Top 10 Tips for Staying On Track With Your Goals

In the book, This Year I Will... author M.J. Ryan shares numerous tips for how to stick with New Years resolutions and goals. I love this book because her straight forward writing style is refreshing and fun to read, while also being very practical.

In her first chapter, The Adventure of Living Your Dreams, she lists the top ten pitfalls for keeping your New Years resolutions. Being the tireless optimist that I am I decided to reframe all ten of them into positive statements. Here they are as,

The Top 10 Tips For Staying On Track
With Your Goals:

1. Be clear about what you want to create. (write out what you really want for yourself)

2. Make a strong commitment to the goal. (be honest with yourself)

3. Move forward with regular consistent action. (small doable steps)

4. Be willling to go through the awkward phase. (the times when it feels uncomfortable or impossible)

5. Set in place a tracking and reminder system.

6. Let go of perfection and be patient.

7. Have outside support. (a buddy, coach, or support group)

8. Affirm a positive self-image and belief in yourself to achieve your goals.

9. Stay flexible; things change, so create a back-up plan or be willing to make adjustments.

10. Keep getting back on track when or if you go off track.

Don't feel like you have to have all of these tips in place at once in order to be successful. Even if you put just a couple of these tips into practice, you will be more apt to stick with your goals. No one ever said change was easy, but if you start with small doable steps (tip #3), you may be surprised by the results.

"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit." -Aristotle
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