My last two blog posts have been a lot about why I no longer make New Years Resolutions and why I think you can achieve greater success without them through committing to longer term goals and then reviewing them regularly. Did you miss them – Check them out here and here!
Part of the success of goal setting is ultimately creating a plan for success. It is all good and well to have the vision and goals, but without the plan in place to make them happen they are really just wish lists on a page or in your head. Also, your goals and vision should ultimately be underpinned by your values – these are what YOU consider to be the most important things in your life.
Therefore, as an example, if you are saying the most important things in your life are your family, friends and health, then your vision for what your life looks like should also be aligned to these, as should the plan you then put in place to achieve them. Often though, this is where we fall down. We create these amazing vision boards, goals lists etc, but we don’t commit to the changes we need to make in order to then achieve them.
Show me your schedule and I will show you your values.
I used to fall victim to this ALL the time. I would say to myself regularly that my health and my relationships were hands down the most important things to me, yet day after day I would roll late from work exhausted, grumpy, and often having barely eaten for the day. I wouldn’t make plans at night because I’d assume I would have to work. Then, because I didn’t make any plans, I would work. It was a vicious cycle, but one I did to myself because I didn’t truly prioritise my values and I didn’t plan on how to deal with any obstacles that got in my way.
If I printed off my schedule back then and bucketed it up into the key themes, absolutely it would be made up of approx 60% work (that includes actual work, thinking about work, and then overthinking about work!), 30% rest/sleep and maybe 10% time for recreation. Zero time allotted to exercise, or development and growth. I did this to myself though. I allowed this to happen by not having clear boundaries to prioritise the things most important to me (and by allowing myself to overthink – if you think that might be you, check this blog post out on Overthinking!).
I dare you to do this little exercise over the next few weeks. Keep a log each day of where your hours go. Split them into the following buckets.
- Work
- Rest
- Relationships (Family and friends) + Play
- Exercise
- Development and Growth (e.g reading, learning, meditation etc)
See where you land at the end of 3 weeks and where you find your time gets spent. This will tell you your values as they currently stand.
Reflect on this log. Is it where you want it to be? Are there areas of opportunity? If so, what are they and what are you going to do about them? What changes will you make to get your schedule back in alignment with your values? I would love to hear from you on what you have found – email me at yo****@ea***************.com
This exercise is also not to say that there wont be times where your work load might be heavy and you might be “tilting” towards work more than you usually would. That is ok – it is when this lifestyle or schedule becomes the norm for us and we become completely out of sync with our own priorities that we need to step back, breathe and make some changes.
If you want to know more about what “tilting means, check out this link where I quote the article as one of my slices of inspo. CLICK HERE.
I help women get out of their own ways. I help you deal with the overthinking. The Imposter Syndrome. The self-doubt. All the things currently getting in your way of being a confident, kick a** woman. Need help? Contact me at yo****@ea***************.com and let’s see how I can help you. Our first phone consultation is completely obligation free.
