5 Tips to Recommit to Your Goals

Saying we’ve been through a lot these past few months is an understatement. The Pandemic had all of us scrambling to adjust to a blurred home and work life, and then confronting the racial injustice towards Black people, people of colour, Indigenous people, and fighting for LGBTQ rights created a much needed reckoning towards social justice. 

The goals we had at the beginning of 2020 may seem like a long ago dream we can barely remember. 

Since we’re halfway through the year, it’s a great time to re-evaluate and re-commit to our goals. The following five tips will help you reawaken your passion and drive towards your vision, make sure your values are aligned with your purpose, and to let go of those plans no longer serving you. 

1. Goals Aligned with Your Values

   We’ve had the opportunity to pause from normal life during the Pandemic to take stock of our work and homelife. Maybe we’ve discovered we LOVE to work from home and online, or maybe we realize the contract we’re in no longer lights us up, or that the people we work with are not aligned with our values of being anti-racist.

   Take a half hour and write down your business goals and ask yourself if they are in line with your values. 

2. Future Planning of Business Goals

   Writing down our business goals is an important task, but one that is often confusing and feels like more work. Try this: Imagine it is December 31, 2020. You’re having a quiet moment of reflection. Take out a notebook and write the December 31, 2020 at the top of the page and then write from the future. “In the last six months of 2020, I’m so glad I…” “I’m really proud that I…” “...was really hard but I’m so happy I pushed myself to do it as it meant I achieved...”

   This will give you insight into what you really want to achieve, what delights you, and also the motivation to commit to the hard work of achieving these goals. 

3. Look at Your Goals Everyday

   There’s a lot of research backing up the notion that looking at your business goals everyday will help you to achieve them. You can take it one step further and write out your goals every day. You don’t have to get into detail - that would be a daunting task. But quickly writing out your top three goals when you start your day reminds you of your vision and helps you to stay on track with what tasks you choose to focus your efforts on. 

4. Letting Go Of Goals that No Longer Serve

   When you take the time to re-evaluate your goals, you may find that some that were so important to you, have fallen away to be replaced with new passions. I’m not advocating you give up on valid goals to chase after the next shiny thing. That’s a classic way of procrastinating on goals that are taking a long time to come to fruition, or are taking a huge amount of effort to achieve. Don’t give up on the ones that are still aligned with your values and vision. Keep pushing forward. Have patience. Results take time. But by all means, don’t hold onto ones that no longer serve your purpose, or are drains on your time. Letting go can be painful but necessary. It’s okay to give up on a plan that’s not working. Try something else.

   It’s your life and your business. You get to decide. 

5. Celebrate Your Success

   Celebrate what you achieved so far in 2020.

   Take the time to look back at the past six months and really celebrate what you’ve achieved. Even if you feel like you didn’t accomplish anything you set out to do, trust me, you’ve done a lot if you’ve managed to get groceries and get through the day. And when I say “celebrate”, don’t say: “Yeah. Yeah. Good for me,” and then go on with your day. Take the time to do something special for yourself. Women especially have a hard time with this. Acknowledging our efforts is a great tool to work towards our goals. It tells us: “I’ve done hard things. I’ve created things that were’t there before. Hooray for me. If I can do that, I can keep going and take on these next tasks.“

At this halfway point, it’s a wonderful time to reflect and recommit to our vision, our goals, and our dreams. We can choose to look at these past few months as challenges that have made us more resilient, stronger, and more clear on what we want to achieve.

We can still use our talents, energies, and passions to make the world a more beautiful, just and equitable place for all. Keep going! You’re going to rock these next six months!!