Four questions about how big you set your goals

This goal setting exercise comes in four rounds. Don’t work out how you’d do any of them. Your first answer is the one to write down.

The four rounds

1. Could you get 500 euro into your account by the end of this week?Write down yes or no, and move on.
2. Could you get 5,000 euro into your account by the end of next week?The amount is ten times bigger, and you get an extra week.
3. Could you get 50,000 euro into your account by the end of next week?The amount goes up ten times again. The deadline stays where it was.
4. If somebody gave you a million euro for getting 50,000 into your account by the end of next week, what would you say?Answer this one as fast as the others.

What changed between round three and round four

Round four asks for the same amount by the same deadline as round three. Only the reward changed.

If your answer moved, you were judging the stake in round three and not the difficulty.

How to set bigger goals with it

Bring this to your next ninety day goal and ask whether the stake is right. A goal with something you’d be sorry to miss gets more of your attention than a safe one.

Where the idea comes from

The idea turns up in lots of goal setting books, often as a case for targets ten times bigger. We like the smaller version of it. Take a goal you’ve given up on, change the stake and see if your answer moves.