Tired of Not Meeting Health Goals? Strategies to Set Winning Goals
Several months ago, I set the goal for myself to start exercising much more regularly. My habits had kind
of dwindled since COVID, and I wasn't going to the gym like I had been for the years prior.
I set the goal to exercise every day. I can tell you, this was not a successful goal, I completely failed at this.
I failed is because I did not set the right goal.
This is what I'm talking about today on the podcast. I'll give you several tips to make sure you're setting the right goal for you!
Transcript of the Episode
Andrea here with another episode of adventures and feeding my family. Several months ago, I set the goal for myself to start exercising much more regularly. My habits had kind of dwindled since COVID. And I wasn't going to the gym like I had been for the years prior. And my exercise was really not what I wanted wanted it to be, and I didn't feel as strong. So I set the goal to exercise every day. And I can tell you, this was not a successful goal, I completely failed at this. And you know, want to know why I failed is because I did not set the right goal. This is what we're talking today. And we're kind of putting things through the wringer. And making it so that we can really set goals that we're going to win at and set ourselves up for success. This is what we're talking about in my new upcoming group coaching series. It's six weeks starting on 28th. That's going to be on Wednesdays for six consecutive weeks. And we are starting out by setting and establishing one goal. But not just any goal, not a goal. That's like a wishy washy, non concrete goal. This is something that is going to be really specific. And we're going to take it through this multi step process to drill down and make sure we have the right goal for you. After that, we'll continue to refine that goal and make sure that it's it's the right one. But those subsequent weeks are really about accountability, and making sure that you are putting that goal into action. So if you've been frustrated by your health habits, your eating habits, and you want to finally make a change, this is the forum for you. adventures and feeding my family is a weekly podcast discussing the challenges and fun around feeding your family healthy meals. I'm Andrea Heyman, and I've been a registered dietician for over 25 years. So I know the importance of good nutrition. But I'm also a mom of three so I understand the challenges and humor that comes along with trying to make this happen. In this podcast, I'll share my tips, tricks and menus, but also share the stories and food prep failures that come along the way to interview guests, we'll discuss family food traditions, how to strengthen bonds around the family table, as well as their favorite family recipes. There isn't one right way to feed your family. But there are countless stories, you can take bits and pieces and learn from all of them. I really do think that setting the right goal is kind of the key to being successful in changing your health habits. And I've got a few tips to kind of the the things that I see that are red flags, or like certainties for not having successful behavior change. And this is happens like with the first step in setting the goal, a lot of times our goals are really vague in general. And let's put this through the process. These are the several things that I see that are kind of the failures in setting your goal. The first one is that you don't believe that you can actually achieve your goal. Yeah, this is something that you really have to think about. And be honest with yourself. Sometimes if we've had so many failures on the road to health and improved eating habits, that we don't really believe that we can finally lose weight, or Finally, you know, completely change our eating habits. So this is really the biggest roadblock. If you don't believe that you can achieve your goal. No surprise here, you're not going to achieve your goal. So that belief should be the first thing that you focus on. And if your goal for example, is to lose 50 pounds, but you don't really believe that that is a realistic goal because you've never done it before or whatever other reason, then a more appropriate goal maybe to lose five pounds or seven pounds. And if that is believable, then that is the goal that you should set for yourself. If you have a lot of resistance about the goal that you're setting Then you often overthink it and ultimately unconsciously sabotage your efforts. Do you really want to ask yourself? Is it too much of a stretch? Do you really believe that the goal that you're setting is possible for you? That is, first and foremost, number one. The second thing I want you to ask yourself is, if you have a strong enough reason to meet the goal that you set. So if you are setting a goal, because society is telling you to do so, or your mother or friends and family around you, but it's not really what you want to do, you are not going to meet that goal. You need to have a strong purpose. And a lot of times understanding what the consequences are of not meeting that goal is a good way to go about it. So you want to think about who does the goal benefit. If it benefits yourself and other people, it's absolutely easier to achieve. Another way to say this is to really get clear on your why without a why or if the Why is not your own reason or your own, why, then it's not going to feel right, and you're really not going to meet that goal that you're setting. So we are most driven to avoid pain and avoid the consequences. And we want to avoid those consequences in a healthy way. So saying things like I should do this, or something like that is a really doesn't work. If you've got should in your sentence of your goal, then I can tell you straight up that that is not a strong enough why or a strong enough reason, I can tell automatically that you don't believe that it's a strong enough reason for you to work toward. Thirdly, I really recommend writing your goals down. There is a strong link between the written word and your subconscious mind. writing things is more powerful than just thinking the goal. You want to put effort into your goal, tell someone else your goal is even stronger than just thinking about the goal. So really putting it out there, whether it's to pen and paper, or telling others so that you are more accountable, you're putting it out in the world that you want to achieve this goal. The next mistake I see a lot is that you weren't specific about the goal. People will tell me, Andrea, I want to change my eating habits. Okay, well, what does that really mean? I don't even know if the people that are setting that goal really know what that means. And so without a very specific plan and specific goal, you can get tripped up and really get stuck because it's almost like that's kind of vague goal can change from day to day. Now it's okay, if you want to edit your goal, there's no perfect, you can edit it and refine it. Over time. You can do that every day or every week for a while. And sometimes just starting, it will help you become clear on what the goal really should be. Another mistake I see a lot is setting too many goals. It really depends on the individual. But in my experience, people can really only handle one goal at a time. Once they add one goal and establish it as part of their new habit, then they can add another but if you set too many goals, where are you supposed to focus your energy, it's really a recipe for failure to spread yourself too thin. I like to encourage people to go deep and all in on one goal as opposed to going really shallow on a bunch of goals. Alright, this next one is sort of like the first goal but with a little twist. But I'm going to put it in here because I think it's important as well. The final goal is that you really didn't expect the goal to happen now that you really think it'll happen in the future. So think about if someone sets a new year's resolution, and they're four weeks into the new year, and they didn't, they didn't meet their goal. They've already kind of messed up and sort of thrown in the towel. So they give up and then they say okay, well next year, I will set another resolution. I'll do it then. But meanwhile they've got 11 months until the new year. So they've given up because time has passed and you have like this strict timeline and think that it can only happen at a particular time of the year. This is evidence of a lot of resistance. But if you do not think that the goal is is going to happen now. 10:02 It's not gonna happen now. Andrea Heyman 10:04 So those are the common mistakes I see when people are setting new health goals for And if you're interested in working with me, we will come up with strategies to address these common mistakes and really delve into establishing a really healthy, appropriate goal for you. We're going to do this in the pathway to new habits, six week group coaching series. And as I mentioned before, it starts on Wednesday, April 28, I would love to see you there. We are a community of women that are really supporting one another, and helping one another to get off that diet roller coaster feel better and change our perspective toward food. During our group coaching, we're going to have a workbook that takes us through how to establish the right goal. And obviously, in our group coaching, we're going to do this together and go a little bit deeper. But if you're interested in grabbing that workbook, you absolutely can I'll leave that in the show notes. And hopefully, let me know if that helps you. Even if you don't join the group coaching. I would love for you to have that and just give me some feedback and let me know if that was helpful for you. Until next time, take care