#1 Way to Set More Effective Fitness Goals
The start of a new year often comes with new goals. While I have nothing against setting goals, my approach is counterintuitive to most of the things you have ever been taught about setting goals and making them stick.
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Key Takeaways
If You Want To Set Goals that Last in 2022:
- Lower the bar about your expectations
- Create a tiered system to support your goals
- Address your priority as early in the day as possible
The Problem With Shooting for the Moon
Often, we are stuck on the idea that we need to aim high and shoot for the moon when it comes to our goals. But, when we are not able to reach the maximum, the shame and guilt that comes with that can discourage us from trying again. While there is nothing wrong with aiming high, setting a lower bar can actually help you be more successful in the long run when it comes to execution.
Aiming Lower for Better Results
Instead of shooting for the moon, lowering the bar and thinking about our goals in a way that is shrunken down can help you be more successful in achieving your goal. By learning the systems and structures necessary to evolve, grow and accomplish our goals, we can implement them into our lives more seamlessly and effectively.
If you can lower the bar, create a tiered system for your goals, and make your goals concrete, you will be amazed at how much simpler it is to achieve the things you want to.
How do you set goals and make sure that you follow through? Share if you found my tips useful with me in the comments below.
In This Episode
- Learn about my new rebrand and what to expect from my new website (2:21)
- My number one tip for goal setting in 2022 (8:16)
- The problem with an all or nothing mentality (12:26)
- Tips to help you lower the bar and support the goal you have (17:13)
- Why you need to make your actions concrete (22:50)
Quotes
“This time of the year can be really tricky for people because of all of the pressure we feel from the outside world. And ‘New Year, New You’; and all of the other shitty messaging that comes along with that can just take a flying leap for all I am concerned with.” (5:39)
“Information is everywhere, but it is how you implement it that matters.” (7:47)
“There is nothing wrong with picturing something big and bold and juicy. But when it comes to execution, I think that shooting for a lower bar is ultimately going to help you be more successful.” (9:06)
“When it comes to following through, autonomy and the ability to have a choice is one of the best ways to do that.” (19:29)
“Lower the bar, start thinking about our goals in terms of shrinking it down, shooting for less, but being more successful, so that over time the systems and structures that you need to continue to evolve and grow, and your confidence in terms of your ability to execute and do the thing, grow as well.” (25:54)
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#1 Way to Set More Effective Fitness Goals
Steph Gaudreau
The Listen To Your Body podcast is all about helping women who lift weights get stronger, fuel themselves without counting every bite of food, perform better in and out of the gym, and take up space. I’m a strength coach, nutritional therapy practitioner, and certified Intuitive Eating counselor Steph Gaudreau. This weekly show brings you a discussion about building strength, without obsessing about food and exercise, lifting weights, food, psychology, and more. You’ll learn how to eat, train, recover, listen to your body, and step into your strength. Hit subscribe on your favorite podcast app. And let’s dive in. It’s the start of a new year. And oftentimes the topic of goals comes up. On today’s podcast, I’m going to be sharing with you my number one tip for creating goals that stick. And it is completely counterintuitive to probably most of the things you’ve ever been taught. This is not about intentions or resolutions, or even a word of the year. All of those things have their place. And if they feel great to you, awesome, you have to do you. But on this podcast today, I’m going to be breaking down not only how to set goals that stick, but I’m also going to share my number one tip with you. And also a couple of other things that work really well for my clients as well. So if you have a goal you want to tackle in 2022 Make sure you keep listening.
Oh my goodness, we are back from our podcast hiatus. It was about two months. I think it was on a break. And you know what it was needed. It was a needed break. Because it’s been a long time. I’ve been podcasting. I’ve had a couple of breaks here and there but have really been podcasting pretty consistently since 2015. So, you know, a little break now and then helps to re-Energize. A lot has happened in the last couple of months. Let’s see. Number one is that you might notice that this podcast has a bit of a new, fresh look. And that is all down to the rebrand that happened at the end of 2021. Huge shout out to Brandt Creative Co, Tatum Brandt, and all of the amazing people on her team. We have a visual rebrand, which is sort of a new look, new colors, and all that stuff and new tagline ‘Fuel Your Strength’, which I’m really excited about because it feels so right. It just feels so good. And then a little bit after that a brand new website, also done by Tatum and her crew. So it’s been a journey, y’all. Some of you have been listening to this podcast since it was Harder To Kill Radio. Some of you have been in the community since My website was Stupid, Easy Paleo way back in the day, I’ve talked about over the years, why things have changed. And I’ve tried to be as open and transparent as possible with you all about things like rebranding and leaving paleo behind and all of the things that you go through as a business owner, and it’s been quite the ride. So I am really, really stoked about the new site. I hope you go check it out StephGaudreau.com, same URL as before, that the site is organized so much better. It really is there to help you navigate and find the things that are you know, you’re most interested in the resources that are going to be most useful to you. We have some new features like a quiz that you can use to take and see which programs are the best fit for you. There’s just a lot there. And I hope that you please go check it out because I’m just really happy about it. And I know it’ll be useful for you as well.
Okay, so we’re gonna start off this new sort of season ish, talking about goals. And let me be the first to say that I do not subscribe to ‘New Year New You’ and all of the other frankly toxic unhelpful messaging & don’t even get me started with Noom coming into my fucking Gmail account and like advertising, to me, they’re like… I’m used to seeing them in all sorts of other places but seeing it inside my Gmail inbox just felt so intrusive. Right, it’s the beginning of the year, we know that these messages are ramping up, they have ramped up frankly, I saw it starting in the last quarter of 2021. But this time of the year can be really tricky for people because of all of the pressure that we feel from the outside world. And ‘New Year New You’ and all the other shitty messaging that goes along with that can just take a flying, leap, frogging all in, all I’m concerned with. But this episode, I wanted to cover it this time, because it is something I work with my clients on, and I’m talking about my one on one clients, I’m talking about the people in my group coaching program, which is Strength Nutrition Unlocked and it is something that people do think about at this time of the year. If the idea of goals seems like your body is rejecting it, and you don’t want to talk about goals or learn a better way of working on goals, then that’s fine. Not every podcast will be for every person. And I totally get it, I’m not here to convince you that you must set goals in order to be successful. So let’s just kind of get that out of the way. And like I said if you’re somebody who likes the concept of intentions, or a word of the year, or whatever it is, and you really feel good about that stuff, great. Go with it. I’m not here to tell you to kick that stuff to the curb.
Okay, so we’re going to talk about on this podcast, a different way to set goals that hopefully will be more useful for you. And as we’re talking about this, if you are interested in working with me, in a small group on strength nutrition, then go ahead and check out StephGaudreau.com/link, which will bring you to the page for strength nutrition unlocked my group coaching program. That is where we get together, we spend a couple of months together and we really dive deep to help you get stronger build muscle, to have more energy, because who doesn’t want that, and perform better both in and out of the gym. And when the way we do it is by talking about and really implementing strategy around the four keys, which are fuel, lift, recover, and calm.
And so that’s what we do we workshop that get you taking action taking action because the information is everywhere, but it’s how you implement it that matters. So if you’re looking for clarity, you’re looking for support, you’re looking for simplification and strategy. I’ve got you Okay, so go to StephGaudreau.com/link there, you’ll be able to see if the program is currently open or closed. And if it’s open, get in on it. I want to see you in there. And if it’s closed, get on the waitlist.
Alright, so let’s talk about my number. My number one tip for goal setting in 2022. And it is lower the bar. The lower the bar. Yes, you heard me correctly. And you’re probably thinking, uh, what? Okay, but I thought the New Year or really anytime you set a goal is about the biggest, boldest, badass bitch declaration of what I want to conquer and shooting for the moon and thinking big and dreaming big. And yes, that’s fine. There’s nothing wrong with picturing something big and bold and juicy. But when it comes to execution, I think that shooting for a lower bar is ultimately going to help you be more successful. So let’s kind of break it down because, yes, we’ve talked about goals in the past, and things like working on the process instead of focusing more on the outcome. But I think that when it comes to the process, we even need to take it down a notch or 10. So here’s the thing that you need to understand is that steady progress toward smaller goals or smaller increments of the process still counts. And this is where we get fucked up in the head because we think, Well, I’m not, I’m not taking a big enough leap or I’m not making progress fast enough, or I’m not trying to change something dramatically. So it’s not as useful or important or it’s not going to help. And time and time again, when I’m working with my clients. It’s not here’s the thing that becomes the rub, it becomes, how do we allow the systems and structures that support your success and your consistency, to evolve at a pace that you can handle, right to, to sort of unfold in a very natural way, instead of trying to jump automatically and do the hardest, biggest, most dramatic thing, all at the same time.
And so to illustrate this, I’m going to use an example. And the example that I’m going to use is walking and a walking goal. And this does tie into something personally that I did in 2021, which was going from no purposeful walking at all, to essentially tripling the steps that I was doing per day. So how did I do that? And I’m going to use that example. And sort of talk you through it. So you have something you can visualize. So a lot of people started goal, especially around the new year, they’re like, oh, yeah, I shouldn’t be doing stupid walk every day. Like everybody says, do some walking, it’s good for your mental health, that guy you outside. And so you’re like, Okay, fine, I’m going to do it. And so you think, okay, great, I’m going to set a goal for walking. And I’m going to choose 10,000 steps. This is a very popular goal. It is something that people repeat over and over again, is like the gold standard, even though it’s completely arbitrary, and was made up by a marketing company, I believe in Japan, for a pedometer. So 10,000 is kind of an arbitrary number. Is more walking than you’re doing. If you’re not doing any walking at all going to have a benefit. Yes, of course, you’re getting more movement, etc, etc.
But what if you currently aren’t doing any daily walking at all, you’re thinking about going this is what’s gonna happen trying to go from probably a very low step count, especially if you’re not doing any purposeful walking in your day is kind of you know, centered around your the places you normally go, you’re not walking to and from or, or around a walkable neighborhood or something like that. You’re trying to go from no walking to 10,000 steps. And that is a huge jump. Now, it’s a nice goal to have. But is it realistic? So here’s let’s break it down this way. On average, 10,000 steps is about five miles, the way it kind of breaks down, and it depends on the person and how long their legs are in stride length and all that stuff. But it’s about 2000 steps per mile. So okay, that’s about five miles for 10,000 steps, the average walking pace is somewhere around a 20-minute mile. So how much time would that entail that would entail approximately an hour and 40 minutes a day? Are you ready to jump from none to one hour, 40 minutes a day? And the answer is you’re probably not really ready when we talk about some of the other things that you’re going to need. And also, if you’re like a lot of my clients, and even like myself, in certain ways, it was, you know, there’s probably some all or nothing thinking still kicking around when it comes to food or exercise. And so what ends up happening is setting up an all or nothing situation where it’s like, well, I’m definitely not going to get 10,000 steps today, an hour and 40 minutes. So I might as well not bother.
And you might not actually be thinking about it in those words. But what tends to happen is defaulting to the nothing side of the equation, or just thinking, I can’t do the maximum amount today. So you know, I’ve already failed and I’m a bad person. So why am I going to do any walking at all and that happens quite a bit. The other thing is that we’re used to shooting for the maximum all the time. So it looks like things like this. I have to walk 10,000 steps today. I have to work out seven days a week. I can’t have any treats or any sugar for a month like no added sugar. And you’re going to just try to do the maximum all at one time. So again, when you think in terms like that, the minute something slips and you don’t hit that maximum thing, you default a lot of times to the nothing side of the coin, and then comes the guilt and the shame and feeling like you’re a bad person, and you can never make the change, and why does this keep happening and you’re damaged. And it just takes on such a, you know, a really difficult tone in terms of what you think and how you feel about yourself. So the other thing is that it’s not just the actual time to do the walking, right, you need, again, systems and structures that will support the goal that you have. And when I’m working with my clients, most of the time, this looks like small nudges. It looks like, how are you going to carve out that time? For you? Does it mean, a big chunk of time all in the morning? Does it look like 10 minutes a few times a day? What does that look like? It’s obviously your schedule and anything else you need to move around?
For example, for me, I had to shift some stuff around in the morning, by the way, I do not get 10,000 steps on most average days. So there’s that. It’s also the other things that you need to think about, right? It’s the systems and the structures that support the goals that you have. Maybe it’s dead in the middle of winter when this podcast has been released. And you’re thinking, Holy fuck, how am I going to go outside when it’s 10 degrees outside and walk for an hour and a half? Right? Maybe that just feels so hard to do. And so then you think well, not today, and abandon the goal entirely. So that’s my biggest, my biggest recommendation is to lower the bar. How do you actually do that? Well, again, you can break it up, you can chunk it up. And I’m going to share a couple more tips with you, in terms of let’s create some other possibilities. That means you’re not just jumping from zero to the maximum of the thing that you want to do. So that you have time to adapt, you have time to evolve, the structures and systems, and all the other things that you need in your day to be supportive of the goal that you have. So these are sort of the side-to-side tip that I have. So the first side tip, if you want to call it that is to create a small, medium, and large breakdown for your goals. Now I struggled with what to call that. Because you could call it short, medium-long, you could call it whatever doesn’t really matter. But creating a tiered system, like a tiered structure for what you choose to do. And this has a couple of benefits. So for me, I’m going to use the example of the walking right. As I said earlier, I went from no purposeful walking in the first three months of 2021. And then in April, I thought you know what I do want to start a daily walking habit.
I am not going to start with an hour and 30 minutes, I said, Okay, I’m going to commit to at least 15 minutes. For me that made sense. Maybe for you, it’s five minutes, I don’t know, lower the bar if you’re like 15 minutes is where I’m going to try to shoot and you can’t meet that yet. Start with a smaller chunk of time, I know is going to sound maybe potentially silly. But I promise you, if you start smaller with something you can make, you can hit and build your confidence that way, it’s going to be so much easier to potentially go longer and longer. So I call this small, medium, large, or whatever you want to call it. But it’s like three different tiers. So for me, a small walk is 15 minutes, or actually 20 I have a 20-minute loop near my house. I know that if I do this loop, it’s 20 minutes cool. For me, a medium walk is somewhere around 30 minutes, I have an extended loop that I’ll do and a large walk is 45 minutes. It’s kind of the loop that I’ve created that’s about that amount of time. Do what makes sense for you. But this has a couple of benefits. It gives you a choice, first of all, and one of the best ways to make things consistent is to give yourself actually a choice. And I know that sounds silly but when it comes to following through autonomy and the ability to have a choice is one of the best ways to do that.
So that gives you a decision that you can make sure but it takes you out of the URL, it has an option, right? You have a choice. It pulls you out of a binary. Okay, so the way most people and most of my clients set goals is 10,000 steps is what I want to shoot for well what is the nothing side of that is zero. So if I don’t hit 10,000 steps, I might as well not try. And that sounds probably pretty familiar to a lot of you because you’re, you’re kind of going back into those only two options. If I can’t get 15 minutes, then maybe my other option is none, I already wasted it, I wrecked the day. So I find that having those three options like that different tier of small, medium, and large, helps to pull people out of the binary and gives you a choice. And of course, if you have less time, you opt for something shorter. And if you have more time you go for something longer. But your, quote-unquote, what used to be your nothing is now set at something like five minutes or 15 minutes. So try that and see how it works.
My second side tip is to do it early, as early in the day as you possibly can. The earlier you said, think about your priorities. If this is a priority, whatever your goal is, or whatever the thing that you want to do and make it a habit is not everything in your life can be a priority. That’s just the way it goes. Okay, so we don’t want to turn health and healthy habits into this big ass long to-do list of things that you feel resentful about. But think about what is something that you can make a priority maybe for the next three months, maybe for the next month. But do it earlier in the day as early as you can, because it’s more likely that you’ll get it done. This is how I approach it personally. And of course, when I work with clients, I try to have them my address their priority as early in the day as possible. Because that means are fewer things that are going to get in the way fewer Whammies are gonna pop up more energy typically in the morning than they’re supposed to, as the day goes on. And it just is more likely to get done. The side benefit here, of course, is getting out and getting some morning sunlight. This sends a powerful signal to your brain through your eyeballs. And it helps to regulate your circadian rhythms. If you’re somebody who has a hard time falling asleep at night or waking up in the morning, then helping your more sunlight natural light doesn’t have to be direct sunlight, it can even be a cloudy day. But getting out in the morning hours is really, really powerful. And when I wrote this on Instagram, I wrote just don’t stare at the sun like a weirdo. Yet don’t go stare at the sun because that’s gonna hurt your eyes, right, but maybe go out without sunglasses, get a short walk. And you’ll be amazed at how quickly you’ll start to feel better because you’re getting some morning light exposure, which is when we should be getting bright light exposure according to circadian rhythm. Alright, and the last side tip is to make it concrete. So I hear about this all the time, especially with regard to walking. And that’s why I’m giving this example. But I’m sure you can think about other ways it shows up. So a lot of people will say I need to get 10,000 steps. But it’s hard to conceptualize the idea of steps. You know, can you just automatically envision what 10,000 Steps look like? Probably not. And so let’s think about it this way steps are connected to distance.
And that could be helpful. But chances are most of how you structure and organize your day is according to your schedule, which most people think about in terms of time. Right? So if you have a calendar like me, if it doesn’t go on my calendar, it’s not real, it doesn’t exist. So putting things in your calendar is really, really powerful. This is one of the things I do with my clients, I make them schedule things, because when it’s scheduled is more likely to get done, because you remember, and you have a reminder. So what I would say here is when you tie a length of time to your walking, instead of a more arbitrary sounding step goal, you can actually fit it in your calendar and block off the time. It’s more concrete, it’s scheduled in your like 15 minutes here, I have 30 minutes, or I have 10 minutes twice a day. And you can actually schedule it so it becomes more concrete. It’s something that you don’t have to try to envision what it’s going to look like or how you’re going to fit it in because you’re thinking about it in terms of chunks of time. And that just a side note to that is if you’re someone who feels an immense amount of guilt or shame or like you need to march in place next to your bed to close your Fitbit rings.
I’m going to encourage you to check out the podcast that I did on recovery trackers and fitness trackers and essentially fitness technology so that you maybe have some questions to ask yourself as to whether that’s healthy or not. Because if you feel like you cannot end your day and go to sleep and It’s 1130 at night and you have to march in place next to your bed to close 10,000 steps. I wonder if you have a sense of is this actually a healthy mindset for me because it might not be. So you can go check out that podcast that I did last year. It’s funny to say that, but I did that podcast in 2021, about fitness and recovery trackers. Alright, that does it for this episode on goal setting. And hopefully what will be a more useful way for you to set goals. So my number one top tip was to lower the bar, start thinking about your goals in terms of shrinking it down, shooting for less, but be more successful so that over time, the systems and structures that you need can continue to evolve and grow. And your confidence in terms of your ability, ability to execute and do the thing grows as well, instead of shooting for the moon and the highest, biggest thing every single time right out of the gate, and then not being able to meet it because the other things in your life haven’t adapted in order to help you meet that goal. So lower the bar, you’ll be amazed and I heard so much feedback on this, not only the post that I did on Instagram, but even on my personal Facebook, I shared this. And I had so many people that said, Oh my gosh, this is so useful. Or this is an approach I’ve taken with other things in my life. And gosh, it needs to huge difference for me. So I really decided to make it into a podcast because I really wanted other people to hear about it.
So if it’s useful, let me know, send me a direct message on Instagram, or reach out, I would love to hear if this has made a difference for you. Remember to get the show notes for this episode on StephGaudreau.com. There, you can find all of the links to all of the stuff, the show notes, the transcript, and all of the stuff related to the podcast. Of course, please go check out the new website, go see what it looks like. And yes, the recipes are still there. So if you use my recipes, still, they are still on the website, you do not get rid of them. But we’re there to help feature fueling your strength and really stepping into your strength. Stepping into your strength nutrition, your recovery, your lifting, and doing it in a way that’s really supportive of your body and your mind. So that you get the results that you want to see from your training. So go check out the new website, please, it would make me so happy that you even just went and checked it out in solid it looks like hit this podcast subscribe button on your favorite app running down my list of things that sends a signal to the podcast app that you liked the show and other people like you may also enjoy it. Thank you so much for being here with me in this new season. I feel like my energy is restored I feel refreshed. I have some amazing guests interviews coming up for you already recorded some of them and they are waiting to be released some more solo episodes and really looking at all of these topics that hopefully will make a difference in your strikes until we talk again. Stay strong and have a great week.