Last session we asked you to complete a SMART goals example to help Ben overcome his fear of wearing shorts in the park. There is no one right answer to this example, but here is one way we could help Ben reach his goal.
End Goal: Wearing shorts in summer
Specific: Rather than saying wearing shorts in summer, we could say that the end goal is to go walking in the park for 30 minutes. Now the goal is specific.
Measurable: It will be obvious when it’s completed, and we can measure it.
Achievable: Yes, there is no physical reason why Ben can’t do this.
Reasonable: Ben hasn’t exposed any of his skin in public for years, so asking him to get out a pair of shorts and walk around a busy park would be unreasonable to him!
Timeframe: Ben needs to have a timeframe for when he will start wearing shorts in the park.
This is where the action plan comes in. We could set him some smaller goals to help him to reach the long-term goal of walking for 30 minutes in a public place in shorts.
Action Plan
1 – We could help Ben get used to showing his psoriasis by setting him a goal of wearing his shorts around his house.
2 – We need to make this goal more of a challenge, but still be easier than achieving the end goal. So we’ll ask him to walk to his local shop (or somewhere nearby) and back to his house wearing shorts.
3 – We could now ask Ben to walk for 5 minutes around the area near his house once or twice a week, after work for 2 weeks. We can ask Ben to wear his shorts even when his psoriasis has flared up. This’ll help to increase his confidence and prepare him for his end goal.
4 – Ben is now ready to walk around the park in his shorts. He can do this for short periods at first until he feels ready to achieve his end goal and walk for 30 minutes.
We have set him a Timeframe for achieving this goal so that he doesn’t just keep putting things off
The end goal is quite difficult for Ben so we are going to give him 10 weeks to achieve it.

A reasonable timeframe might be:
- 2 weeks to achieve the first goal of wearing his shorts around the house
- 2 weeks for Ben to go to his local shop wearing shorts.
- Another 2 weeks to practice walking in his shorts around the area near his house.
- Ben could have another 4 weeks to get to the park in his shorts and walk for 30 minutes. He could try building up to this by going walking in his shorts for a few minutes each day until he is used to it.
There are 4 stages on the action plan for Ben, but he can carry out many smaller tasks to help him along the way.Here is your answer for this activity:
Although there are no right or wrong answers, hopefully you broke down Ben’s goal into smaller more manageable steps and you gave him plenty of time to get used to each goal. Don’t worry if after reading this you think you would have done the activity differently. Just reading through the answers is good practice for developing your goal setting skills. Also you might find it helpful to read the goal section again to refresh your memory.
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