How to Stick to your goals when life disrupts them...

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How to Stick to Your Goals When Life Disrupts ‘Em

Have you ever been doing great with a goal or habit change — exercise, waking early, becoming organized, eating healthy, anything — and your progress was completely disrupted because of some major event in your life (death, marriage, illness, work, etc.)?

Of course you have. It’s happened to all of us.
Life gets in the way.

Fortunately, although we often give up our goals when something like this happens, a life event that disrupts your progress doesn’t have to sidetrack your goal completely. You can overcome this obstacle — and it is an obstacle, just like any other.

Here’s the thing: the path to every goal is littered with obstacles. You must, must, must, absolutely must anticipate that you will run into obstacles … figure out ways around them … and keep going.
Here’s how to do that:

1. Anticipate, anticipate. Think ahead. What obstacles do you see on the horizon? What obstacles have you run into in the past? What will change your routine? Weekends are a mini-obstacle that often seem to derail people trying to create a habit. But there are other changes in routines … holidays, summer, big events, changes at work, birthdays … these are often things you can anticipate and plan for. When you see something coming up on the horizon that might derail you, plan for it. Make it a part of your plan.

An example: I’ve been trying to learn to eat under my new meal plan … and I knew that a birthday party was coming up. Well, I anticipated it, learned the restaurant, researched the menu, and incorporated it into my plan. But on another occasion, I just anticipated the family event and allowed it to be one of my two cheat meals for the week. You have to be able to let up a little if you want to stick to it for the long term.


2. Find the path. When you see an obstacle, are you just going to give up? I hope not. An obstacle is just something we have to get around, or over … it’s not a reason to quit. So instead of quitting, ask yourself: how do I get around this obstacle? There’s always a solution, if you’re creative enough.
Sometimes there isn’t just one path. And it can be hard to decide which solution to choose. But don’t fret: choose one path, and see if it works. If it doesn’t, try another. Life is an experiment.

3. Two steps forward, one step back. You will face some setbacks every now and then. That’s a part of achieving any goal worth achieving — if it were too easy, it’s not a worthy goal.

But instead of seeing the setback as something discouraging, just accept it as a part of the journey.

4. If you fall, get up, and learn from it. All of us fail, from time to time. No one is successful all the time. But instead of letting failure stop us completely, you just need to get up and dust yourself off … and this part is important: learn from your experience. When you fail, ask yourself: why did I fail? What stopped me? What obstacles got in my way? And how can I get around them next time it happens (and yes, it will happen again). And plan for next time.

5. Find new motivation. Sometimes a setback will leave us not only derailed, but demotivated. So the real problem is finding the motivation to start again. So, it helps to get back to the basics: what made you want to start in the first place? What was your reason for change? What motivated you? Thinking about that, and the benefits it will have in your life, and the way things will be once you’ve accomplished the goal, can help motivate you.

6. Go with the flow. Change is good. Change is a part of life. We might like our routines, but there will always be something that comes along to disrupt them. Accept that, embrace it, and learn to flow with it. If we become too rigid, we will break in the face of the pressures of life. But if we learn to accommodate those changes that life throws at us, and still head towards our goal, we’ll be happier and we’ll get to where we want to be.

Be willing to be flexible. Change comes at you … don’t despair, or get frustrated … take that change and make it a part of your plan.        GM-Fitness Dedicated To Training.....

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