10 Steps to Empower You To Reach Your Goals
6-minute read
Can you believe it’s already 2023? I’m not sure where 2022 went but what a year. How did you go in 2022 achieving your goals? Maybe you achieved some and not others. Maybe you failed them all?
Not to worry, this article outlines 10 steps on how to ensure you stick to and achieve your 2023 goals.
What are your goals for 2023?
If you’re anything like how I or my clients used to be, your goals are focused on quick fix weight loss or physique goals that pertain to dieting and joining the gym. Every year, you make the same commitment to yourself, that you’ll lose those stubborn kilos. That this year will be different, you promise yourself, this year I WILL stick to my diet and exercise plan and I will have my dream body.
Yet every year, midway through January that motivation starts to falter, the diet starts to slip, instead of going to the gym 5 times a week you’re going 3 and eventually it all stops. Potentially ending in a binge episode or not exercising for a few months before you get that spurt of motivation again to start your new diet. And the cycle continues. Because this diet is different, this diet will work! Sound familiar?
What is keeping you stuck and stopping you from achieving your goals?
Very often, the focus is on the external meaning the weight loss, the diet plan or the exercise regime.
“Before something can change in the external world, the change must first happen in the internal world.”
This means, if you don’t change how you think or start to look at the reason why you want to lose weight, the body will unlikely change because YOU haven’t changed. If it does change, the change won’t be sustainable.
So how can you create sustainable change?
“Sustainable change comes from within, creating daily habits that become part of your life. Rather than quick fixes or short-term solutions that can leave you worse off than before you started.”
First step is to look at what’s driving you to want to make the change.
Why do you want to lose weight?
Very often, the desire to lose weight stems from deeper feelings of loneliness, lack of self-worth or not feeling loveable. Unfortunately, weight loss won’t fix your binge eating or feelings of loneliness. Focusing on weight loss is a distraction preventing you from having to sit with these uncomfortable and undesirable emotions.
Just like you, I spent years numbing my emotions, cycling from diet program to diet program trying to shape my body into a perfect chiselled physique thinking that when I lost weight I would be ‘happy, perfect, loveable………..’ But year after year I failed. With each failure, I lost a little bit more self-worth and self-love. It wasn’t until I dug into my internal world that my external world changed. No longer under nourishing myself, over exercising or bingeing, my body changed on its own and found its set point (the weight the body functions at optimally). I was able to tolerate difficult emotions and discomfort better and healed my relationship with food and my body! I have not only helped myself but using my tried and tested methods and evidence-based practice my clients have also had similar results. Results such as, overcoming limited beliefs, healing their relationship with food and their body to create a connected sense of self to eat without guilt and live authentically.
This year, instead of choosing the same goals and getting the same unsatisfactory results. I challenge you to be courageous enough to show up for yourself, to dig a little deeper and deal with what’s really going on.
10 steps to reach your goals
1. Define your values
Your values make up your identity and your identity defines or limits your success. Take 5-10 minutes now to write down and define your core values.
Some examples may include trust, communication, health, courage or integrity
2. Discover your goals and dreams
Take 10 minutes to dream. Write down whatever comes to your mind about what you want to achieve this year. Be as creative as you want without limits.
3. Choose 3 - 4 goals from the list
Choose 3-4 goals from the list to work towards this year. Are these goals in line with your values?
If you value health but are participating in programs or diets which are starving your body of nutrients, then there is an incongruence between your goals and values. You are much more likely to achieve goals which are inline with your values because they dictate what you stand for in life.
4. Create an actionable goal
Now it’s time to set a specific and actionable goal. You can't hit a target if you don’t know what it is. Not planning or setting out clear actionable goals is a definite way to sabotage your success. Knowing your outcome is the first step to achieving it. An easy way to set a goal is to follow the SMART goal procedure set out below.
Specific - What do you want?
Measurable - how will you know when you have achieved the goal?
Achievable - is this goal realistic?
Relevant - is the goal relevant to what you want to achieve?
Time based - What time frame will you complete the goal in?
To Note: outcome must focus on what you can control and not be reliant on other people as a determining factor of your success.
5. Why do you want to achieve these goals?
If you can find a strong enough reason, you will be able to get yourself to do anything. Your ‘why’ is the difference between being interested and being committed. Relying on motivation will not get you very far as motivation is conditional on emotions. As we know, emotions can change from minute to minute.
What is driving you to achieve these goals?
What will keep you on track when you feel unmotivated?
6. Write down how you would feel achieving these goals
Take a minute to think about how you would feel if you achieved these goals.
What sensations can you feel in the body?
What emotions?
7. How do you know you will absolutely achieve these goals?
Take a moment to reflect:
What tools do you have to help you?
Do you need to set up some self and/or external accountability?
Are there times in your life before you’ve achieved similar goals or overcome obstacles? Why were you successful?
8. Who do you need to become to achieve these goals?
Take a moment to reflect:
What traits and characteristics does the kind of person have who would achieve the goals you’re looking to achieve?
What attitudes, beliefs, behaviours do you need to attain to be able to successfully achieve these goals?
9. What may stop you from achieving these goals?
Take a moment to think about:
What patterns have stopped you from achieving your goals in the past e.g. emotions, thoughts, lack of planning.
What might stop you now?
How could you prepare for these obstacles?
10. Take action
Create a step-by-step plan and then TAKE ACTION.
What daily habits do you need to create to help you take action?
“Planning and tools are great but useless without action. ”
Your action doesn’t have to be perfect. Mistakes and failure are encouraged as they are just signs that there are areas to improve on in your life or tools that need to be added to the toolkit. Instead of beating yourself up for failures, ask yourself how you can improve next time.
Need some help creating your goals, accountability or overcoming obstacles? I empower you to shed the fear of failure by letting go of binge eating and self-sabotaging behaviours to reclaim your sense of self and feel comfortable in the skin you’re in.
Limited spaces opening up in my 12 week 1:1 coaching program enquire below.
If you found this article helpful why not share it with a friend.
Happy goal setting!
