Goals: You Can’t Set It And Forget It!
Goal setting is something I used to teach teenagers on sailboats in the summertime. Goals are important and more importantly they need to be attainable.
Most of the time it’s about incremental changes to reach your goals, and it’s about focusing on mini goals that help you reach the final target. It is so easy to make excuses on why we can’t achieve our goals but really at the end of the day…they are excuses. I’ve been making excuses lately about why I can’t stay on my diet and exercise plan.
“Just started Blue Gypsy, Inc. I don’t have time to work out.” “We’re moving soon, my whole routine is thrown off.” “My clients come first.” “The day just got away from me.” “It’s genetic, both my parents are big.” “I used to lead a more active lifestyle when I worked on boats.” “I’m getting older, my metabolism is slowing down.” Do any of these excuses sound familiar to you?
The thing is, here we are mid-March and I’ve abandoned my goals of 5 pounds a month because I’ve made these excuses to myself and put everything else before my health. But, I’ll do better work for my clients, and have more clarity with my business, if, first, I take care of myself.
The other thing I know about myself is that I eat healthier when I write down everything I’m eating. Then I’m less likely to put needless junk in my mouth because I’m much more accountable to the list. “But I don’t have time to write everything down…” Another excuse.
Lastly, I have a shelf full of great books on both my industry, New Home Sales, and my interests, Social Media and yet they never get more than a glance. “I don’t have enough time to read a book.” Sound familiar?
So I’ve employed my skills of multi-tasking and a few great tools to help me put the excuses on the shelf and get down to some personal business. I have a treadmill. I thought I had to run on it. Everyone says run if you want to lose weight. But you know what, I HATE running. But it elevates up to 40 degrees. I was in the best shape of my whole life after hiking in Nepal. So I set the treadmill on a slow steady uphill pace and walk…for an hour…and read a book…for an hour….and burn 500 calories.
It’s tough, I’m sweating, I’m reading, and I’m burning, but best of all I feel that much better afterward and can focus for the rest of the day. And because of my new iphone I have an ap now (thanks to a friend who was telling me I was making excuses) called Lose It! Where I can log all the food I eat and the exercise I do and it calculates the calories I need to burn in order to lose the weight I want at the rate I want to “Lose it!”
Goals are important, and if you can achieve your work goals but not your personal goals then you aren’t balancing your life. I find that I’m a workaholic and focus on those work goals no problem, but when it comes to myself, I fall short. The secret is balancing both of those things for a happy life.
With goals, you can’t just set it and forget it! Have you let anything slip since your New Years resolutions? Okay I’m off to grab a book and climb a mountain.