I agree smaller goals are important and make the proposition more feasible. I also like the FRED idea — could work well. I think there are two things are at work that make a small goal work:

1. You can’t climb a mountain in one day -> it take days so you have to define how much you climb in one day
2. The compound effect which is that you can build on what you did previously. As you build each block on the other, the goal is not only feasible but progress is VISIBLE. People do not cope well when they don’t have visibility let alone achieving goals.

Now I’ve learnt that I need to write every day. One thing I’ve found works well is reading and engaging with other people’s stories here on Medium every day rather than writing a new story myself every day. Don’t get me wrong publishing my own stories is good but I don’t think it’s needed every day.

This way works since I learn something new and I don’t always have the time to write a piece that requires research. However I did challenge myself to write a piece each week = 52 articles a year to submit for one of the publications I write.