Where Are you Going? What Do You Want?
How do you get there if you don’t know where you’re going?
January is over, and New Year resolutions are dying a slow death. As a coach, I’ve come across many people who make resolutions with the best of intentions. It can be hard to get started, never mind keep the momentum. That surge of motivational energy you feel in January (or whatever time) quickly dwindles, and you’re left with a gym contract you’ll never use again.
Where are you going and what do you want?
It would help if you had a map to get from A to B. This is where setting goals comes in! Powerful goal-setting isn’t as directionless as a New Year resolution and should mean something to you.
How do you set powerful goals, you ask?! Well, hold on, and I’ll tell you!
SMART goals may be a term you’ve heard before, but do you know what they are? It means each goal should be:
- Specific — What exactly is it that you want to achieve? i.e. “I want to lose 10lbs” instead of “I want to lose weight.”
- Measurable — How will you know you’ve achieved your goal? If you want to lose 10lbs, you’d need to weigh yourself at the start and throughout your journey.
- Achievable — Can you achieve your goal? If you are an overweight person, 10lbs is very doable; however, if you are already very lean, 10lbs may not be appropriate. Don’t set yourself up for failure. You might make the goal too easy on the other side of the scale (no pun intended). Challenge yourself.
- Realistic — It’s all well and good to set goals, but they need to be relevant to your situation now. Is your goal achievable given your circumstances right now?
- Timebound — Set a date to achieve your goal. If you don’t have a timeframe to achieve your goals, they’ll be no urgency or need to put your all into it. Remember to be realistic when setting this.
Make sure you write these down and keep them close by. Look at your goals every day.
Reward yourself!
Everyone wants a trophy. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to reward yourself when you’ve worked hard! So make sure you factor in a reward. I would say that it’s a good idea to NOT reward yourself with something that can be damaging to your hard work. For example, you spend a month fighting the urge to have a double chocolate muffin. You kick the habit only to ‘reward’ yourself with a double chocolate muffin! And so the circle carries on. I like to reward myself with a trip to the cinema as it’s not something I do as often as I would like.
The bottom line is that you plan to fail if you fail to plan. SMART goals help you clarify what you want, and the reward(s) will make it exciting!
Be SMART; get out there and do it!
Your coach,
Michelle Lyons