Achieve Goals in 2014? Here’s how…

Happy New Year! Can you believe it’s 2014? With the New Year, many people start wondering how to really achieve goals that are important to them. How about you? Are you ready to make a change or content to just continue floating along?

This month, as we focus on the Vibrantly Live principle of Define What’s Truly Important & Why, I want to share with you an often overlooked necessity when it comes to making real change in your life.

At this time of year, we get obsessed with wondering what our New Year’s Resolutions are going to be. But we all know that before January ends, most people have just gone back to doing what they did all last year. Real, meaningful change doesn’t happen when all you focus on is doing something different.

Nope! Real change; the kind we both want – only happens when you take an honest look at who you are being! If you get caught up in just achieving goals, but don’t change your thoughts and beliefs, you’ll become tired and go back to doing what you’ve always done.

Let me give you an example. I turned 40 in 2013 and really wanted to get serious about taking better care of myself. Sure, I’ve set lots of goals to “exercise more” or “lose 10 pounds”. I achieve goals most of the time with great effort and then immediately go back to where I was again. It’s just too hard to keep doing the actions.

This year I took an honest look at who I am. I know trying to do too many things makes me scattered and not as successful. So, I took a different approach. I decided on a goal weight I wanted to reach. Then I took another hard look. I know I need to eat differently if I’m going to reach that weight. I don’t enjoy cooking and it’s real easy for me to slide back into “easy” eating patterns if the meals are going to take too long. I found an eating plan that required 2-3 minutes of prep time, was healthy, had lots of variety and would teach me long-term healthy eating patterns.

I knew I needed to view eating in a different way. This shift in thinking allowed me to come at nutrition and meals from a completely different perspective than I ever have before. I was BEING different, rather than just doing things differently. I acknowledged my weaknesses, and decided to work with them rather than against them.

As a result, I’ve lost over 20 pounds – EASILY!! It’s not been a struggle. I haven’t felt deprived, grouchy, and frustrated like I have in the past, when I’ve barely scraped by with losing 10. Instead, I view eating as a healthy endeavor to fuel my body and make it strong. I know what makes me feel good and what makes me feel sluggish.

I changed my thoughts and beliefs about healthy nutrition, THEN I changed my actions! That’s the secret to achieve goals. Here’s another one… I’ve got 10 more pounds to lose. I feel very confident in my ability to do this. Why? Because I’m not on a “diet”. Instead, I’ve changed who I am when it comes to food. I know I’ll reach that goal and I’m confident I’ll be able to maintain it too.

Can you say that about the goals you’re mulling over for the New Year? If not, I want to encourage you to come join me in my upcoming class, “This Year = Your Best Year Yet!” This is an intimate, small group VIP workshop, where we’ll focus on helping change who you are being and then create the actions to support your success. Click here to learn more and join me!

Here’s your Vibrantly Live Challenge: When you think about what’s important to you in 2014, who do YOU need to be in order to allow those things to happen? Be sure to share your thoughts below. Until next time – get out there and vibrantly live! Bye!