SMART Goals for Travelers: Setting 2021 Travel Goals

As I have learned more about goals, I’ve noticed that making my goals SMART pushes me to actually accomplish them. Thus, that’s why it’s essential for there to be SMART goals for travelers. I remember growing up and spending every New Years’ Eve at my dad’s house. We would do some traditional activities, but my dad would always sit us down to go over our goals for the next year and review our ones from last year. My goals were somewhat simplistic as a kid; they have adapted as I have grown and have included what travel I’d like to do in the coming year. I’d like to take you through my travel goal writing process.

SMART Goals for Travelers don’t include “Travel More”

I feel like we’ve all been there (or at least I have), we talk about what we want to do in the next year and we all say something along the lines of “travel more.” Don’t get me wrong, I think this is a great way to get started, but it shouldn’t be your endpoint when it comes to travel for the next year. I remember being at student council camp one summer when I first heard of SMART Goals. If you haven’t heard of SMART Goals or need a refresher, here is a breakdown, SMART stands for: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Time-Bound.

Let’s Brainstorm

Subgoals are great

Goals can be large, especially travel-related goals. To make larger goals more feasible, I break them down into smaller subgoals, so I can see that I am making progress toward the big goal.

Let’s Make them SMART Goals

S – Specific

What are you looking to accomplish? Is there a place you’d like to travel to? Do you have a dollar amount that you need to save for an upcoming trip? Take a look at what you have brainstormed and start from there. Make your goal make it concise and clear, include details and numbers as necessary. 

M – Measurable

This one might be easy for travel as you can check it off by saying that you measure it once you complete the trip. However, I suggest using the subgoals that I previously mentioned to show that you are making progress along the way to your big goal.

A – Attainable

The next step is to look and make sure that it is going to be something that you can do. Do you have enough vacation days? Are there other financial obligations that would be in the way? Setting subgoals will help make bigger goals more on the track to be more attainable.

R – Realistic

You’ll need to be sure that your travel goals are even possible and reachable. That is to say, just because a goal is not possible now, that it won’t be possible in a few months or a couple years. Having subgoals while planning will allow you to see the steps to reach your big goal and see if it is realistic.

T – Time-Based

Have your travel goal meet a deadline. What good is a goal if you never set a time to have it done by, right? If you are a person that struggles with procrastination or dealing with big picture concepts, creating subgoals that are also time-based might help. They will allow you to make sure you are meeting deadlines along the way to that big travel goal.

SMART Goals for Travelers Example

Let’s take a look at one of my goals: to visit every National Park in the United States. Realistically, I know that I am unlikely to visit every National Park within the next year and probably not within the next five years either. 

So let’s break it down. I believe that regardless of the state of travel, it’s realistic and attainable that I’ll be able to visit one new National Park in the coming year. To make this happen, I need to do some research on the park I want to visit. From there, I’ll need to decide to fly or drive, determine if I’m going to camp or not, set aside money for the trip, and request time off work.

Setting your Travel Goals

What travel goals are you setting? Let me know with a comment below! When doing research for other goals I found MindTool’s SMART Goal’s article super helpful.