Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning,
Speaker 1: This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
Speaker 1: tip is to make space for goal setting. If you
Speaker 1: want to succeed in reaching your goals, you should make
Speaker 1: sure these goals are well chosen and well thought through.
Speaker 1: Figuring all that out requires time, but it is generally
Speaker 1: time well spent. So I am writing this a few
Speaker 1: weeks after I returned from a goal setting retreat in Florida.
Speaker 1: My Best of Both Worlds podcasts co host Sarah hart
Speaker 1: Unger also runs a podcast called Best Laid Plans, which
Speaker 1: is about all things planning. She hosted the retreat where
Speaker 1: about twenty of us came together to plan out the
Speaker 1: next year. Now, I know not everyone can carve out
Speaker 1: three days of their lives for planning, and I know
Speaker 1: that the next year will happen whether I set goals
Speaker 1: or not. Some of my goals might not happen for
Speaker 1: reasons I can't control. That said, thinking about how I'd
Speaker 1: like to spend my time over the next year vastly
Speaker 1: increases the chances that what I want to have happen happens.
Speaker 1: With that, not all goals are created equal Sometimes people
Speaker 1: set goals like lose weight or get in shape, but
Speaker 1: what does that mean? Life is lived in hours. How
Speaker 1: do you intend to use your hours to achieve these goals?
Speaker 1: What steps will be involved? What will you be doing
Speaker 1: on an average Tuesday to work toward these goals. When
Speaker 1: I set my goals for the past year, I spent
Speaker 1: some time thinking through what I would actually do. I
Speaker 1: have long wone to write a collection of sonnets, but
Speaker 1: I had never followed through on that desire. Then this
Speaker 1: past year I realized I could commit to writing two
Speaker 1: lines anyambic pentameter every day. Two lines a day is
Speaker 1: fourteen a week, which is a sonnet every week. Because
Speaker 1: I figured out the logistics and figured out how this
Speaker 1: goal would be doable, I did it, and I have
Speaker 1: now written as many sonnets as there have been weeks
Speaker 1: in the year. But I had to figure that out.
Speaker 1: Things don't always just pop into our heads. We need
Speaker 1: time and space to think about them, and to think
Speaker 1: about what goals are appealing and which aren't, and of
Speaker 1: the appealing goals, how we can actually structure daily life
Speaker 1: to make them happen. So today's tip is to give
Speaker 1: yourself that space. Figure out when in your life. You
Speaker 1: can take at least a few hours to think through
Speaker 1: any goals you would like to set for yourself. When
Speaker 1: can you get a few hours apart from the rest
Speaker 1: of your life. What sort of setting would be conducive
Speaker 1: for this? You might think through some prompts so you
Speaker 1: aren't just staring at a blank page or computer screen
Speaker 1: the whole time. Think through your career goals. Picture yourself
Speaker 1: at an annual review a year from now. What would
Speaker 1: you like to be celebrating. Picture what you will be
Speaker 1: telling friends and family about your amazing life. Next holiday season,
Speaker 1: what are you toasting? Think through any pain points in
Speaker 1: your life. Are there steps you could take to solve
Speaker 1: these pain points? What practically might work? How would these
Speaker 1: things fit into your life? Give yourself the space to
Speaker 1: think through your goals, and you will probably come up
Speaker 1: with better ones that if you just give it a
Speaker 1: passing thought on December thirty first, you will emerge with
Speaker 1: a better plan. It won't just be I'd like to
Speaker 1: write some poems. It will be twenty syllables in a
Speaker 1: certain rhyming scheme every day. The latter feels a lot
Speaker 1: more likely to happen. In the meantime, this is Laura.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening, and here's to making the most of
Speaker 1: our time. Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast. If you've
Speaker 1: got questions, ideas, or feedback, you can reach me at
Speaker 1: Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast is a
Speaker 1: production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts from iHeartMedia, please visit
Speaker 1: the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
Speaker 1: your favorite shows.