The beginning of the year is one of the most tangible of beginnings: Setting and Achieveing a goal. An easy time to decide to start something new and commit to your new goal. However, many goals, while excellent in thought, are not followed through on because it takes time, effort, planning and dedication to complete. However in this article we are going to help teach you how to achieve your goals and take the guess work out of the process.
For some, new year goals may be financial or specific destinations, but for a majority of people this time of year, these goals surround health and the commitment to health. Whether it be to lose weight, quit a habit, drink less alcohol, eat healthier foods, meal plan/prep, or even more importantly, decide to figure out what is going on with your chronic health condition; no matter what your goal is, it is important to you and it has every right to be reached!
3 Steps on How to Achieve Your Goals
Commitment is defined as “the state or quality of being dedicated to a cause or activity. a pledge or undertaking.”
1. Commit to Action
First and foremost, once you decide on your goal, write that goal down! This makes the goal more concrete and palpable. When you write it down your brain is able to better comprehend it.
From there, write down your why! What is the outcome or benefit to you in creating this goal? What is the deeper meaning of your goal? When the going gets tough you can come back to your why to encourage you to keep going.
Next, plan out and write some specific actionable steps to get you there. It’s easy to have a goal, but without a road map, it’s MUCH easier to get lost! This might sound easy, but will truely taken some time and thought if you are wanting to achieve your goals this new year.
2. Accountability Partner(s)
A recent study at Ohio State University found that if you want to achieve a goal, it’s important to tell another person, however, it’s important to WHOM you tell. This study revealed that people had greater commitment and performance toward goals when they told it to someone that they believed had higher status than themselves. People demonstrated more motivation because they cared about how the higher-status person would perceive them, indicating that the important thing in finding an accountability partner is that you need care about the opinion of the person you are telling. Take accountability for yourself by telling someone else about your new commitment will be that extra boost of confidence and energy to achieve your goals.
3. Check-in Regularly
Checking in with yourself, your goals, your action steps and with your accountability partner regularly and consistently is extremely important to success. Whether it is daily, weekly or monthly, figure out a time frame that makes most sense for you and your goals and mark it in your calendar. Checking in helps you assess how far you’ve come, make sure you’re hitting your guidelines and make further plans to keep you on track. These regular intervals also allow you to refresh and revise your goals, reminding you why you made these goals and if you need to amend the ones that are of lower priority. Without these check-ins it’s easy to lose sight of your progress and your goals.
How to do a check in:
- What’s going well? What are you proud of?
- What’s not going well? Is anything holding you back?
- Refresh and revise – Is your goal still resonating and feeling right or does your goal need editing?
- Connect back to your why – Remind yourself why this goal is important to you. Tying your goal to a greater outcome or meaning helps to keep pushing you forward. Identify specific action steps – Plan out (meaning write down) your next steps to continue moving forward with ease. This encourages your brain to remember and commit to the step.
- Carve out time to work on your goal – You must plan specific times in your schedule to work on your goal otherwise there is a greater likelihood that the action steps will not get done. Of course life happens, but when you actually make time in your schedule for say, a weekly workout, there is a higher chance you will actually do it.
- Schedule your next check-in – Choose a date and time and put it in your calendar!
What is your commitment to your health this year?
What do you want to achieve?
How do you want to feel?
What are you willing to do to get there?
No matter what you decide, we are here to support you and help you acheive your goals year-round and help you find solutions to make the steps and check-ins simple and attainable.
