The Social Aspect of Goals and Sustainability

So how do we look at the social and emotional side of goals and sustainability?

I wanted to start by sharing my definition of mental health:

Mental health includes our social, emotional, and psychological well-being. It affects how we think, feel, and act. It also helps determine how we handle stress, relate to others, and make healthy choices.

So for me, when I am discussing the “Social” aspect of most things, this is the lens I am looking through.

Social includes the traditional concepts of relationships with others around me, as well as the relationship I have with myself.

A few ideas come to mind with the social frame of goal setting.

First, I think of goals and accountability. It would be fantastic if we were always so motivated by our goals that the lack of outside accountability had little to no effect.

In practice, however, there is a large number of us that do considerably better in our goals practice when we have external accountability.

I am grateful for the accountability groups that I belong to in many of my goals areas.

Last January I joined a group working on 1% Habits. Even though we each had differing goals we were able to support and encourage one another as we all worked on individual things.

In that group I connected with someone who also had a goal to increase workout consistency. We decided we would exchange numbers and keep in contact through our Apple watches and sharing our workouts.

Even though we have never met, we have been cheering each other on in our fitness efforts for over 500 days!

There were definitely days that I didn’t feel like doing what I had scheduled to do. But a small thought in my mind reminded me that “Jill” would know I didn’t do my workout. 🙂

I am sure that is partly because I tend to follow characteristics of what Gretchen Rubin terms an “Obliger”, or someone who meets outer expectations while struggling to meet inner expectations. I have a very well-developed fear of letting other people down.

I didn’t want to disappoint “Jill”. And seeing her notifications come through also motivated me to do my workouts as well.

We have become friends and I am grateful for her consistent encouragement and motivation. It has played a part in being able to show up for myself.

Accountability partners or groups don’t work for everyone but they can be a help if you are struggling to consistently do the things that move you towards your goal.

Second, the mental health piece of goal setting has changed the most for me over the past two years.

I have struggled to set goals as an adult because of the critical voice in my head that would get very loud when I didn’t accomplish my goals, or maybe I didn’t execute the goal “perfectly”.

This negative self-talk had me giving up on my goals to avoid the criticism that was sure to come. Failing ahead of time was a way to lessen the pain of failing to be perfect.

The irony is I still criticized myself for not following through, for not completing the things I thought I wanted. So I didn’t avoid the negative talk. It was just “less painful” because I didn’t fail per se, I just stopped trying.

Goal setting in the past has been my way of “fixing” the things that are wrong with me. Improving the areas that I am not measuring up to some elusive standard in my head. Working on my own mental health has helped me in my goal-setting and continued progress.

I am still a little resistant to setting the recommended SMART goals. SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Timely.

I am improving and making my goals a little more specific. But part of my brain thinks the specifics are what makes it unattainable. If I were to keep it more vague, I wouldn’t know if I was missing the mark, and therefore wouldn’t have to be mean and critical of myself for “failing”.

Even though we have never met, we have been cheering each other on in our fitness efforts for over 500 days!

There were definitely days that I didn’t feel like doing what I had scheduled to do. But a small thought in my mind reminded me that “Jill” would know I didn’t do my workout. 🙂

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I’m Michelle. I am learning how to minimize my overwhelm, perfectionism, and people-pleasing and I am ready to help you do the same. I’m a certified Life Coach and a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Come with me and learn how.

Goal setting in the past has been my way of “fixing” the things that are wrong with me. Improving the areas that I am not measuring up to some elusive standard in my head. Working on my own mental health has helped me in my goal-setting and continued progress.