Episode 2- Setting Goals for Transformation and Growth

Transform your life one goal at a time! Ever found yourself lost in the whirlwind of motherhood or facing an identity crisis? You're not alone. Picture this: a simple act of putting up a Christmas tree became a profound moment of self-discovery for me, unveiling insights into abundance and personal growth. Join me as I share my journey from the lush landscapes of Barbados to the cozy embrace of my English country cottage, where I uncover relatable tales of transformation and invite you to explore your own path to clarity and purpose.

Unlock the secrets of effective goal setting with strategies that truly work! From the art of time boxing to the creativity of vision boarding, discover how to efficiently move from point A to point B. Learn how understanding your values and purpose can set the foundation for achieving your dreams. For those with ADHD traits or anyone struggling to identify their goals, I share personal experiences and insights from working with coaches that can illuminate your path. This episode isn't just about setting goals—it's about understanding the core of what drives you and turning that into actionable steps.

Join the conversation about realistic and specific goals, especially if you're a busy professional juggling multiple responsibilities. Witness how breaking down aspirations using frameworks like SMART can lead to success without overwhelm. From setting goals steeped in self-compassion to the idea that sometimes doing less is more, I highlight the importance of wellness and balance. Embrace the power of accountability, whether it’s through a friend or a coach, and embark on a shared journey toward long-term success. Let's support each other on Instagram, sharing tips and personal goals, as we work towards healing, growth, and sustainable transformation.

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:02

the business of lifestyle, where ambition meets alignment. Yeah, hello and welcome back to the business of lifestyle, and we've got a slightly different name than when we first aired with a working title, um, but to be honest, it's a name that I really love because it fuses the two sides of things that I guess I'm known for, which is business my entrepreneurial streak and lifestyle, which is all the things that I espouse, the virtue of travel, etc. So business of lifestyle is what we're called and I'm so glad to have you back. So I well, firstly, I just need to say thank you, because releasing the first story was obviously, as I alluded to during the episode, quite challenging for me because it was just sharing my personal story. The feedback has been amazing, so thank you so much for that, and so many women resonated with that story, not obviously the specific parts of you know, the trauma, etc. But just generally the motherhood journey, the loss of identity. I've had so many amazing conversations just off the back of that. And, yeah, healing is not a linear journey, as we know, and this podcast is not around people living their best life post PTSD or anything like that. My story is simply an example. It's one story, one woman's journey to go from A to B, and it's an example of the transformation and that's why you guys are here. Right, there is some level of transformation that most of us want to try and achieve and that is very, very topical for today's episode, which is goal setting. So what I'm not going to do is walk you through the methodologies of a positive psychology coach. As most of you will know, that's what I'm doing day to day now. There's like maybe some crossover here, but what I'm actually hopped on to talk about is my personal goal setting journey what I did, what I didn't do, what went really well and what didn't go so well at all.

Speaker 1 2:24

But well, let's firstly acknowledge the change of scenery. We are no longer in Barbados, guys, sorry about that we are filming from my home, so my country cottage in England, which I absolutely adore. You'll hear me talk about it so much on social media and across this podcast, because it's absolutely stunning and there's a really interesting story for another episode about how I actually got my hands on it. But right now we're in my kitchen. There's just you and I. It feels really comfortable to have this conversation here. Wilbur, my white Pomeranian, is dotting around somewhere in the background so he may make an appearance, but otherwise we should have the space to ourselves to just talk, real talk. So, um again, thank you so much for the feedback. It was amazing and I do invite you to please like this episode. If you're watching on YouTube, if you're listening on the podcast channels, please rate the episode as well, or please rate the episode as well, or please rate the channel the podcast, because that really does help to get the message out there, and obviously, liking each episode is super helpful. So, thank you.

Speaker 1 3:36

So I thought I would start with a brief story. We're all coming out of the festive period, which has mixed emotions for all of us, from highs to lows and everything in between, and that's very personal to you your journey, your family, the dynamics of what's going on in your life right now. But one thing that anybody that celebrates Christmas, that is one thing you would have all done, I suspect is put up a Christmas tree. Now, actually, this is a surprising example from my life how that created a bit of a trigger for me. So I have long since had this objective, and I mean a long time. I've had the same decorations or the same Christmas tree for 12 years, I think a long, long time and every Christmas I'm like oh, the same Christmas tree, the same stuff. Um, next year is going to be different. Next year I'll have all of this money. And don't get me wrong, I've been really fortunate and, you know, have very abundant periods in my life, but I've just chosen to spend my money elsewhere property, holidays, etc. And every year I'm like next year I'll have so much cash to sloshing about, I'm gonna get the perfect Christmas tree. It's gonna be some real Christmas tree, eight foot tall, all brand new, sparkly decorations. And each year that's my objective. And most years I don't get to it because it gets to December and I'm like, ah, I've got to put a Christmas tree up. Haven't done anything, or just in previous years was not in the financial position to accomplish that, even if I'd have wanted to.

Speaker 1 5:11

So this year I was a little bit negative around putting up the tree and when I did get around to it, I realised something, actually, that I thought was actually quite profound, considering what I'm talking about as a Christmas tree, and that was that, although technically I was right, I hadn't replaced this Christmas tree in 12 years and I did want all of this new stuff and this emblematic example of how abundant my life was and how together I was and how organized I was as well, because anybody else that's resonating on the ADHD scale will know that the shame that comes around for not having organized oneself in many, many areas. Anyway, this example of a Christmas tree. When I actually started to put it up, I was like, oh, that's interesting, because actually I only bought that a couple of years ago. Oh, that's interesting because that really shows I bought that, or somebody made that for me, when my daughter was born. She's only three years old, so that was actually new.

Speaker 1 6:14

And when I put the tree up in its totality, I was honestly shocked between the disconnect of what my actual Christmas tree looked like and what I had in my mind. For some reason in my mind I just thought I haven't bought any single thing for this tree for all this time. But when you looked at it, I had loads of new stuff and actually the tree. I was going to say something really corny. Then I was going to say it really lit me up. But actually it did. It really lit me up because it was a journey about my recent past. It wasn't. Yeah, don't get me wrong the lights are probably 12 years old, the trees, etc.

Speaker 1 6:49

But I had been adding to that tree. I had been making progress towards my goal of this phenomenally beautiful, picture perfect Christmas tree. But because it had come so incrementally and so naturally and so, like such run-of-the-mill stories, I hadn't had this big sweeping trip to Tiffany's or the local garden centre or wherever I thought I was going to get this stuff from. It had been little gifts that people had given me. It had been even in this last trip to Barbados. You know they were making these amazing ornaments out of shells and I was there very close to Christmas, so I bought us some. Uh, and you know what I was actually really proud of the tree in the end because incrementally, naturally, organically, it represented me, it represented my family, it represented the things that I stood for travel, beauty, you know, memories, connections with people, the way people cared for me, that have bought gifts or made things for me and my family and, yeah, that was way more important than the vision that I had in my mind. So I told you this story just because it was.

Speaker 1 8:06

We're just coming out of the Christmas season and I felt, thought it was kind of festive and I should probably just share that. But actually it does relate to today's topic on goal setting, because that's a cautionary tale to keep one's goals in line with with reality and to check them. And is that still representative? Do I really want to throw all of those ornaments out now and start again next year? Absolutely not. I've been gutted. Some of that stuff is amongst the most precious things I own when I think about it. You know the fairy has been handed down from me, from my father, whose mother gave it to him. You know that fairy is 70 something years old and you know some of those ornaments just represent precious memories. So I guess the overarching lesson from that, which is I'm just literally thinking on my feet is about not throwing the baby out with the bathwater or all of the Christmas ornaments out, with the genuine and still present goal that I have to invest heavily in the aesthetics of my Christmas scene in a year to come, and maybe 2025 will be it. Check in, guys, in December and I'll let you know how I'm going with that.

Speaker 1 9:24

Okay, so let's get into it. So what we're going to do is talk about goal setting. I'm going to give you some examples of what you could do if you've only got 10 minutes. I could give you some examples of what you could do if you've got 10 hours and I am, I guess, going to talk you through one of my biggest goals, which I'm really, really excited about, so sharing it with you for the first time here.

Speaker 1 9:51

So, when I sat down and I did one of my business goals, it was to heal 100 women. Now that goal lights me up so much. If I am sat here at the end of 2025 and I have healed 100 women and I've been part of their journey to help towards healing, I will be so lit up and I'll be so happy and all of you are part of that. Like you know, if this podcast can resonate with any other women that you know or my work could help, you know it's part of, obviously, I've launched my one-to-one coaching session. So, yes, it's part of my business, which is why it's sat under a business goal for me, but it's not purely. You know I don't have the capacity to one-to-one coach 100 women, so it's much more broad than that. It's much more far-reaching, more exciting and, yeah, please follow me along with this journey and, you know, let me know how I can help and we're going to do this together. So that was one of the goals and an example for me.

Speaker 1 10:53

But when I started to do this, I took a multiple approach because I really had it in my head towards the end of December that I wanted to have my goals written down by New Year's Eve. If I'm honest, that wasn't necessarily coming from a hugely healthy place because it was an arbitrary date. Right. There is no reason why we're doing this in January and, by the way, this episode will ring as true in March and July as it does right now. But I know there's a lot of focus around goal setting right now, so please take the pressure off. If this doesn't feel aligned with you right this minute, I'm sure you'll get value out of listening to it, but come back to this episode whenever you want to set goals. So I only had 10 minutes spare. So that's what I did.

Speaker 1 11:37

I did a 10 minute practice which was literally not following any of the positive psychology coaching methodologies. It was literally take down a pen and paper. For me I use an electric version of that. I'm obsessed with my remarkable. So take out my remarkable and write two lists. Very simple two lists five minutes. Each One is personally what's aligned for me? Two was professionally what are my goals in each of those categories? And I ended up with three business goals. I won't talk you through in this episode what they are. Three business goals and seven personal goals that's quite a lot. That's quite a meaty, ambitious number. But because I'm coming off the back of doing quite a bit of work already in a lot of these areas, it wasn't unrealistic and I think that's something to be very mindful of. Are these goals realistic to you? And that literally took me 10 minutes sitting down, with the space very important for me because of my sensory overwhelmed stuff that I got quiet. So my child time, quiet time to sit and reflect on that. And that's what I did. So that took me 10 minutes.

Speaker 1 12:49

And then I went on to phase two of that, when I had another 30 minutes, sat behind that and I wrote down each of those goals. I wrote an action plan. Now what's the adage? Something like a goal without a plan is just a wish, or something like that. I know I've probably butchered that. It's very true. You have to have action points to bring those goals to life. So that's what I did. I sat there the next 30 minutes and for each one of my 10 goals I broke it down into sizable action points. Again, this is still very high level.

Speaker 1 13:29

And then I went and did something that I actually thought was quite interesting. So I went and asked chat GPT to do the same exercise that I'd just done manually. So I asked AI to put my, I told him each of my goals and asked for it to put the action plans behind all of those goals. And there's an argument to say you could have done that the other way around, particularly if you're time poor, you could have asked um chap gpt to do that first and then filled in the blanks where you felt it wasn't strong enough or it didn't resonate or it failed completely. Interestingly enough enough and I suppose I'm kind of embarrassed, but I can't decide whether I should be proud or embarrassed about this there was quite a lot of crossover between what a GPT had put as an action plan for my goals and what I had put, but in the end I think I got some comfort from that to know that I was on the right path if this machine had considered me so. So again, I won't go into it because it would just take an age for me to delve into all of that. But then, yeah, I compared the action points to what ChatGPT had done and I took some of the most powerful ones and put some immediate steps into that, even if it was as simple as diarising time to do x.

Speaker 1 14:55

Two of the things that kept coming up in my action points and it wasn't deliberate, it's just I was free-flowing to see what needed to be done were time boxing and vision boarding. Now, whenever this happened and that could be anything, for you could be absolutely anything but I thought I was then using my entrepreneurial brain how can I get from A to B in the quickest amount of time or the most efficient way? And the answer for me in this example was to do the things that crossed over, basically, even if the goals were completely opposite ends of the spectrums, if the actions were the same. So my example is time boxing. If you don't know what that is, it's a at its simplest form. It's a tool whereby we can literally carve out our day into segments so professionally or personally, or both about what you're going to do for each 15 minute increment of the day, for example, to therefore fit in and prioritize tasks.

Speaker 1 16:06

Now that is something for me, with my ADHD traits, is honestly like my worst nightmare. It's an extremely challenging thing to do, but we'll talk about that another time. However, the relevance of it just smacks me in the face. It kept coming up time and time again. If I'm going to get to these goals, the action points have to be structured to my day. So that is just an example. And for you, I guess I'm just saying have a look across the action points. Where are the quick wins? Where are we going to move the needle quickest by overlaying things? And speed is one measure, right, one measure of success is not everything. But that was just how I did it, because I was like I've only got half an hour now. What kind of? What steps can I take immediately to get on these goals? So that was that.

Speaker 1 16:57

Now I realise I have said something there that, because I don't want to discourage anybody that's doing this exercise or thinking about goal setting or thinking about resolutions in the new year, and I know that that first exercise only took me 10 minutes and I have come out with 10 stellar goals that are really aligned to who I am and light me up. That is not easy to do and it might be, and the reason I'm telling you this is so you're not sitting here. If you're not in that space where you've got one doesn't have to be 10, one killer goal, because in order to get to that goal, I did a lot of work last year to understand who I was, to understand my purpose, to understand my values, to understand my purpose, to understand my values, to understand my strengths, and I did all of that inside of a coaching framework. So if you're sat here and it's not as obvious to you what your goals should be, then that's okay. Why don't we park this conversation and work on what your values are and work on what your purpose is?

Speaker 1 18:10

Now, I did that inside of being coached, which is, I think, to some people sounds a bit odd because I am a coach, but if you believe in the value of something, then you are naturally going to gravitate towards that methodology. So, yes, I have a coach. Actually, I've got more than one coach that works on different dimensions of me um, business, for example, and personal and that work really helped inform this next step. So if you're struggling even getting to step one inside that 10 minutes, then go back and do some exploratory work that precedes this, but, presuming we've got our goals, we're happy with them like, what are the next stages and and implementations that we could achieve with this? So, um, you know, there are lots of frameworks and tools here and, like I said at the start, this is not for me to come and teach you everything that coaches do, but one of the methodologies employed could be like the smart framework, and this is a really quick one that could just take some time off the top.

Speaker 1 19:24

So, um, I'll just take a couple of the letters because, again, we're not going to get through the whole thing, but and I'll also talk about why that's really relevant and why, when I did my 10-minute exercise, I missed some of this, because 10 minutes is not enough. But I'm just I'm trying to give you examples because I'm super aware that a lot of my audience are really busy professional women. You're running businesses, you're in high-flying positions and or you're mothers. So you're in high flying positions and you're and or your mothers. So you're time poor. So I was trying to give you a structure. I'm not saying only spend 10 minutes on this, because that's going to be one and done. That's obviously not realistic, but 10 minutes is better than zero minutes. So I'm trying to give you steps to break it down. So if my 10 minute exercise had had more time in it, I might have used one of the methodologies, one of the coaching tools like the SMART framework, and just taken a couple of those letters.

Speaker 1 20:16

So S for specific. So that's where one of my goals really failed and it had actually quite a detrimental impact on my January. And say T for time bound always really important to make sure that your goals have a deadline, or at least some steps towards your goals have a deadline to keep you on track. So specific. So let me take one of my personal goals that was not specific because I rushed it and I did it in a 10 minute job. So one of my goals was to cement my health habits. Ok, so I the reason I wasn't specific about it is because I didn't take enough time, like I said, but also because I've done so much work on this area of my life.

Speaker 1 21:08

So habit formation is I did a huge, huge project last year and I've made so much progress on it. I can't even tell you like the change that made to my life when I was able to form strong habits, but that of itself is hours worth. I could talk to you for, oh my god, so long. So I'm not going to do that right now. I'm probably going to make that a master class or something. But habit formation is something I've done a lot of work on.

Speaker 1 21:31

So when it came to setting this goal, I was like, oh, I've done a lot of work on that, like that last, next year, let's make some improvements on it this year. So my goal was really vague. My goal was as vague as improve, basically. So cement health habits, make further progress on the health habits that I'd got. But because it wasn't specific, you know I hadn't sat and really broken down what that was going to take for me to achieve and if I had, I'd have realized it was actually unrealistic. So, at a very high level, as an example, that what I thought was one goal was actually more like 20 goals, because I, like I said, I've done so much work here. I've got so many health habits that I do day in or daily or weekly you know from affirmations, journaling, um. Drinking hot lemon water, uh, vitamin consumption, nutrition, um, saunas, cold plunge. You know that actually just me saying just improve on those health habits was a big oversight on my part, because if I sat and ran it through the smart framework, I'd have realized it was not realistic at all, because actually what I'd said with that one goal was actually progress 20 things at once, and that was just one of 10 goals as it was.

Speaker 1 22:58

So what ended up happening to me in the early part of January is, you know, I don't lack enthusiasm. I ran out that gate. Anybody who knows anything about my entrepreneurial journey will know that I can run through walls. I applied that ethos, that methodology that I was going to say obsessive nature I'm not sure that's very complimentary, but that you know where I'm going I applied that to my goals for 2025 and really ran out the gate with it, and it was. It wasn't that it wasn't manageable, but it was just, it was a lot. So that was only one of 10 goals. I was doing all of that and all the rest and I didn't. I didn't fare so well to start with because I was just yeah, I just overstretched myself. Effectively, and, bearing in mind the principle that underpinned all of those health habits was wellness, I actually massively made some improvements on my wellness, but also took away from it at the same time, because I just take I just bitten off more than I could chew.

Accountability and Practical Goal Implementation

Speaker 1 24:00

So, yes, if you've only got 10 minutes, it's definitely great to set some goals, but please do follow up on that. Please do run it through some sense checks. Please do look after yourself as well. It's great to have goals, it's great to have aspirations to improve, but please make sure these are being driven from a healthy place, a place of self-love and self-compassion. And your goals and a lot of mine actually are not to do more, they're to do less. And a lot of mine actually are not to do more, they're to do less. And that concept of itself can be revolutionary. If your goal is to do less of anything, it's still valid. That is a worthy pursuit. To spend less time, people pleasing less time on things that don't light you up, to own less possessions, because clutter leads to overwhelm, and all of that sort of thing. So the whole less is more is definitely applicable to here and also generally to the topic of goal setting.

Speaker 1 25:12

Right, if I'd have applied the less is more, I'd have probably gotten a little bit further. I'm not gonna lie. So I love each and every one of my 10 goals and they are all important to me. I never try and implement them all at once anyway, particularly if this was an exercise where we're doing our goals for 30 days, then obviously we're gonna have to make progress immediately, but this was my. This, specifically, was my goals for 2025, so there is just enough time to say actually, these are the most important, these are the ones that are going to impact me the most and these are the ones that I'm going to concentrate on to start with. So, yeah, like I said, we could probably sit here and talk about this for a long time.

Speaker 1 26:06

I would love for you to share what your goals are. So, presuming you're seeing this on a forum, you can comment, so maybe go on my Instagram. So, if you're not following me already, I'm Miss Lauren Riley on Instagram and I'd love for you to follow me and comment what your goals are. If you've got tips and tricks, remember my mission, my vision, my goal for this year is to heal 100 women. You can help me towards my goal and those women towards their goal of healing by sharing things that you've done that help goal setting. If you can share them publicly in the comments on my instagram, then that will obviously mean other people can read along, so that would be great. So, yeah, I'm always learning, always open to feedback, and I guess the last part of the podcast that I'd like to talk to you about then Would be just some practical tips about how to implement goals that you've got. Yeah, and again, there are probably hundreds and hundreds of these, but I'm just going to go through like a few and tie them back to my own goals and see if they resonate.

Speaker 1 27:32

Okay, so one of the things that will be key to achieving your goals will be to have an accountability buddy. So ideally, this would be a coach. If you're working with a coach, because that obviously is their job and to help you be accountable to the goals that you set yourself but it doesn't have to be. If you're not working with a coach, or that's not in your immediate future, with a coach, or that's not in your immediate future, then you know a friend, a family member, a significant other, a best friend, just somebody that can hold you accountable to the goal. So you'll have to be really honest with them and you'll have to schedule regular check-ins. So we, if it's a short-term goal particularly maybe weekly, if it's a, if it's a something that's spanning the whole year, maybe you get away with monthly check-ins and things like that. So one of the things that will be key to achieving your goals will be to have an accountability buddy. So ideally this would be a coach. If you're working with a coach, because that obviously is their job and to help you, um, be accountable to the goals that you set yourself. But it doesn't have to be. If you're not working with a coach or that's not in your immediate future, then you know a friend, a family member, a significant other, a best friend, just somebody that can hold you accountable to the goals. So you'll have to be really honest with them and you'll have to schedule regular check-ins. So we, if it's a short-term goal, particularly maybe weekly, if it's a, if it's something that's spanning the whole year, maybe you get away with monthly check-ins and things like that. So an example I um a couple of examples, I guess.

Speaker 1 29:15

Every every month, without fail, I go to my gym and I have the wellness manager there do all the vital statistics, including weight, but not limited to weight, because I don't think that's necessarily a great measure of overall fitness, but yeah, sort of muscle bone density, muscle mass percentage, fat, etc. That's very personal to me and something that I've been doing for a long time. It helps keep me accountable. It helps give me data, and data means accountability, doesn't it? It means I can track metrics, and that's just one example. It doesn't cost me anything, very easy to do. Maybe takes me 15 minutes a month and I do it every month. Maybe takes me 15 minutes a month and I do it every month. And now I've now the good thing about that because it's so numbers driven is I can then track that back. You'll remember from my last um podcast that I've lost 30 kilograms in the last few years, which is a lot of weight. It's a lot to lose, and I can tell you the points at which I did that and the different percentage lose. And I can tell you the points at which I did that and the different percentage health stats that run alongside it. And I really like that data and I'm really there's some. It's an example of something I can be really proud of in my own journey.

Speaker 1 30:31

But I'll give you a much simpler and potentially more controversial example of an accountability buddy. So one of my goals is around sobriety. Every year I do dry January, pretty much religiously. I pretty much never drink in January and sometimes that will last three months. Sometimes I'll do a month or two in the middle. Sometimes, yeah, longer periods. It's more shorter periods, but it's just like a help reset for me. I'll talk about sobriety separately, because it is a whole topic of itself, or sober curiousness.

Speaker 1 31:07

Anyway, one of the accountability buddy systems I put in place for my dry January was just to speak with another friend who's also doing dry January to pick up the phone If either of us want to drink. Neither of us have got a problem, by the way, so we're autonomous individuals. We're entitled to make that decision. But before we do, we're going to pick up the phone and call the other person and explain that, and that's okay. That person is not going to stop us from doing anything. That person is not going to stop us from doing anything. It just means that I am much less likely to want to call my friend and somebody who I've explained all the health benefits and what I get from my sober journey. I'm much less likely to pick up the phone to her and tell her why I've suddenly changed my mind and if it is being rooted in something that's not particularly helpful, like I'm stressed. So I want a glass of wine. You know, I know that person and I trust them to be able to give me alternative perspectives. At the end of the day, like I said, I'm an autonomous human being. I'll do what I like when I like, but ultimately I think that accountability step possibly would be the difference between sticking to a goal or not, and that you could use an accountability buddy. It's free if you've got a friend that you trust that can do that and, again, doesn't apply to sobriety, it could apply to absolutely any of your goals, pretty much much um.

Speaker 1 32:47

One piece of work that ties to a lot of goals, and certainly to that um, would be shifting your identity as well. James clear, who talks about um habit formation. He talks quite eloquently on this and I'll try and put an Amazon storefront together or something like that so you can see some of the books that I read if you want to go away between episodes and do some quote unquote homework. That's a really good book to read. Anyway, he talks about shifting identity and this was something that I think happened quite organically, but it really really does help if you identify as the healthy person that makes the decision to have a green smoothie every morning. If that's your goal, um, if you can tie that back to your own identity, then that really helps. And, again, that's been really huge for me with the sobriety, and it's meant that the habit formation these times have been effortless because I just identify as that person.

Speaker 1 33:44

Now, um, there's a whole piece of work that underpins that, but we won't talk about today. But, again, really powerful stuff, um, I think the last thing, then, that I'll talk to you about because I'm aware that we could talk for a long time about goal setting is practical implementations for those goals. So what practical steps can you do to remind yourself of those goals, stay on track, etc. And there's loads of tools out there for that yourself of those goals, stay on track, etc. And there's loads of tools out there for that. But one that I used in particular this time was the good old-fashioned post-it note. No magic, no tricks, very little expense, I think you know I got post-it notes for a few quid and what I did I broke the goals down into right.

Speaker 1 34:41

Go back to what I said at the start, when you only had 10 minutes, was business goals and personal goals. So I wrote on one colour all my personal goals which had, which happened to be double the number of business goals that I had, doesn't mean they're any more important, just means that actually it doesn't mean anything, because you could have lots of smaller goals or some big, significant goals and I've got real good ambitions for this business. But anyway, I happen to have twice as many personal goals as I did as business goals and I literally wrote in different. So there are different colour sticky notes for the business ones, different colour sticky notes for the personal ones, and I wrote them down and I chose to put them in a place that I felt would have most impact to my week. Now that could be completely different to you. It could be a front door one reminding constantly if it's to do with nutrition, it could be on your fridge, for example.

Speaker 1 35:33

I chose to put them all in one place and I chose to stick them physically around my computer not my laptop, because obviously that travels with me, but around my computer. And the reason I did that is, again, habit formation. It's a place that I'm habitually sat at, where I ought to be taking action towards those goals. So being reminded in the place that you're going to take the action on what those goals are, and I mean literally reminded as rudimentary, as a post-it note pretty much in your face, because your computer screen is like that far away from you was super helpful, importantly, when I make decisions based on limitations, because we've all got limited willpower. Although there's some theories behind that you may or may not agree with, but we've got limited willpower, we've got limited time in the day, we've got limited amounts of energy, we've got limited social battery, etc. Etc. So whenever I'm making decisions I want to run them through.

Speaker 1 36:42

Does this decision align with my goal? If somebody reaches out to me and asks me to do something and the goal could be like personal or professional, but yeah, that's the filter in which I'm going to run it from and it also yeah, it's just physically reminding me very often about what, what I'd set at the start of the year, because right now, or like a couple weeks ago, they're really fresh in my mind you know, maybe in three months not so much and I revisit my goals and I would highly recommend that you guys do quite often. But if I get out of that practice or if that's not a practice that you're in, we don't want to be sat here in July having completely forgotten about that, unless it's a goal you decided to walk away from. That's different. If you're consciously decided this doesn't align with you, or hopefully you've smashed it out the park by July and it's now the goal has shifted because you've already achieved it, or you just decide it was not the right goal in the first place. There's no shame in that. Please don't sit there putting pressure on yourself to achieve some goal. That is not going to light you up, that is not going to align with the best version of your future self, that's not going to help you either, and so let the goal go with grace, with gratitude if it gets to that point, but presuming it's still something that you, a haven't achieved and, b that you still really want and really align with. Let's keep reminding ourselves about what those goals were. So the post-it note is one idea.

Speaker 1 38:10

Another, very simple, completely free version of that would be, um, to put reminders on your phone, to literally set a reminder daily, weekly, monthly, whatever increment makes sense to you about that goal or about some step you need to take towards that goal. And really, that is essentially what I hopped on here to say today. Like I said I could talk for another like five, ten times about it, but really just wanted to give you an overview of what I did and what didn't work very well for me, and why it didn't work very well and the lessons I've learned because of that. And please approach this topic with grace for yourself. Please approach this topic from a place of self love and self compassion, because if you don't, then I just can't see how that gets us to the best version of our goals. Yes, they should be ambitious, of course, but also attainable. Like, keep that balance, please. Um. And yeah, like, check in with me. Let me know in a few months, um, depending on your, the time frame for your goals, because you should be time bound. Like I've said before, check in with me, let me know how you're doing. Um. Comment below I really hope you found this episode helpful.

Speaker 1 39:43

Yeah, let me know if this was useful to you. Let me know what you would like to hear more of in the podcast. Obviously, we're still new on this journey. I'm absolutely thrilled to have you along for the ride. I'm really open to the feedback. So, feedback, so, yeah, let me know which topics would be helpful, which topics would not be helpful and, yeah, everything in between. Please do subscribe to the channel, please do like and share it and, if you could, if you're enjoying it, if you give us a review. I would be really grateful. Until next time, which hopefully won't be very long. Thank you so much for tuning in and huge, huge good luck with your goals. I know it's too late to say, but happy new year. I hope 2025 really lights you up.