Last weekend, I made my final private student loan payment. I felt an instant wave of relief. In many ways I felt excitement to take on my other financial goals. While I am not done with paying off all my student loans (hello federal loans, your payoff is coming soon!) I am a firm believer in celebrating all of my wins, big or small. This accomplishment reaffirmed the benefit of staying in my own lane as a key driver to achieving my personal goals.
With the influx of information we receive daily it’s hard not to compare yourself to others. A few scrolls on social media and instantly I feel as though I need to work out more, read the book everyone’s been talking about, learn more about financial literacy, the list goes on. This is not to say that these topics aren’t important, because they all are. But even if we want to do it all, it becomes increasingly challenging to do it all at the same time – so I started thinking about what matters most to me. Focusing on what matters most to me has allowed me to look inward, instead of solely looking outward, so that I can set realistic goals for myself.
Everything matters to me – which is why it became important to identify what matters most when trying to achieve personal goals. Managing personal finances, increasing income, optimizing my savings and investments are all important goals. However, when thinking about what matters most I decided to focus on tackling my student loan debt in a big way.
I think now would be a good time to talk about the SMART criteria I use to set goals. I credit my grad school education with inviting me to the concept a few years ago. The SMART criteria is not unique to Public Health and is known to originate in management spaces.
- S- Specific: What needs to be accomplished?
- M- Measurable: How much do you want to accomplish?
- A- Achievable: Is the goal realistic?
- R- Relevant: Why do you want to accomplish this goal?
- T- Time-based: By when should the goal be accomplished?
I tend to rely heavily on time based goals. So mine was simple. I said:
“I will pay off my private student loan debt by the end of December 2022”
There are a lot of variables that make setting and working towards a goal like this possible. A few years ago I sought out professional advice about budgeting and repayment plan options. On a personal level, I did less traveling this year than I had in previous years. I also significantly reduced my spending in certain areas (i.e dining out). I still contributed to goals in other ways, but without feeling burnt out. By focusing on the most important goal I was able to give a lot of my time and resources to one task.
It is important to visualize the life you want for yourself without comparing it to the life of someone else. Along the way I saw many people who had paid off their debt or were successfully achieving goals that I also had in mind for myself. Trust me when I say, seeing it in others was so important because it showed me what it is possible. But it was more important that I showed up for myself and stuck to my plan. Sometimes we are actually doing just fine– but then we start to look over our shoulder at others and get distracted or miss out on vital lessons.
My journey is ongoing. I am ok with that. Focusing on what matters most lets me know that I am exactly where I need to be.
Focus on what matters most to YOU and let that determine how you work towards your personal goals.
Image by Alexa Williams
Live abundantly,
Bethany
