Goal Setting During COVID-19

Goal setting during COVID-19 may seem like an odd thing to discuss, but I believe it is now more important than ever. If you have been following my site for a while, you will know that I have already shared some of my personal experience with goal setting. I believe that goal setting is an exercise that we should do at least once a year. It needs to be more than a New Year’s Resolution. Goal setting is a tool to help us find purpose and define the goals that are most important to us.

In my original article about goal setting, I provided a free goal setting template. This template should help you to refine your goals so that they are helpful and useful to you. If you would like a copy of this template, please click here.

Why Is Goal Setting Important During COVID-19?

You might be asking yourself, why is goal setting important during COVID-19? It is a question that I have been asking myself lately. Goal setting during COVID-19 may seem like a trivial thing to do in a time where there is no certainty. Why set goals when nothing is certain? If we can embrace the sense of emotional disorientation that comes with COVID-19, it can be a great opportunity to start some habits and work towards goals. In this time of forced idleness, we are being given the gift of time that we may not experience in this way again.

https://youtu.be/beIMFiiYjU4

Holding onto Things Loosely

It can be hard to plan or do goal setting during COVID-19 when things feel so uncertain. I am a person who loves to plan. Part of my previous role in the corporate world was working as a planner and scheduler. Planning is my happy place. So how do we find a way of holding onto things loosely in a time where things are not in our control?

Starting with the Small Things

I believe it is important to have plans of some sort. Without some sort of goal or aspiration in mind we can be left feeling hopeless, depressed, and anxious.

The goals and habits do not have to be big. Small things like reaching out to friends or loved ones daily or making a point fit exercise into your day are great goals. These small habits and changes can help to bring a sense of connection and joy to these moments of isolation that COVID-19 is bringing with it.

But we also need to hold onto things loosely, especially when it comes to our plans. Doing goal setting during COVID-19 is important, but we also need to surrender our will in the situation. We must set goals knowing that we need to have flexibility regarding our plans.

Plan Always Hoping for the Best

We should plan always hoping for the best, but knowing that with the current situation, or in any situation, things may change or be interrupted. We can see this as a major upset, and it can demotivate us. Or we can choose to view it through the eyes of surrender. It may not have worked out in this moment, but we can try again tomorrow, or the next day. Our goals are supposed to help us, not hold us back or make us feel defeated.

Habit Goals

Have you ever set yourself a habit goal for the year? If you have, it can sometimes be tricky to track your progress on that goal. It can sometimes feel overwhelming, discouraging or too much work to bother with. So how do you keep yourself engaged with your goal and tracking it?

A Daily Habit Tracker

My solution to this problem was to create a daily habit tracker. Many of my goals for this year were habit-based goals. These were not daily habits but were habits that I wanted to complete 2-3 times a week. This made these habits a bit challenging to track. To have a better sense of how well I was doing with these habits, I created a daily habit tracker form. This form included the habit, purpose statement for that habit, and a calendar where I could physically mark each day that I completed the habit.

By being able to record my habit progress, it helped me to focus on the habit and make it part of my everyday life. The great thing is now that I am performing these habits often, they are part of my life and the flow of my days.

The Accountability of a Habit Tracker

The accountability of a habit tracker has been very helpful for me. When I do not do the habit I committed to and see blank spots in my habit tracker, it bothers me. By having a record of my actions keeps me accountable and helps me to rework my daily schedule to fit the habits in.

Looking for a Daily Habit Tracker?

Are you looking for a daily habit tracker? I have created an electronic letter sized version of my habit tracker that I would like to share with you. I hope that it will help you track your personal habits. Please click here or on the button below to get your free copy of this Daily Habit Tracker.

Get Your Free Habit Tracking Worksheet

Reviewing Personal Goals

As part of my goal setting from earlier this year, I committed to writing about reviewing my personal goals for 2020. I wanted to review my goals every quarter and share with you what I learned from the process.

Review Your Goals Often

The first lesson I learned from reviewing personal goals is that if you do not review your goals often, they will be forgotten. I had shared a project earlier this year where I wrote my goals on a tag so that I would not forget them. I use this tag as a bookmark in the current book that I am reading. This way I get a daily reminder of my goals and that I need to keep working on them.

Having worked in corporate environments where I would have goal reviews twice a year, I realized that for goals to be useful to me I needed to review them every quarter. Usually within the first 6 months I would have some goals accomplished but there were other goals that I had forgotten about. I would then spend the last 6 months cramming in the goals that I had not accomplished in the first 6 months.

Goals can Change

By reviewing goals every quarter, it not only keeps your goals relevant, but it allows for re-evaluation of your goals. Goals may need to be eliminated or changed as the year goes by. Priorities change and a goal that was important 3 months ago may not apply anymore. It may have been replaced by another goal. By reviewing our goals, it keeps us focused on living our lives with a sense of purpose, of being able to prioritize what is truly important to us.

I am not as Motivated as I Think I Am

One of the humbling things about tracking habits and goals is that I am not as motivated as I think I am. I do not say that from a spirit of self-punishment, but from understanding that to really see a goal all the way through a calendar year takes a huge amount of discipline.

Some Goals Come Easily

Some of my goals have come quite easily. My goal of artistic practice 3 times a week has been one that I’ve been able to easily incorporate. As I find the relaxation, rejuvenation, and the self-care that art brings to my life, it has been easy to increase my artistic practice at 5 to 7 times a week.

Some Goals are a Struggle

On the flip side of this, some goals are a struggle, like my exercise habit. I am not surprised that I am struggling with this one. I do not enjoy the gym. This first quarter of the year has been quite cold, so I have not been exercising much outside. Added to the threat of COVID-19 that prevents me from attending yoga classes, I know that this has affected my goal.

At the same time, I know I am making excuses. If I am truly committed to completing this goal, this goal would have happened. I have been struggling with the self-discipline to exercise. It is easy to procrastinate. But when I start exercising, I feel so much better and I want to do it more often.

I believe that we need to show ourselves self-compassion, to move past the feelings of overwhelm, procrastination and perfection. If we can show self-compassion it can help us to have the courage to meet our goals and to have the self-discipline to work at them, even when it does not always feel great.  

Building Goals During COVID-19

I hope that this gives you some inspiration about how you can do your own goal setting during COVID-19. Please also see my original goal setting article as it provides some great guidance on how to set SMART goals for the coming months.

I have also provided a video of a flip through of my personal planner where I show my method on how I have incorporated habit tracking and goal setting into my everyday life.

I believe that it is crucial during this COVID-19 pandemic to find a new normal. It is not easy but if we find ways to navigate this time well, we can look back at this time as being something special. It will have been a time of building good habits and achieve amazing goals.

I would love to hear from you and how you are goal setting and building good habits during COVID-19. Feel free to comment below or to contact me directly. I hope that you have an amazing week!