Understand why you want them
It’s necessary to understand your motivations. Do you just want to brag about how many reps you can do? Does it sound cool to say you run 5k races?
Reasons like these are too shallow to motivate you long term. Your goals should connect back to where you’d like to go in life and what it contributes to bettering yourself. Once you make this connection, you’ll have the drive you need to do what’s necessary.
Cut yourself some slack
Don’t make excuses for yourself, but do allow yourself to change up your strategy or to even change your mind.
If you’ve gone through your list and noticed that you’d rather try that new yoga class at your local gym instead of running a marathon, that’s okay. This gets you one step closer to being aligned with your goals.
Be specific
“Losing weight” is a common goal to make. But, it’s also very vague. Nothing here designates an endgame, nor does it outline the steps to take.
Instead, try making a big goal like this into something like “I want to be able to add 2 more minutes on the treadmill every time I run.” This way, you have a more measurable process outlined and will be able to see the bigger results as you go along.
Grab an accountability partner
Sometimes we really need an external view to keep us focused on the goal ahead.
Whether it’s a family member, friend or colleague, ask someone you trust to check in with you every once and awhile. This person could help you spot obstacles as well as achievements that perhaps you couldn’t see before.
Revisit that timeline
So maybe you’ve set a month by which you’d like to be able to do 20 full push-ups.
However, if you look at this timeline first by short and long-term goals you’ll be better able to manage your expectations. Once you organize your goals this way, then schedule time in to achieve these goals. If every morning you wake up and do two more push-ups than the day before, you’re committing to putting your plan into action.
Don’t just measure progress
Be sure to also measure what actions you take to get ahead. While acknowledging when you’ve reached milestones is a great way of staying engaged, tracking what you do to achieve your plan will help you learn.
You’ll understand what methods do and don’t work for you and also where to shift things around to make time for these goals.
Celebrate the ups and downs
Reached your goal? Great! Decided not to up your weights this week? That’s fine too.
When you focus celebrating only the major accomplishments, you risk losing sight of other important moments.
Recognizing when you’ve been set back will only help you be more aware as you progress towards your end goals. In the end, you’ll be stronger.
At the end of the day, goal setting and achieving is a process. Don’t forget to express gratitude to yourself for working towards the things that will ultimately help you lead a more fulfilled life.