The second pointer I would give is to ensure you’ve broken down big activities into a step-by-step plan, with achievable component parts. For a year’s worth of goals, draw yourself up a plan with milestones for interim completion. If you’re sitting down in January to plan for the year, make sure you personally commit to yourself to have half of the goals done by July and then schedule your first batch of goals, in piece meal fashion, with plenty of slippage buffer in there in case your urgent activities wreak havoc with your plans.

For example:
If you have 6 goals for the year, make sure you schedule one each month (Feb, Mar, Apr, etc.), with an interim checkpoint for 3 to be completed by July and a final checkpoint in November. By this means, you will benefit by having both interim targets for each step and a greater, over-arching pair of personal milestones that will add up to you succeeding in your long-term goals.

Without fore-planning, these types of activities are rarely re-visited and you would find yourself dissatisfied at the end of the year, with only 1 or 2 of the 6 goals met.