So 2022, we are all hoping that it will be better than 2021 I'm sure! Looking at what I would like to achieve this year and where I would like to be by the end of it, it seems like a mountain to climb.
I have had trouble in the past with goal setting, mostly because I have never understood how to do it properly and effectively. I do tend to stick to resolutions I make, but I do struggle. I have recently been learning more about how to effectively set goals and achieve them - so as it's that time of year I thought I would share what I have found out. Here are the things I have learned, I am NOT an expert but if you are thinking about a resolution this week I hope this blog post is helpful :)
Align With Yourself
Something that has really helped me in deciding my goals for 2022 is learning more about myself and my personality. I recently did a number of courses with the Personal Development School which I found enlightening. Although there was nothing in particular on goal setting, there was an interesting section on how personality needs impact you achieving a goal or not.
The course was all about discovering your personality needs and the strategies we have to try and fill these needs. We can develop good or bad strategies to meet our needs, sometimes we can curb a bad habit by replacing it with a good one to fulfill the same need.
The 6 basic human needs we all have are
1. Love and connection, 2. Significance, 3. Growth, 4. Contribution, 5. Certainty, 6. Uncertainty. Depending on which of this is the most or least significant can determine a large proportion of someones personality, hobbies and daily life.
If we are not aware of what our needs are, we can end up developing bad habits to try and meet a need we are not even aware of. Some good examples of this are if you have a high need for love and connection you might binge watch reality TV to connect to the characters.
If this same person then wanted to have a new years resolution to loose weight, if they were aware of the importance of love an connection to them, they could incorporate this into the goal. This would mean they are more likely to stick to it. For example a person with a very high need for love and connection may not be motivated to go to the gym and work out every morning - but they would be motivated to go to classes where they can be social and connect with others.
Little by Little
Lavendaires videos on YouTube on goal setting and how to achieve goals have really helped me understand how to set and achieve goals. She explains how to structure your day to incorporate little actions that move you slowly towards these goals. I liked this idea as I often feel overwhelmed by goals I set and struggle to reach them or I just stop once a certain weight or financial target has been reached. Focusing more on daily actions as she explains, helps form new habits. Our thoughts and actions once they are repeated create new neural pathways in the brain. So if we want to form new positive habits, slowly strengthening our positive associations day by day can help, long term, build a better life.
She recommends breaking down your goal into smaller chunks, setting 12,6,3 month goals along with the daily action that will get you to this goal. So if you wanted to have £2000 in an emergency fund by the end of the year, how would you action this daily? I really like this concept of structuring your day into little bite-sized chunks all aimed at taking you to where you would like to be.
Don't Be a Tyrant
Building off the previous idea, I also wanted to mention something that Jordan Peterson said that I have always remembered. He said, and I paraphrase, 'don't be a tyrant'; this was all about learning to bargain with yourself and motivate yourself without punishing yourself - which I don't think is spoken about enough. So many of us (me) when we are trying to reach a goal force ourselves to do things that are horrible like get up at 5.30 and go to the gym or scrimp and save to the point where we don't enjoy our lives anymore. Remembering that we don't need to punish ourselves to be motivated is an important part of goal setting.
Our goals, ultimately should help enrich our lives and bring us more meaning and happiness and that means rewarding and encouraging ourselves along the way. If you tyrannize yourself too much you can end up damaging your relationship to yourself and even loosing trust and confidence in yourself - so watch out!
Find Balance
In the past I have been guilty of of over-focusing on achieving my goals in one specific area of life while not addressing bad habits in other areas. This is easily done, especially if you are an all or nothing type of person; however, you don't want to end up sacrificing other things in relation to a goal that you are over-focusing on. When setting goals this year I will be setting one for each of:
The 7 Areas of Life
1) Career
2)Relationships
3)Financial
4) Mental
5)Spiritual
6)Emotional
7) Physical
(8 ECO?)
If we don't set a goal for each area then it is too easy for our lives to become unbalanced and we start to feel stressed and ultimately don't build the life we want. I am guilty of this, in the past I over-focus on one thing and let other things slide... but no more!
Get Control
Another tip I learned recently that I need to work on is focusing on goals I can control rather than goals that require something from other people. An example of this could be, for example, if I have a bad relationship with my neighbor (I don't) I could set the goal to improve relationship with my neighbor - but they might still hate me! A better way to set this goal would be, when I see my neighbor I will make an effort to be friendly and stay calm. As this is something I have complete control over so even if my relationship with my neighbor doesn't improve, I won't damage my own confidence by feeling like I have failed. I loved this idea and will be using this moving forward in all my goals!
I hope you all enjoyed this blog post, I know it inst the usual content but I do like to share new things I am learning from time to time that have helped me! I hope these tips help you reach all your goals for this new year :)
(lastly, I am having trouble with the blogger platform atm - move to wordpress pending so sorry to anyone who keeps seeing posts that have not been updated!)
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