Setting and reassessing goals doesn’t come natural to me. I was never a goal setter. I was a to do list maker, but it doesn’t amount to much without a goal in mind. So day after day I was trying to mark all my way too many items on my list, but without a purpose. Just to get through the day.
One of the first things I began to work on last August, was setting goals. In every area of my life. Personally, family, work.. all the things. But this time I really took time to set goals, did some work to find out what my goals should be. And then reverse engineered to make steps to reach my goals.
Even though I’ve never really been a “goal setter” before, I have stated things I wanted like they were a goal.. but I’ve “wanted” things that are either unrealistic ( like losing 50 lbs in 4 months) or I’ve said I wanted them, but never given legs to it. Never built the action steps. And at times I’ve been in the completely wrong headspace to set goals.
Let me explain what I mean.. when my youngest was about 2 months old I declared I would lose 50 lbs before I went back to work. That would’ve been in about 4 months. And that was my goal, 50 lbs. I weighed daily. I barely ate and I walked. Occasionally. First off, I set a completely unreasonable and dangerous goal. Second, I was judging myself too harshly. Third, I had no plan. And most importantly, I was coming from a mindset of negativity. And shockingly enough I didn’t even come close to my goal. Not at all. And I just quit trying. I felt like a failure.
When your mindset is out of whack, like when you look in the mirror and only see the negatives. When you can only point out the parts of your body you hate. When your internal voice tells you that you aren’t good enough. When the track in your head is stuck on repeating you can’t do it… you aren’t ready to set goals. Without the right mindset goals are nothing but torture.
So before setting goals you have to ask yourself, why this goal? I like to do a brain dump. You know, set a timer for 10 minutes and just write down where you want to be in 3 years or 5 years. No grammar, no thinking, no perfection. Just write. After the timer goes off, read what you wrote. Pick 1-2 goals from the list. And then spend 10 minutes coming up with action steps that will make them happen.
From my latest brain dump, one of my goals is the Disney Princess ½ marathon. Setting a goal of running a half marathon in less than a year when I hadn’t ran in… YEARS, that would be unrealistic. It would set me up for failure and make me feel like I just couldn’t do it.
Instead I set my goal to run 3 days a week using the couch to 5k program. Then run a 5k in the fall of this year, a 10k in the spring of next year, and continue training for the entire 2020 year before running the Princess ½ the year I turn 35.
I have action steps for every single month, these are attainable, duplicatable, and reasonable for me. Which not only helps me meet my goal, but can give me a feeling of accomplishment. Which for me is very important, because feeling like I failed makes me want to just give up.
If you are ready to set real goals, and give them legs.. check out my Goal Planning Work Book here. Let’s do this together.. there is power in numbers!
Until next time –
ALL THE MAGIC,
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