Goals to Live By

Choosing a healthful lifestyle change goal is a very big deal.  A chosen goal sets the tone and the agenda for everything that follows.  So you must proceed accordingly.

Bruce Martin, Jeffrey McNally, and Simon Taggar (2015) underscore the critically of goals.  They show that goal performance is promoted by self-evaluation and that the mere pursuit of goal-relevant self-knowledge is goal-motivating in and of itself.  The trio specifically asserts that knowing one’s self and validating that knowledge also facilitates actual goal outcomes.  This study clearly is a call to introspect and to use the introspected knowledge to determine what to pursue health-wise.

Knowing oneself is easier said than done.  We all have a host of self-protective psychological defense mechanisms that insulate us against any negative self-introspection.  You cannot be mindless about who you are and about what you presently are doing.  You must be actively engaged.

I suggest that you consider four aspects of who you are:  your history, your temperament, your personality, and your current environments.  That obviously is a very tall order and one with which I will be helping you throughout the entire course of my current and future blog postings. 

For today, let’s focus on your history.  Choose one of the health essentials—cognitive-emotional status, interpersonal relationships, physical conditioning, diet-nutrition, work, or relaxation-recreation.  Pick the essential with the greatest likelihood of success.  You need the success to reinforce your efforts and to inform your current and future change strategies.

Introspect as honestly as possible about how your present lifestyle came to be and about your lifestyle-relevant strengths and weaknesses.  Look critically at yourself and enlist comments from trusted others.  Be specific.  After identifying the one most achievable feature of your healthful lifestyle essentials change goal, identify some reasons that describe any past success, no matter how small or fleeting, and any failures in the chosen specific healthful area.  Broaden your focus to include all of your strengths.  Find those positives that can compensate for your present unsatisfactory status and for your past failures.  Work, work, work to set a very concrete, fully achievable healthful lifestyle goal.  If you stumble, pick yourself up and continue.

Remember that Bruce Martin and his associates have the data to support the value of expending your time and energy to self-evaluate, self-validate, and to persevere regarding salutary physical and mental health goals.

Reference:  Martin, B., McNally, J., & Taggar, S. (2015).  Determining the importance of self-evaluation on the goal-performance effect in goal setting: primary findings.  Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science / Revue canadienne des sciences du comportement, Oct 12.  No Pagination Specified.  Retrieved from doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/cbs0000025.