by Phyllis Reagin
All the pre-New Year hype can make you feel super inspired and hopeful. People buzzing on social media about their vision boards, word for the year, and all the ways they are going to “crush it.” You may have been one of them, swept away in the fever of all that fresh possibility.
Then January 1st ticked in and, well, everything felt pretty much the same. Other than a few holiday pounds and holiday decorations to put away, there wasn’t much of a difference. You may have thought to yourself how silly it was to believe that you would see change this early. Yet, didn’t most of us think that we would feel a little “new” right away?
Perhaps, you see in your social media feeds, people touting their “wins” already. All of this can make you already feel behind the eight ball and it’s only the beginning of January. The early comparisons and unrelenting discussions of goal setting can make you feel downright blue.
Here are 3 tips to get out of the funk…TODAY.
1. Stop the social media comparisons
Your feeds may be bombarded with people declaring their early wins. You really can’t determine fact from fiction. Some people may be stretching the truth, lying, or announcing a little early any really fleshed out wins. Even if you see people posting announcements of new jobs, new pregnancies, new trips, new anything, that doesn’t mean it happened right after they chose a goal. You weren’t there when they were working on these goals six months or even 1 year ago. Give yourself a break. You aren’t in a race with anyone else. Make this the year that you are kind to yourself about your pace toward your achievements.
2. Don’t give your goals your life, give life to your goals
Establishing your goals and all the steps to making them happen is a smart way to approach your life, certainly if you want to live the life of your dreams. However, all this goal setting can suck the fun out of life if you’re not careful. Don’t become so calculating that you don’t make room for life to be amusing. It just doesn’t need to be all seriousness, all the time. Rethink ways you can breathe life into your goals so that they feel playful. If you are searching for a new job, add in that after each interview you are going to take a victory lap to the nail salon. Or, after you lose the first 5 pounds, you are going to spend the evening laughing to your favorite comedy. Whatever it is that makes your life feel fun, make sure you create space and time for it too.
3. Take a baby step
Your goals might be fabulous but sometimes the big and important ones can feel daunting to tackle. Setting that special goal may be the right thing to do at this point in your life but getting started can be intimidating. The longer you wait, the more it feels impossible, the deeper your funk becomes. To get started, just do one baby step. Then another. And another. Before long, you will be on your way with your goal and feeling like you have it handled. One of my clients, has a great book idea. It exists only in her mind. She set the goal of writing one day a week but that is already feeling intimidating to her. Instead, she chose the baby step of speaking her ideas into her phone voice recorder. She is already feeling like this will get her in her stride. After she achieves this baby step, she will set another. Perhaps, to have the memos transcribed. Another step closer to creating a book. Just establishing these baby steps makes her feel that her dream goal is achievable.
Don’t lose the new year glow already. Remember, these are the early pages in a 365-page book. Like with any book, you wouldn’t expect to have it all figured out from the first few pages or even the first chapters. Be kind and gentle with yourself. Keep yourself balanced and the funk will lift. You will notice that you are making progress and that your dreams begin to unfold just as you planned.
————————————————————————–
Phyllis Reagin is a writer and Confidence Coach based in Los Angeles. A former leader for a Fortune 500 company, she teaches female leaders how to uproot their insecurities, to assertively deal with others and situations, and to find their empowered voice. You can sign up for Phyllis’ free weekly confidence building tips at her website.
She Owns It accepts guest post submissions at https://sheownsit.com/guest-post-submissions/. If you have an article that would be of value to our community, please submit for approval.
All posts will be screened, links checked (limited to 3 and must be relevant), and author must be verifiable through a website and social media accounts.
