What To Do When Progress Feels Like a Series of Fits and Starts

Are you having trouble sticking to your goals?

I’ve talked to many people about this (including myself!) and it seems we’ve all got a lot of obstacles to overcome when it comes to meeting our goals.

Obstacles might feel like excuses.

And to some extent, they are excuses. Because, for the most part, they are not insurmountable reasons for why we’re not getting to the place we want to go.

But they are reasons nonetheless. And certainly the pandemic is still very much a big reason why we’re not progressing as we’d like to.

-       Many of us are still homeschooling our kids to some extent, if not completely.

-       We’re at home often, still taking some precautions, and may not feel comfortable being out and about.

-       Our relationships likely need rebooting, in and out of our homes.

-       We’ve gotten into habits and go-tos that just aren’t serving us.

 I’ve talked about this a number of times…

My big goal is to be more fit.

I’ve taken steps forward. They feel small. They’re not the dramatic, “Well, I just decided to stop/start (fill in the blank) and that was it. I was on my way to success. And I’ve continued on this path since I made up my mind with no bumps in the road.”

 No, they’re steps that are feeling more like fits and starts – sporadic, inconsistent, even lame. At least that’s where my thoughts can go.

But what good is beating myself up and demeaning myself for not doing enough?

No good…in fact, it only delays my goals further. Because instead of giving myself credit for drinking my water, moving more, or making sure I eat more greens, I end up adding guilt and shame to my arsenal of “things I’m failing at.”

So I’m refusing to do this bad-mouthing-myself stuff. Because really it comes to no good end. In fact, the more negative things we say to ourselves and the more we repeat them, the more likely we are to believe it. That’s scientific truth!

Will you join me? Will you too refuse to bad mouth yourself because you’re not doing as well as you’d like, or you’re not meeting your goals, or you’ve backslid again?

Let’s instead be nice to ourselves. Let’s treat ourselves as we would a friend who is feeling badly about themselves. Would we say to them, “I can’t believe what a failure you are! You should feel guilt and shame. You haven’t done what you said you were going to do…and you’re never going to.”

 NO!!

 We would likely look with love and compassion into our friend’s eyes over a cup of coffee and say,

-       I believe in you.

-       You can do this.

-       Don’t ever give up on you and what you desire – I promise, I won’t give up on you either.

-       I’m praying for you and I’m cheering you on.

It might be time to write a message of encouragement to ourselves on our bathroom mirror – or any place we’ll see it over and over again.

I’m choosing

“I can I will!”

What words of encouragement will you write on your bathroom mirror?