How to Do a Wellness Year in Review & Better Future Goal Setting
Can you believe that we’re coming to the end of another year?
How to Do a Wellness Year in Review & Better Future Goal Setting
This episode is will walk you through exactly how to do a wellness year in review in an actionable, tactical, and simple step-by-step way.
I’ll share some ideas for how to set better goals for the next year to move toward your version of success.
Shownotes
On why you should do a wellness year in review:
Thinking back over the last 12 months really helps to clarify what actually happened.
On one hand, things go so quickly that it’s hard to remember exactly what happened, and on the other, people tend to not give themselves enough credit for what has happened.
It can also be challenging to identify where the challenges were.
This is an intentional time to dot hat review so that when you are thinking about the next year, you’re able to set better goals, be realistic, and set yourself up for success.
Find some time to do this– it took me about 20-minutes.
I’d recommend sitting down and doing this exercise with a pen and paper.
It can also be really great to do this with a partner or friend.
Phase 1 | Review.
Clear some space and think back on this year.
Jog your memory with these specific tips:
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Look back at the year on your calendar or planner
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If you have one, flip through your journal
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Look back at photos (something Ali Edwards has really encouraged me to do)
(Note: listen to this episode with Ali Edwards on setting intentions / picking a word for the year)
I’d also encourage you to break it up by season or quarter of the year.
Phase 2 | Assess.
The assessment phase comes in two parts.
Part 1: For each season or quarter, write down “big wins” and “mini-milestones”.
This is where you give yourself credit and see more than just what we didn’t get done
Think about it from the 3 M’s perspective: meals, mindset, and movement.
Maybe you fond a better rhythm of sleep, or started a mindfulness practice, or started shopping are farmer’s markets, or maybe you started a morning routine (link), or maybe even started doing the 4 R’s.
I really want you to get out of that striving mindset, letting go of all or nothing, comparison, or perfectionism, and get into the feel-good mindset of cultivating self-compassion and giving yourself credit for a middle ground.
don’t leave it blank. Identify what those big wins were, even if they didn’t last the whole year, and what those mini-milestones were, thinking about the 3 M’s for a more holistic picture of wellness.
Part 2: of assess is to identify any challenges.
It’s a chance to be very honest and realistic.
I’ve noticed that, for me, my expectations for summer aren’t always aligned with reality.
I’ve learned from this process that I needed to return to those four R daily routines even in the summer and to adjust them
Another thing I learned was that things take a lot longer than I expect.
I was surprised, and I now look at this as an opportunity to extend the timeline, to really focus on the process
“We can have the best intentions, we can eat well, we can move our bodies, and we can have all those healthy things for our mind, but sometimes the unexpected happens, sometimes we have setbacks, sometimes we have serious health issues.”
There’s power in acknowledging it.
Phase 3 | Project.
The better way to goal-set for the future is goal-flipping.
You know what happened, you know what worked, and you know some things that didn’t work.
Now, I want you to think of goal-setting in terms of quarters.
Research suggests that setting goals for the entire year are a really difficult thing to do.
A lot of things happen over the course of 12 months that we cannot predict and we’re really better at thinking ahead a few weeks at a time
Think about the first six weeks, or three months, of the next year or next quarter, and ask yourself these three questions:
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How do you want to feel?
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What do you want to focus on?
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What do you want to let go of?
How do you want to feel?
Don’t start with “I want to eat healthily” or “I want to lose 20 pounds”.
Start with how you want to feel.
I like to pick one word, three at the most, to really ground how you want to feel.
What do you want to focus on?
If you are feeling pulled in some way, whether it be starting a daily wellness routine or getting better sleep, this is where you can really hone in on it.
Do you want to focus on incorporating real, beautiful food?
On adding more frequent feel-good movement?
What do you want to let go of?
You can return to the Feel Good Mindset, to your Feel Good Archetype, and actively focus on releasing the grip of perfectionism, comparison, or all or nothing thinking.
Goal flip:
Pick one those things that you want to focus on or let go of and ask yourself:
What is the daily process of what I want to focus on?
What do I need to do more days than not to see this through, to make this happen, to have this be a big win and mini-milestone that comes up on my year review next year?
This is where new year resolutions go completely off the rails, where goals fall apart:
The goal is the wrong goal, to begin with, it’s the “lose the weight” or “start eating healthy”
OR
Even if you do make a S.M.A.R.T. goal, it still doesn’t tell you what you have to do on Monday, or Tuesday, or what happens when you get sick on Thursday.
This about creating a life filled with daily wellness.
That thing that you want to focus on– what are the daily habits, behaviors, and routines that are required to make that part of your life?
On my 2020 goals:
I want to focus on my frequency of movement.
I’m already very committed to movement; it is my joy, my mental health, my stress-relief.
But, I do tend to block it as a 30- or 45-minute workout in the morning or evening.
One of the things I’m learning about Endometriosis is that stagnation in the pelvic area is not so great.
This means that the more often I can move around, the better.
One of the things I want to feel is more fluid in my body.
One of the things I want to focus on is my frequency of movement.
Here’s the daily process: it’s not that I’m going to workout more, it’s way more specific to habits and routines.
It’s hooking them into routines (which is why I love to use the 4-R routines which you can read or listen about here OR grab the Feel Good Archetype Guide for next-level info).
The daily process is getting up and moving in an intentional way a couple more times a day.
Once you’ve set a goal, go back and ask yourself:
Is the daily process that I am asking of myself realistic?
Is it so far from what I’m currently doing that this is going to be a hardship?
“Don’t ditch the focus and don’t ditch what you want to let go of. Think about this daily process and how to make it an extension of your current big wins and mini-milestones and take into account reality, your real life.”
Resources
One Little Word with Ali Edwards
For more on my simplified morning, check out My 5-Minute Morning: The Secret to Starting Your Day Refreshed, Revived, and Ready to Thrive
How to Radically Simplify Your Morning Routine
For more on the 4-R’s, listen to The Essential Wellness Routines You Need Right Now
Show the Feel Good Effect Love
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