Every year, millions of people set new year’s resolutions that start strong, and ultimately end up failing. This year, try something new, and make commitments, goals or New Year’s resolutions that will last and have a profound impact on your life. Goal setting can be tricky. Set yourself up for success by following these 7 simple goal setting strategy tips!
These tips will help you have success in meeting your goals, but more importantly will help you set goals that are realistic.
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How Does Setting Goals Lead To Success?
On the surface the practicality of goal setting and its relativity to success is obvious.
What is most often overlooked is the relevancy of the goals you set.
Having goals, something specific that you are working towards, is the foundation to you feeling a sense of self worth, building drive and determination and achieving feelings of accomplishment.
To be successful in reaching your goals you need to set goals that are both relevant and realistic.
7 Ways To Start Planning Your New Year’s Resolutions
We’ve all been there. It’s the beginning of a new year and you want to start off strong.
You want nothing more than to start your year off in a way that is true to the goals that you have, your life vision, your morals and your beliefs.
As you go through this process, try using a simple series of steps to set yourself up for success.
Start With Reflection
Start off by taking time to reflect on last year. Here are some tips to help you start strong and be sure that your goals aren’t short sighted.
Find a quiet place, and be sure that you have at least 15 minutes to dedicate to focus on genuine reflection of the past year.
If you’re a busy mom, this may mean sneaking away to a bathroom or taking advantage of nap time. Don’t worry… the laundry can wait.
If you can, put on some quiet music that’s calming to you. Keep it low so you can barely hear it. Close your eyes and reflect on the last year.
What do you see and what do you hear?
How does it make you feel?
Now take a few minutes to reflect on what you wanted to do. If you have your goals that you set last year, look over those. Go ahead and check off the things that you accomplished.
Understanding what you succeeded at and what you want to build on from last year can be helpful in setting your goals.
Build On Last Year’s Goals
Are the goals that you set last year still relevant?
It’s not uncommon to set goals based on how we’re feeling at the moment that you’re writing them.
That isn’t always a bad thing, but it’s important to keep in mind that the goals that you set and New Year’s resolutions should be life goals.
They should align with your morals and how you generally want to live your life.
Use Visualization To Set Your Goals Or New Year’s Resolutions
Next, consider what it is that you would like to accomplish.
I am a huge believer in using visualization to realize your goals and your dreams.
If you’ve never done this before, it’s probably going to feel a little weird as you do it for the first time. It’s so worth it though.
This is how it works.
Close your eyes and see yourself at the end of the year. Imagine yourself at your best.
There are so many questions that you can ask yourself to get a better understanding of what you are seeing in your visualization.
Here are some to help you get started:
- What are you doing?
- How do you look?
- What facial expressions are you making?
- How do you feel?
- What are you wearing?
- Where are you?
Using visualization is truly about seeing yourself in that moment of true success.
When you see yourself in detail as you are meeting your goal it makes meeting your goals that much more possible and tangible.
Here’s the thing. You don’t want to set yourself up for failure by envisioning yourself in 10 years, and setting goals for 10 years from now.
TIP: Set yourself up for success in meeting your goals by using intentional visualization with a limited timespan. Focus on the coming year.
Be sure to focus on the end of the year, or sometime throughout the current year that you’re setting goals for.
Remember you can always add more goals once you’ve reached success and met your New Year’s resolutions.
Consider Potential Pitfalls
It’s important to consider your values and how they align with your goals. You and only you can decide what that looks like.
For example, one of my goals this year is to be more present in every moment.
I am a type A personality, and an overachiever which doesn’t always align for being present in every moment. So, this year I will be sure that my goals don’t create obstacles for me around my presence, and state of mind.
What is most important to you? Is there anything that you’ve made a commitment to and can’t have other obstacles prevent you from doing that one thing?
Keep It Simple
Just like anything you want to make sure that the goals that you’re setting are realistic and achievable. You also want to make sure that you’re not setting so many goals that it’s impossible to meet them.
If you reach all of your goals and you’re only eight months into the year there’s nothing saying you can’t go back and create your new goals.
You can even add new goals as you finish them that relate to that very same New Year’s resolution.
For example, if one of your goals, or New Year’s resolutions was to read 12 books on self care, and you finish that. In July, you could add a new goal. When you finish that one the goal could become more specific.
You could set a new goal of reading three books on each self care pillar. The point here is, don’t make so many goals that you set yourself up for failure.
Life is going to be going on all around you. Leave yourself time to enjoy it!
Don’t Expect Perfection
All too often we set unrealistic expectations because of an expectation of perfection.
Let’s just get this out in the open air. You are not perfect. I am not perfect. None of us are perfect. We are going to fail, we are going to fall short of our goals sometimes, that’s just part of life.
You could think of it this way. If you don’t fall short of your goals, how are you supposed to learn?
We learn the most in the moments when we don’t achieve “that thing” that we’ve set out to do. Our failures tend to be our biggest learning moments.
So rather than looking at not meeting a goal as a failure, look at it as an opportunity.
Harness The Power Of Yet | Growth Mindset
In everything in life it’s important to have a growth mindset.
Rather than saying, “I wasn’t able to lose the weight this year” try saying, “I haven’t lost the weight yet.”
Or maybe your goal or your new New Year’s resolution was to volunteer, twice a month.
And for whatever reason you just weren’t able to do that. Rather than saying, I didn’t meet my goal for volunteering.
You could say, I haven’t been able to manage my calendar to volunteer twice a month yet.
You see the power of the word yet is significant.
Just be sure that as you focus on the power of yet, that you remember you can achieve anything that you set out to do.
So as you create your new year’s resolutions, or your goals for the year be sure to walk through these steps.
And most importantly of all, give yourself grace. Perfection is not a realistic expectation.
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