Setting Realistic and Sustainable Goals
It's finally 2023! And as January rolls in so do New Year resolutions and big plans for the coming year.
In this month’s blog I talk about how to set realistic and sustainable goals for the year ahead and beyond.
The most common goals around this time of year are:
To lose weight
To get fit
To get stronger and/or more flexible
These are all common goals, yet they don't necessarily set you up to succeed as they generally aren't specific enough. It's so common in January for people to set broad goals, fall off the bandwagon, not achieve them, leaving them feeling discouraged and frustrated. Does that sound familiar to you?
Likewise, setting a goal that is too great, (lose 10 kgs in one month kind of goals) can leave you feeling like every time you set a goal you are destined to fail.
When setting your goals, it can be helpful to ask yourself some of the following questions. This allows you to dig deeper into what your goals are, and why you want to achieve them.
What action steps do you need to put into place to lose weight?
What does getting fit look like on a daily basis?
How can you measure your strength and/or flexibility to know that you've all improved?
All these questions dig a little deeper into specific goals and set you on a path to achieving them over the long term.
In this blog, we'll look at some of the ways in which you can reframe the way you set goals and feel proud and motivated with what you have achieved.
How to set realistic and sustainable health goals?
One of the ways to set goals is with the SMART method. This stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Timely.
Let's look at these more closely:
Specific:
A specific goal is clear, concise and strategic.
Specific goals answer the 6 “W questions”:
Who ~ who is involved?
What ~ what do you want to accomplish?
Where ~ where will you complete the goal?
When ~ when do you want to achieve it?
Which ~ what obstacles might stop you from achieving your goals?
Why ~ why are you doing it?
Measurable:
A measurable goal is one that measures your progress, so it is clear whether you have achieved it or not. Seeing progress also helps with motivation and staying on track, particularly with larger or longer-term goals.
Achievable:
Is your goal achievable? Whilst your goal should challenge you, you also don't want it too far out of reach and therefore unachievable.
Realistic:
For effective SMART goal setting, you want your goals to be realistic. These types of goals are those that if improving your current habits, you will be willing and able to achieve these goals.
Timely:
A timely goal has a time frame. That way it is clear what direction and in what amount of time it will take you to achieve your goal. The timing can be adjusted along the way. Research has shown that if you don't have a timeframe on a goal, it is less likely to be achieved.
Here’s an example of setting SMART goals for Health:
As an example, let's use the common goal of 'getting fit".
A 32 year old woman wants to get fit as her goal for 2023.
When we dug a little deeper into this, here is what her answers looked like
Goal - Get fit in 2023
Specific:
Who, What, Where, When, Which, Why?
I will do regular exercise 3 times a week for 30 minutes at the local gym. Why am I doing it? Because I have a 4 year old daughter and I want to be able to keep up with her at the park.
Measurable:
I will use my fitness watch to track my progress.
Attainable:
I will schedule it into my calendar on Mondays, Thursdays and Saturdays. If I have events or holidays on the weekends, then I will do Monday, Wednesday and Fridays.
Realistic:
30 minutes seems manageable at the moment, I can always reassess at 3, 6 months and increase the time or intensity if needed.
Timely:
I will workout 3 times a week for 30 minutes for 3 months and then reassess my progress and goals.
By using SMART goal setting, she will have a plan to follow and a way of tracking her progress towards her goal of getting fit.
For me personally, 2022 was a big year. I was running my Yoga and Mat Pilates studio completely solo after both of my instructors had moved on to other things. I was teaching 10 classes a week plus taking care of the admin and marketing while still working 35 hours per week at my “normal” job. I was also running Restorative Yoga workshops every couple of months.
In January of 2022 I made the choice to temporarily close the studio for the whole month due to a massive covid outbreak at my workplace. I did this as I didn’t want to take the risk of sharing anything more than my love of Pilates and Yoga with my clients (if you get my drift).
This meant phoning and emailing all of my regulars and letting them know that it would be Zoom only classes for the entire month. I also had to turn my (non-airconditioned) home yoga space into a recording studio so I could host the Zoom classes.
Around July, I joined forces with Harmonic Essence and began offering monthly Yin Yoga and Sound Bath sessions in my local area.
In October, my partner and I began renovating our very old kitchen and laundry and replacing most of the floor coverings in the house. As anyone who has done this sort of thing before, it is not always smooth sailing - especially with an older house. Thankfully most of it is done now, with just a few finishing touches left to go.
Unfortunately for most of 2022, I was also dealing with ongoing health issues which seemed to be getting worse instead of better. Sadly, this meant I had to make the very difficult decision to close the studio and take a 3 month break to allow me to focus on improving my health, while working out a more realistic and sustainable way forward with the business.
It was not something I did lightly as I really loved teaching the classes and spending time with my wonderful clients.
(I do plan to resume teaching later in 2023, but on a much smaller scale for the time being, so stay tuned for updates.)
In 2023, my main focus and goal is to schedule in regular time to look after my physical and mental health.
One of the ways in which I am going to achieve this is to begin a daily meditation practice.
I have outlined what that looks like for me using the SMART method below:
Goal: Start a daily meditation practice
Specific:
I will meditate for 10 minutes every morning as soon as I get out of bed (and after I feed my cats). Why am I doing this? To give myself some quiet time and set a clear intention for how I would like my day to unfold. This will also help manage my stress levels, which will have a positive flow on effect for both my physical and mental health
Measurable:
I will set a reminder on my phone and mark off each day when I have completed my meditation.
Achievable:
I can easily find 10 minutes in my morning routine if I prepare my work meal and work clothes the night before and getting up 10 minutes earlier is easy for me as my cats are usually asking to be fed well before I am out of bed.
If for any reason I miss a morning, I can always find 10 minutes in my lunch break or when I get home from work
Realistic:
I am willing to set my alarm 10 minutes early in order to make meditation a regular part of my day. I am well aware of the benefits of doing this, so for me it is worth the effort. I am also open to reassessing in 3 months time if I would like to increase the amount of time spent in meditation or if I would like to add in a morning AND evening session.
Timely:
I will commit to giving this a try for the next 3 months. At the end of the 3 months I will evaluate my progress and decide if I need to change or reassess my goals
I share my goals in the hope it inspires you to set your own SMART goals for 2023.
If you would like to share, I'd love to hear what they are! You can send me an email or over to my Facebook or Instagram page and share your goals for 2023 and lets help keep each other accountable
Sam