Set better health goals

“I've always been a really goal focused person. Outside of my health I've achieved pretty much everything I set out to.”?

Many of us ‘high achievers’ can relate to this.?

Kicking goals professionally but not with our health.

One of the reasons for this is the way that we set our goals.

The goals we set focus on the outcome we want to achieve.?

We pick a target or project and knock it off. Then we pick another one and knock it off. We move from outcome to outcome. Jumping from one to the next.

Achieving these usually makes us feel great. Because we feel good achieving the outcome we repeat the pattern.

It's also the way our work and our society is set up.

But when it comes to our health, outcome based goals aren't sustainable.

Good health is based on consistency over the long term. Repeated healthy action, again and again.?

Some of the outcomes we target for our health include; numbers on the scale, pants or dress sizes, the next event on the schedule.

Jumping from event to event can be tiring. And if we need events to keep us taking action with our physical activity it puts consistency at risk. What happens if we can't make the next event? Does our practice fall apart?

Shooting for size or weight based outcomes can also be problematic for consistency.?

What happens if we don't achieve our target? We feel bad about ourselves and possibly give up.

What happens if we do achieve it? How do we sustain it?

Instead of outcome based goals we should focus on consistency based goals.?

We practiced this with one of my clients last week when we set goals.

We worked out there were 82 days until the end of the year. Then we set some goals to foster consistency.?

50 workouts by the end of the year. Gym, bike rides, run/power walks.

60 days having greens with 3 meals a day.

700,000 steps - sounds like a lot but works out to be just under 9,000 steps per day.

We've taken the focus off an outcome and placed it on consistency for the long term.