New Year: New Goals!
By: Claire Duarte
Happy 2020! The new year is upon is! A new year can bring about an the desire for change, a fresh start, and new beginnings. I used to try and make my “New Year’s Resolution” each year, especially when my parents would go around to each of my siblings at the dinner table asking us what we wanted to do to change that year. So it instilled the idea in me that each new year is a time for change. I don’t disagree with that concept but what becomes challenging is that over time, we have learned to place such an emphasis on figuring out how to create change in the new year. For many of us, sometimes that means we want to try and change EVERYTHING, all at once! Which can be very overwhelming and often results in burning out quickly and ultimately not reaching the goals we have set.
Over the years, I have set many goals and created a variety of “change” in my life and I have found that regardless of what time of year it is - you can truly only change ONE THING about yourself at a time. For all you multi-taskers (like me!) this may seem shocking. “What do you mean I can only focus on one thing at a time? Have you seen what I’m capable of at home?!” (picture: music playing, scrolling through phone on social media, laptop up with emails, making breakfast, packing bag for the day, turning over laundry, etc.) You get the picture. The point is, our brains can truly only designate a certain amount of focus for each task we give it. So YES, you may be capable of multitasking at home/school/work/etc., (and maybe you do it well! Like I pretend to think) but in order to find success in goal setting, it is often easier to focus on creating a clear path to your goal and going one step at a time. If you do set multiple goals at once, it is essential to have a game plan and clear stepping stones to reach those goals.
While the new year brings about a large sense of ambition and change, it is always better to start by focusing on changing ONE THING at a time!
EXAMPLE:
Goal: I want to wake up earlier (We’ve heard this one before)
Instead of throwing a million tasks at yourself like: start going to the gym, starting a brand new morning routine, using a new planner, etc, start slow and make your goal realistic. While these all sound like great things to do, these tasks in and of themselves can actually be very difficult to implement in the long run especially if you change too much at once. It’s challenging to create a new LASTING habit, which is the whole point of making a change in the first place.
So here are a few tips to slowly start taking action by implementing steps toward real change that you can maintain!
TIPS:
CHOOSE YOUR GOAL: This may sound obvious, but it’s an important step. If you really want to go BIG with this, I recommend even creating a vision board. It can be as simple as using something like this Dry-erase board combo, where you tack on pictures, words, and any other visual reminders of what it is you are working towards. There is a lot of research on the power of visual goal-reminders and how writing out your goals can truly help you towards reaching them! When setting a goal, you want to make sure it is a realistic one and that it is very clear and specific, this will make it more attainable.
WHAT IS YOUR WHY: This is a step many people will skip, and I get it, because I definitely avoided this for years (or just simply did not know that I should do this when goal-setting). When setting goals with students and clients (including myself!), I always ask them what they would like to work on. They respond with words like “I would like to do __” or “I want to do ____” or “I want to improve ___”. The problem is that “would” and “want” are wish words. If you leave your goals in the “wish” state, it will be a lot harder to create actual change. If you can connect your goal to your WHY, aka, WHY you want to achieve this and what it means to you, you automatically give your goal so much more meaning and power. **Bonus: if you actually write your WHY down next to your goal, it becomes even greater!**
START SMALL: Once you have your goal and WHY outlined, start small! I even did this myself this year. Who doesn’t come out of the holidays wanting to clean up their eating and nutrition a bit?! So instead of saying “January 1st I will do XYZ to get back on track”, I instead took the day to relax and unwind with family, cleaned up my house, gave myself a deadline of when I would start cleaner eating, then I started researching new recipes, meal planning, and looked at the rest of my week and month to make my plan.
SET MINI-GOALS: Once you have picked the first thing you are going to work on, start setting MINI-GOALS. You can’t learn a new language without learning 1 word first. I know we live in a GO-GO-GO world where we want instant gratification, but change and new habits don’t work like that. So start small! If you have to take it day by day, do it! Use a calendar (or print out your google calendar each week) and create a visual for yourself to check off each day! Or focus on one thing a week (something I have been implementing myself this year).
CREATE DEADLINES: A few years ago, I was told to attach deadlines to my goals. This was scary at first, because I thought “oh these are goals that will take me months to achieve, how do you think I will get this done any faster?!” At the time, I had a mentor that truly believed in me, and she urged me to set my goal-dates A LOT earlier than I had picked for myself. Funny thing, it worked. We are not always the greatest assessors of our own time, but I challenge you to set dates of when you want to achieve your goal.
PRAISE YOURSELF: This might seem a little odd, because a lot of us may not be great about giving ourselves praise or pats-on-the-back, but it’s okay to celebrate yourself and your small wins along the way! Whether that be in the form of treating yourself to a night out with friends, new shoes, new video game, etc., having a fun little reward can make the work fun!
Some other great books and reading that I find super helpful when working towards goal-setting and change are:
The 12 Week Year, by Brian Moran
Happy New Year and Happy New Decade!