We should all set goals for ourselves. Without them our lives would stagnate. We'd end up spending most of our time either in front of the tube watching Brady Bunch reruns or sitting at a bar getting plastered. It's not a pretty picture in either case. Having said that, when you do set goals it is important to be realistic about those goals. Setting a goal that is obviously impossible to achieve is not only foolish, but will end up frustrating you to the point where you give up on your goals.

Setting realistic goals may sound easy, at least to those of us who think logically, or at least feel that we do. But sometimes there is a fine line between realistic and impossible. So how do we go about setting realistic goals for ourselves? How do we keep ourselves from falling into that no man's land of "Oh my God, what have I gotten myself into?" Hopefully, after reading these few tips, you'll have no trouble setting realistic goals for yourself.

The first thing you have to do is sit down and make a list of your abilities. The last thing you want to do is set a goal to be the first man to swim from the East Coast of the United States of America to Great Britain when you can't swim a stroke. Now, while that may seem like an extreme example, it would be just as extreme to expect to make the Olympic swim team if you can't swim. So your first goal, if you really want to do that, should be to learn how to swim and set a realistic time frame for doing so. You won't learn how to swim in a day.

So what if you don't know, realistically, how long that should take? Simple. Consult with an expert. Speak to people who either are swimmers or teach swimming and ask them, on average, about how long it takes to learn how to swim. If the answer is say, six months, don't expect to learn in a few days. You may learn a little quicker or a little slower depending on your natural ability. However, you should keep your goals within a reasonable time frame.

Another thing you will need to do is set your goals in stages. Let's say your ultimate goal is to win a Grammy Award as a song writer. Even if you do have talent as a writer and even if you've been technically trained to write, if you haven't even had a piece of music published, you're going to have to set some realistic short term goals to go along with your long term goal of being a Grammy winner. You might want to start off with your first goal being to simply get a song writing contract. Set a realistic time frame for that to happen. After you get that contract you still need to get the song recorded by an act. That would be your next goal. Set a realistic time frame for that. You keep going along the chain until you've reached your ultimate goal. Some people reach this goal in a few years. Others take a lifetime. And then of course there have been some very talented song writers who have never won that Grammy Award.

As hard as it is, being realistic is probably the biggest key to setting goals that you'll be able to achieve. If you can do this, you stand a good chance of getting through life with as few disappointments as possible.