How to build G.O.A.L.S.
January whether you like it or not is the busiest time of year in the wellness space, and although I don’t agree with it on an energetic level I understand the push to start something new at the NEW YEAR. So if you are all about goal setting in Q1 and you want it to be sustainable and habit forming than these are some of the things I would ask you to think about.
So it’s January 2026 and you want to SMASH this next 12 months. How can you set targets for yourself in a kind compassionate way and give yourself a framework that supports you instead of beating you down?
Enter SMART goals. You’ve probably heard of them, but how can we utilise them:
S pecific
Instead of “I want to go to the movies more this year” say “I want to see 10 new films this year”; be clear with what you want. This is true for anything you want to go after in life, you can’t manifest something vague or grey or middle, even if it’s a HUGE goal like running a marathon, if it’s specific you can break it down, pull it apart into bitesize pieces and take them on one by one.
M easurable
Is it something that you can accurately track? It’s great to give yourself things to aim for but saying something like “I want to lose weight”, which as you can imagine I hear a lot in January as a instructor, doesn’t give me any tangible information that I can use. If you said “I want to run a faster 5K, my current time is 35:20 and I want to get under 30 minutes”, BOOM, that is a measurable target that will inevitability will make you fitter and healthier along the way.
A chievable
Do you believe it’s doable in the timeframe that you give yourself with the resources that you have? I could tell you I want to become an astronaut in 2 weeks but the reality of that would be that for all my wanting there would be no where near enough time for me to train or become knowledgeable enough to go to space. Alas, we do have to be slightly bound by some realism if we want to live authentically as much as we might dream of space travel.
R elevant
Does the single goal build a stronger foundation for overall development? E.g. You want to get stronger, a relevant goal could be to get your first pull up, a trackable achievable relevant goal that shows increased strength. With anything, the overall picture needs to be viewed, we can’t zoom in too closely or we can lose the beauty of it. This can happen all the time in life but particularly in the fitness space, can you zoom out from one macrocosm and take in the whole picture of your health and your wellbeing.
T imebound
Give yourself a realistic window to achieve it - if you want to form a habit it takes an average of 66 days, allow the window to be wide enough that you can push and achieve without draining yourself. This I think in a lot of ways can be the hardest thing, how long to give yourself to get to that thing, it’s the bit I am really bad at. I expect myself to be able to achieve something immediately or what’s the point… And that point of view is unsurprisingly difficult and unrealistic, just like a good tofu dish needs time to marinate we too need time to learn, build, hone skills etc, everything takes TIME.
The greatest thing about all of this is that you can always tack and change direction. If something isn’t working, take a step back, go through your S.M.A.R.T target setting and be honest about what could be edited or how you could pivot. It’s really easy to get trapped and in a rut when things feel like they’re not working but you’re in the drivers seat, you’re in control.
January isn’t the only time you can set goals, you can reset, pause, change and then change again whenever your heart desires.
R x
