Yesterday, I wrote about one of my most important personal goals for my 28th year: taking better care of myself, including allowing myself to want things.
Just like with my blog goals, I find it easiest to break goals into small steps that I can follow one at a time. My typical process for doing this includes doing one thing a week. As an example, when I was pregnant, I set a goal to get dressed every day for a week; then I set a goal to shower every day for a week; and then I set a goal to do my make up every day for a week. I slowly build on my goals until I feel like I'm actually accomplishing something.
For my personal goals for the next year, that's what I'm doing.
At work, we often do something that I find very helpful: you plan just 3-4 months at a time (usually a quarter); then in 6-8 weeks you reassess what's happened and what's coming up next and you make appropriate changes. I really like this process because, combined with my usual method of setting and achieving goals, it makes it really easy to stay on top of things.
As with my blog goals, I want to share the next 3 months of goals.
November
For November, my goal is to focus entirely on self-care and intuitive eating. I recently started listening to Food Psych by Christy Harrison (a podcast about eating disorders and intuitive eating) and I've found it really helpful in terms of dealing with my anxiety and food issues, as well as body image. For November, my goal is to do one self-care process a week--and really focus on it. These include journaling, quiet reading time, alone time (going shopping or out to a meal on my own), and incorporating exercise into my daily life.
December
My goal for December, as promised, builds on my goal for November: I want to focus on staying active, maintaining my mental health, and focus on intuitive eating. As the holidays approach, I can sometimes get overwhelmed and retreat into my feelings of anxiety. This year, my strict goal is going to be to continue to allow myself alone time, but to also say yes to all social obligations (unless childcare arrangements cannot be made). This last part is very important as I'm a pretty well known social flake! My main goal is to attend one social function a week.
January
For January, I want to start taking steps to improve my anxiety through improving the appearance of my home. I've written before about how my house is messy, by my standards. (Most people tell me my house looks "cozy": not pristine, but not a disaster. To me, it's a disaster.) In January, I want to focus on deep cleaning one space per weekend, focusing especially on my office and bedroom. This goal will definitely improve my self-care goals and feelings of anxiety.
How do you set personal goals? Share with me on Twitter!
