How to Time a Goal
One of the biggest questions I ask my clients when onboarding with them is: Do you have a timeframe? Sometimes the answer is no, and sometimes yes. It’s really dependent on the person, the goal, and why they are coming in to work with me. For most people with general fitness and health goals, I like to give at least 3 months of consistent work together, and creating daily actionable steps that you can follow no matter how busy your day is. If you have a goal that is dependent on time, like a wedding or a vacation, then you should have planned at least 6 months ahead to give yourself some wiggle room for life. And at the end of the day, YOU are the one making the change, if you work with a coach, they are guiding you through the process and helping you along the way, but the work comes from you. So being kind to yourself and taking things one thing at a time is a number one priority.
When we think about Health/Wellness/Fitness goals, we need to consider one thing. Our capability as a human being. We need to be kind to ourselves and know that there are many factors of Deep Health that play into the results we want. If we want to improve our sleep, if we want to lose body fat, if we want to gain muscle, if we want to change our lifestyle to improve our mental health. Those all take time. And if we don’t give ourselves sufficient amount of time, we end up feeling bad about not hitting our goals, some give up, some create negative self talk from that experience and carry that on for the rest of their lives. So where do you start?
“Do you have a timeframe?”
“I like to give at least 3 months of consistent work together, and creating daily actionable steps that you can follow no matter how busy your day is”
First, we need to establish, ahead of time, when decisions about our behavior will be made.
We also need to pair the decision to start a new behavior with a set date where we’ll re-visit and evaluate that behavior.
And, that timeframe should reflect the other important factors we’ve learned about, such as:
our starting point (aka our baseline);
unique, dynamic circumstances in our lives; and
how long it might reasonably take to see the effects of that change.
(This is where a coach can be incredibly helpful — they can remind you that you won’t immediately feel full of vigor after one spinach salad. But, we might be feeling like Popeye in the long run.)
There are many factors that go into who we are, what we do, how we live day to day, when we have time for ourselves, why we are changing, and what we are changing. Most of the time, if we haven’t strategized a plan for change, we get sidetracked, and we tend to follow the path of least resistance, but when we are trying to change, the direction of change is usually met with high resistance. So how do you know?
For any lifestyle goal, I like to start big and go small. As a coach, I am usually thinking in terms of years, then breaking that down in to quarters, months, weeks and even daily action. As a client, you are usually focused on what to do right now or tomorrow in the service of long term goals.
To practice for yourself, is a exercise that can help you see the connection between what you do today and your long term goals
Step 1: Where are you now, and where do you want to be?
Step 2: What matters on the journey to getting there?
Step 3: What’s your plan for the journey?
Step 4: What’s the first or next step of that plan?
Step 5: How is that step going?
Step 6: Did it work?
Try this out for yourself: 4 Circles Exercise
And if you’re still stuck, I can help you plan your goals by:
identify how long significant progress might reasonably take;
break that longer-term horizon down into smaller, more manageable chunks;
identify specific actions that a client can do today; and finally
measure the right things at the right times.