Body Mind Matters: New Beginnings, Part Three

Are you a morning, afternoon, or evening person? If you have to do something that goes against your nature in order to achieve a goal, like taking a class in the evening when you are a morning person, how can you support your nature with the care and attention it needs when it is challenged? Will you need to rest before that class or the next day? Tune into what you will need to do to if circumstances arise that have you at odds with you natural rhythm or style.

Honor Your Circumstances
Be optimistic and realistic when you create your goals by noticing what is currently going on in your life. What’s happening right now that you need to take notice of? Like my client who wanted to start running again, are there certain factors in your life that may be new or perhaps not changing for a while? Looking at these factors and adjusting the steps or schedule of your goal will help you feel more satisfied along the way. In other words, you are where you are in life and sometimes the things you have to adjust for are pleasant and sometimes there is tragedy or heartbreak to account for. Either way, you can keep moving towards your goals if you’re realistic about the circumstances such as time, health, state of mind, or work schedule.

Anchor Your Goals
When you’re thinking about the goals you want for yourself, anchor them in the pleasure of self-care. Sometimes we create goals that will bring an immediate feeling of achievement and sometimes our gratification will be delayed. Getting a degree, finishing a book, working on a relationship, or losing weight are examples of delayed gratification. It’s important to remind yourself somehow along the way that both this goal and you are worth the energy you are putting out. Verbal or written statements about how proud you are of your effort or that you honor yourself for taking each difficult step will keep you moving towards what you want.

Validate Your Achievements
This strategy is very often overlooked, yet is vital to the goal achievement process.

I often ask my clients to do acknowledgment homework, which means they have to come in with a written list of accomplishments they noticed during the week. You would not believe the resistance and sometimes lack of faith I ran into when I assigned this!