misplaced.
Check off grids are a powerful visual motivational tool. You want them displayed prominently. You want the message that they carry to infuse your mind every time you look at them.
I keep my check off grids in the bathroom where I see them at least twice per day, and often five or six times per day. As the check off grids are only up for a month or so the moist air in the bathroom is never really a problem. The nice part of keeping them in the bathroom is that I can check off yesterday’s intentions whilst brushing my teeth in the morning and I get positive feedback every time I look at the wall whenever I visit that particular room.
I have noticed that with the check off grids in the bathroom that friends and visitors to my home ask about them when they come over. Many people find it funny until they realize you have made visible progress every single day towards a particular goal. The bemusement invoked in your friends is really just their portion of societal drag acting on you.
Alternative places I have tried keeping my check off grids are the kitchen, very powerful again because I visit the kitchen more often than I visit the bathroom. If you work in an office or cubicle you may want to attach them to the wall there, though be prepared for even more increased societal drag from your co-workers.
Don’t be surprised if one or two of your co-workers sabotage your sheets by writing stupid messages on them or adding in crosses where they shouldn’t be or removing stars from previous days.
Remember: your check off grids are for your benefit.
Any bemusement or sabotage expressed by others is really just them acting out on something that is different. You can view it as a form of bullying, it is light hearted workplace abuse. And when people bully and abuse, it’s usually because of fear and jealousy.
I only ever track three to five intentions at one time. Any more than this and my mind, and my work day, is a whirl of commitment. There needs to be slack time for unplanned daily events. By tracking too many things at once you will find yourself becoming de-motivated. It may all work in the beginning, but if you slip up and fail to deliver on your intention one day, you’ve broken a chain. Psychologically it doesn’t just affect that one chain, it affects all of your chains, even if those other chains remain unbroken. Break two or three chains in one day, or a chain becomes broken for a period of time, and you have effectively destroyed the habit you were developing and you go back to square one to start all over.
Whichever method you choose for checking off your days, be it a large red X or a silver or gold star make sure you keep the pens or stars close by the check off grids ready for use. You don’t want to spend extra minutes each day looking for a pen. Using the same pen or same colour stars day after day allows you to psychologically build the chain that leads to the habit and finally to the goal as well. The same uniform colour of crosses marching across the calendar is again, another motivator. You need to institutionalise and internalise the significance of the unbroken chain of crosses and a uniform marking off of the days with the same pen or the same stars will help you to do that. I use a big red marker pen personally as they are easily replaced and one type of red marker pen is the same as any other.
If you’ve studied personal development to even the slightest degree you will have come across the meme that states your goals must be specified in the present tense for them to be the most effective. The same holds true for daily intentions that you place on to your check off grid.
Instead of writing “walked on treadmill for 30 minutes” (past tense) you should write “walk on treadmill for 30 minutes” (present tense).
Instead of “Wrote for blog for 2 hours” (past tense) you write “Write for blog for 2 hours” (present tense).
Instead of “ate healthy today” you should write “eat healthy.”
Though that last intention about eating is a poor example and I’ll explain why in the next section.
This one little technique can easily make you more effective at pursuing your goals.
Clear Intention, Location, Time Frame, Limitation
Specifying the intention for the check off grid can be tricky at times. “Exercise at gym” is a really bad example. The word “exercise” doesn’t really convey what my intention is other than to do some sort of exercise.
But what kind of exercise? Aerobic? Anaerobic? Run? Walk? Lift weights? Karate? Let’s tighten up that intention.
First I’ll determine what exercise I’m interested in. Well, I like walking, and when I walk on the treadmill it means I can write or play World of Warcraft. So I’m changing “gym” to treadmill and “exercise” to “walk.” Both specific words that have a narrower scope. Now I have “walk on treadmill.” But it doesn’t say how long I should walk for. Or how fast. So now my intention becomes “Walk on treadmill for 30 minutes at 2MPH.” Now I have a clear intention, what and where, a time frame, and a limitation.
I am not saying that all of your intentions should have these four parts to them, but you should have a very good reason for an intention not to have these four components. I try very strongly to avoid generic terms such as “work,” “exercise” or “perform.”
That is not to say I don’t have an intention right now that I am tracking that is titled “work on blog for 2 hours.” That’s a generic “work” intention and it has no limitation on what kind of work I will perform. This is because my intention is part of a project. The project tracks what I will be working on for any one specific day. The intention is a weak one, but I am willing to subject myself to it based on my own self-discipline quotient.
Again I have to iterate, avoid the use of past tense. Past tense wording will sabotage your intention every time. I know you are tracking an activity you did in the past, either earlier in the day or even yesterday if you’re like me and most days mark intentions off the grid in the morning when I am brushing my teeth. But trust me on this, use present tense to describe your intention. The intention is the mental programming for your activities for that day, the check off grid underneath is for what you have done.
I just want to drill these points home so I am going to summarise them with more examples from my own check off grids. All of these examples come from intentions on check off grids I have used in the past.
“Play Warcraft on treadmill for 2 hours at 2MPH”
This intention is a good one. It has a specific activity. It has a specific location. It uses a time frame and also a limitation. How can you not like an intention that insists that you play World of Warcraft for 2 hours every day?
“Post to my blog”
This intention seems light on detail but for me it works. It has a specific activity; I’ve no need to say how long I should write for, or how many words. Just the fact that I posted is important. Of course, I’m not going to post nonsense or wasteful drivel to my blog so the requirements are pre-built in to the intention.
“Drink a 1200ml pure fruit juice smoothie”
Another specific activity; no time requirement required. Again, very simple. I even put in the quantity of smoothie consumption I should be aiming for as the limitation.
“Answer one pending email in 10 minutes.”
A specific activity with a time limit. Get the email out in ten minutes or less. No matter what other emails I may compose or respond to that day I will have removed one pending email from my follow-up list. With this intention I will eventually have the folder that holds all of my emails to be followed-up completely cleaned out.
If you already have a system in place that lets you track the progress to your goals such as a burn down chart and you’re thinking of switching over to check off grids I recommend that you try the check off grids for a week or two, in conjunction with whatever system you are currently using. Don’t just immediately start using check off grids and abandon whatever old system you have, you hopefully have too much habit invested in your current system to just switch gears smoothly. Check off grids are a lightweight tracking system so running them in conjunction with your current procedure should not be too much of a burden.
Not currently using a tracking system?
And why not!?
If this is you I recommend you start with tracking two or three goals on check off grids to begin with and start doing it today.
Remember the important thing: Don’t track too many intentions at once. Not because you may become overwhelmed by the tracking but because when you make adjustments and course corrections towards your goals you will not be able to tell which change affected what goal and by how much.
It is a fundamental principle, too many goals and too many tracking variables will just screw with you and leave you confused.
If after a week or two you find the check off grids are working for you I recommend sticking with them for at least 3 months until either you have reached an acceptable level of competency in whatever you are trying to improve in, or you have formed the habit of what you intended and now do the activity, the intention, as second nature, as naturally as brushing your teeth in the morning.
It might be fun to track a particular goal or intention for an extended period of time, perhaps years, but that’s really defeating the purpose of the check off grids. Check off grids are simple and quick. They are not meant to be an all encompassing tracking system. You will want a far more robust system for anything longer than that. Check off grids are good for forming habits. Check off grids are good for daily tracking of goals and intentions. Burn down charts, thermometers, folders and other systems are ideal for tracking the goal itself and tracking it over a long period of time.
Have fun with filling in the little boxes and be sure to let me know how you get on with using the check off grids.
Download The Check-Off Grid
I have created an Excel spreadsheet that lets me track my daily progress towards a goal over the course of a month. You can do the same too by using check off grids. The file is a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. If you need an Adobe PDF of the file contact me and I’ll be sure to send you one.