Try This New Spin on Goal-Setting

Recently I listened to an interview with Chalene Johnson, who introduced me to a new idea for goal-setting.

At first I was skeptical, but when I actually went through Chalene’s steps, it worked!

Here’s what she suggested:

1. Set 10 goals.

WHAT? TEN goals? That’s too many, isn’t it?

Trust Chalene. Write down 10 goals across a wide range of areas of your life.

Here are the areas Chalene suggests for your goals:

1. Educational (a “get smart” goal — something you want to learn more about)
2. Pure joy — something just for the fun of it
3. Love life
4. Family / friends
5. Spirituality
6. Environment — Meaning where you spend much of your time, such as your home or workplace
7. Purpose / profession
8. Financial
9. Fitness / nutrition
10. Mental wellness — I like to think of this as emotional well-being.

Once you’ve come up with a goal for each area — or 10 goals in any area, if you prefer …

2. Figure out your personal “push” goal.

What is the one thing that will facilitate the achievement of all or most of your 10 goals?

Chalene refers to this as your “push” goal because it acts like a domino, pushing the other ones over.

In the interview she gave the example of getting more sleep. For some people, this is the one thing that could make all the difference in achieving their heart’s desire.

In doing this exercise I discovered that my personal push goal is to budget my time.

I personally need to parcel my time into packages and assign specific activities to those packages — including rest.

I can make huge strides toward my 10 goals, but only if I focus on my “push” goal of time management.

3. Focus on your push goal.

Your 10 goals should fall like dominoes behind the right “push” goal. What’s yours?

I’ve been focusing on time management for the past week. Planning my time has become the most important thing I do.

Once the time is allotted for a given task, I can sit down and do it. Because the time is designated for this particular task, I’m free of the “Should I really be doing this right now, or is there something more important I need to focus on?” blues.

When I take the time to plan my time, it’s astonishing how more productive and balanced I feel.

Thanks, Chalene!

---

With all this focus on how I spend my time, I’ve decided to stop slavishly posting on Tina’s Tidbits every single Saturday.

This is my 170th post, and I’ve never missed a Saturday. But it takes longer than you might think to put together a thoughtful blog post.

Blogging is only one of my activities, yet it takes up more than its share of my time.

I also speak, teach and counsel in addition to trying to eat more fruits and vegetables, see family and friends, travel, exercise, learn Spanish, and find time for my guilty pleasure: Reality TV. (Wait — does watching The Bachelor count as a spiritual goal?)

So I’m officially hanging up my “weekly blogger” skates and putting on the plain “blogger” shoes.

I have blogging commitments at PsychologyToday.com and GoodTherapy.org, and I’ll continue to share those posts, with exclusive commentary, right here on Tina’s Tidbits.

I’ll also share any worthwhile tidbits or “deep thoughts” (air quotes) as they come to me. I like talking things over with you, and I value your feedback.

But I’m excited to start taking the time I need in ALL areas of my life, including training to walk the 2015 Portland Marathon in October!

So don’t be alarmed if you don’t see a post on any given Saturday. I’m still here.

I’m just managing my time differently.

I hope this post inspires you to find your own “push” goal, the one thing that will help you achieve everything you desire.

Photo courtesy of bplanet / FreeDigitalPhotos.net