Press Restart on Your Goals Today

It’s the middle of February. Resolutions have been broken, Valentine’s Day is over and we’re slowly becoming comfortable relaxing in our sweatpants while watching Netflix with microwaveable popcorn. So begins the new year like every other year; destined to end like every other year-despite promising yourself this time, things will be different. It doesn’t have to be that way and it certainly isn’t too late to start achieving your goals, whatever they are.

If you’re anything like me, in January you were smashing it. You were in the gym every day, you were eating healthily, you were more productive and you were hitting your targets. Then February came around. The final stretch of winter cold, a few more weeks away from Spring officially starting and to be honest, not seeing much daylight can be depressing so things slowly came to a stop. Im here to tell you that’s ok; you don’t have to give up but it’s not going to be easy.

When you set goals for yourself it’s like going to target practice for the first time.

At the beginning, you miss and do things wrong. Slowly, the posture, the aim, the surroundings become more familiar and you start missing the target less, eventually, you realise you’re hitting the bullseye. You take breaks because unless you’re Schwarzenegger, no one has the arm power to hold something straight all day and you take the time to digest the session and learn from your mistakes. Bring this mentality to what you want to achieve.

Learn from what you did in January.

Take the time to re-evaluate how you can do better, how to stick to your resolutions more or hit your targets faster. Perhaps, like I did, you realise you need to slow down in order to continue. Like target practice, your goals and how you achieve them need continuous work and adaptation. You’re not suddenly going to become a gym-obsessed fanatic or a person who always hits their daily writing target overnight, even in a few months. A big part of reaching our goals is actually the discipline and repetition of tasks that eventually lead us to where we want to be.

We have all clicked on those posts which supposedly tell us how billionaires live their life.

We quickly lose interest when we hear they get up at 5 am every single morning, at least I do. They seem to have a rigid routine down with a perfect work-life balance (don’t forget the PAs and house cleaners and gyms next to their bedrooms). What we need to understand however is those routines and getting up at ungodly hours and didn’t just happen overnight, or important. It’s the cumulation of years of trial and error, trying again and finally finding a sweet spot that allows them to continue being good at what they do. Taking breaks and re-evaluating is not a failure or giving up, failure is when you don’t get up and get back on the metaphorical horse. Continue to fail but in the words of Will Smith, ‘fail better’.

The biggest excuse is time; so work against it.

My goals for this year is to do all the things, especially write more, exercise more, film more and continually strive to be the best human being I can possibly be along with some others. Last year I always quick to say ‘I have no time’. So I created a big timetable from 6 am till I went to bed Monday through to Sunday and found where I had time to do things and blocked that time out for specific goals. It’s changed a bit since January and it’s still not perfect and I’ve been lazy some days but I have written more, filmed more and ran more than I did last year already so I’m taking that as a win. Perhaps a timetable is not for you, but do try to find a way of carving out time for your goals and sticking to it.

I’m going to continue trying to stick to and modify my agenda and do the things I really want to achieve. If it means putting my goals on hold for a week because I’m busy at work or I’m visiting a new place, that’s ok- as long as I come back refreshed, reflected on my work and ready to start again. I’ve written down my goals, I’ve told everyone who will listen and am slowly realising my aspirations for 2018 may not be impossible after all. Please let me know in the comments what your goals are for 2018 and how you plan to achieve them. Any tips to help keep myself and others motivated are much appreciated too,

We’re all works in progress, don’t you dare give up!

Over and Out!

Nathalie x