Make Your New Years Goals SMARTER

Ahhhhhh the new year. A time for new beginnings, new resolutions …a fresh start!

Yet over 90% of people that make ‘New Years Resolutions’ give up within the first 60 days of the new year. Why?

Well let’s first start with the idea behind a ‘resolution’ and replace it with something much more powerful: A goal.

Goals are simple right? You have goals, you write them down or type them somewhere on your computer and then you achieve them….right?

Errrrr….not so much. Because there is SO much more to goal setting than just writing them down – and it may actually surprise you!

Have you ever heard of SMART goals? These are goals with real ‘umph’ to them – real action, real measurements, real results behind them. And most importantly, a BIG ‘Why’ behind them.

How many of you have ‘resolved’ to lose weight over and over again yet have never experienced the results of your ‘resolve’? This is because this goal was not a SMART goal.

SMART is an acronym for: S: Specific M: Measurable A: Attainable R: Relevant T: Time Bound

Best Year Yet, a transformational goal setting program, takes SMART goals one step further and makes them ‘SMARTER’ adding: E: Exciting R: Revealed

So let’s take a goal of ‘I want to lose weight’ and re-frame it using SMARTER goal setting.

1) Is This goal ‘Specific’? Not really. So let’s get to the meat of the goal….the ‘why’? Really think about ‘why do I want to lose weight?’ If it is ‘I want to lose 10% of my current body fat in order to be more healthy to play more with my kids’ – then THAT is a specific goal. The more specific you can be, the better. AND – I highly recommend not making the goal ‘weight specific’ in terms of health and wellness. The scale is such a mental mind game…making it about losing body fat helps you to focus on the actual loss of fat, gain of muscle and NOTHING to do with the scale! #Winning!

2) Is it measurable? 10% body fat loss? You bet it is!

3) Is it attainable? Absolutely….this all depends on how much priority you are willing to give this goal and how easily you break it down to achieve. A VERY important part of goal setting is being able to take the overall goal and break it down in to smaller ‘pieces’ or milestones you can achieve each week, month or quarter. All too often, people set a goal that they cannot break down and it remains a ‘goal’ that never gets achieved year in and year out.

4) Is it relevant? Yes! Absolutely it is relevant to YOU. You want to be able to play with your kids, feel better, feel healthier and have more energy – so this is a very relevant goal.

5) Is it Time Bound? Well it can be! You want to reach your goal of losing 10% bodyfat by January, 2017. There! You just made a time-bound goal. Setting a ‘due date’ helps push you forward consistently to reach your goal. Many people make their ‘time bound’ goals too un-realistic (we’ve all seen the crash diets that literally ‘burn out’ ones metabolism and the weight comes flying back on). Being realistic about your time frame is important and also allows you to be more consistent.

6) Is this exciting? Feeling better physically in order to play with your kids…THAT Is exciting! Just saying ‘I want to lose 20lbs’ – eh…what is 20lbs lost going to bring to your life? Weight loss doesn’t make you magically ‘happy’ so think about what WILL make you happy.

7) Can you reveal this? This is up to you! Share it with your spouse, a friend, your social media network or wherever you are comfortable! Sharing your goals with others holds you more accountable!

See the difference? My life absolutely CHANGED when I started setting SMARTER goals. And it became so much more well rounded when those goals were about me, about my career, about my health, about my marriage, about my spiritual growth: all the things that make me ME and the best me I can be.