Goal-setting is a great way to motivate yourself into action. You see, first you set a goal that is hopefully easily attainable yet just hard enough to make you work a little harder than usual to achieve it. Then you create a plan of action, steps you are to perform to get to that goal. Then you just do it.
Sounds easy, right? Only if you actually do anything beyond setting the goal. I always have goals: get in my good health guidelines each day; stay withing my daily points target; stay within my weekly points allowance; run today; run tomorrow; run an entire 4 miler; etc. I have lots and lots of goals; some are small and will only take moments or hours to do, while others may take years.
It’s good to have goals, but to achieve those goals, you need to actually work at achieving them. I really haven’t been working at anything lately. I don’t quite know why, but I have not been tracking my food even though I know I need to do this. I have not been running, even though I have a race in 4 weeks.
Why? I don’t know exactly, but I know that based on history, I just seem to always get in my own way. Yes, weight loss and being healthy is something that I physically do, and if I took all of the thought out of it, I know I would be extremely successful. No, I would have already achieved my goals. So why do I always seem to get in my own way? Is it because I have been overweight since high school and am afraid of the unknown? Am I afraid I will be a different person and I won’t like that person? I don’t know.
Whatever, the reason, I was not happy the way I was. Sliding back into old behaviors may seem comfortable at first, but it's not. Not when I will no longer beable to fit into my clothes. So I need to stop it now. Moments ago, I looked myself in the bathroom mirror and told myself “Enough! This stops now! You can do better than this! You ARE better than this!”
I AM better than what I have been doing lately, so I am taking the opportunity, with the first day of the new month, to start again. I already tracked what I have and will be eating for the rest of the day. I laid out my running clothes at home for tonight when I get home. (And yes, I plan on running tonight. No, I am GOING to run tonight!) I am setting up a running schedule for the next two months. No more excuses.
No one ever achieved anything by hoping and wishing for it. I can’t just sit on the sidelines and expect results. I need to continue my active role in my own health and well-being. I need to act if I want to achieve my goals. And I need to start now.
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