Ways to Promote Personal Change

Changing ourselves is hard. Having insight into why we have a particular behavior is not enough to change the behavior, unfortunately. It's an important start, and while we need to begin with insight, we then need to move into action.

Change is its own process. Here are a few of my favorite ways to create personal change:

1. Visualize the outcome and the obstacles.

Close your eyes. Imagine you have achieved a goal that's important to you. How do you feel? What impact has this change made in your life?

Routinely visualizing the outcome is a great way to increase motivation. Making a change usually requires us to give up something that we like or enjoy. Or it requires us to stop avoiding something that we need to do. Both require feeling discomfort or even fear.

Neuroscience has shown us that it's not enough to only visualize success. You are more likely to achieve your goal when you envision being successful, but also envision the obstacles that will for sure arise along the way, and how you will manage those obstacles.

This way of thinking can give you the motivation and the realism you need as fuel to make a change that will ultimately be quite meaningful to you, make you feel better about yourself, or improve your quality of life.

2. Realize that change happens in the now. 

I read this one a little while ago and really like it. It's something we know, just said a bit differently. To change, we have to do the behavior we want now. TODAY. Not tomorrow.

I recently saw a guy at the gym with a tattoo that said, "Sacrifice today for results tomorrow." (The guy was in super good shape and I overheard him saying that weightlifting is a "break" for him in his normal fitness routine. 😳 Clearly he gets this principle. (And clearly we are cut from different cloth bc I would never describe weightlifting as a "break" :)).

It is easy to say, "I'll start tomorrow." But actually living change means taking action today.

3. Get curious to understand yourself better.

Knowing yourself, and how you work, is key to being able to also change how you behave or approach certain parts of your life.

What gets in the way for you? If it's a behavior you're trying to stop, what keeps the behavior going for you? What do you gain from the behavior (bc there is a gain, even if ultimately the behavior is unhelpful or even hurtful). What feelings does the behavior bring up in you? How do you feel when you imagine making a change?

When you increase your self-awareness you can learn what your triggers are and where you're most likely to make missteps. This self-understanding positions you to come up with the right set of tricks to manage yourself in the tough moments and stay on track, moving towards where you want to go. 

4. Remember that starting is the hardest part, and teeny tiny mini steps will move you forward.

A fellow coach and I were talking a few years ago, and we discovered that we both use the same self-talk trick to get more out ourselves when we don't feel like doing something. We remind ourselves, "An object in motion stays in motion, and an object at rest stays at rest."

Once you have momentum, it's often pretty OK to keep going. You feel yourself reaping the rewards. But starting can be so hard. Furthermore, it can feel silly to say, "My goal today is simply to start."

But really, once you start, you will unlock energy and create the vision and the buy-in from yourself to keep going. 

Similarly, breaking any bigger goals down into the most teeny-tiny minuscule steps helps us take action, and continue to take action.

When I'm REALLY having trouble getting myself going, I will often make my first goal, "Open the document. Then you get to take a break." (The "break" is usually something physical yet productive, like opening mail, bc it helps me to continue to build momentum). It may sound ridiculous, and frankly it is a bit ridiculous, but soon after I see real progress and traction. The hardest part is over.

5. Think about who you will become.

This is similar to step #1 around visioning, but this one focuses on identity. How do you want to think of yourself? How would you want your colleagues and friends to describe you? How do you want your children to describe you?

When we think about changes in terms of who they will allow us to become, we can create inspiration for ourselves that helps us to get excited about where we're going. A focus on identity also can help you get through the hard moments when you are crystal clear on who you are working to become. 

Change is never easy, but positive change feels great and brings meaning to our lives.

I would love to know: What are the strategies you have used in the past that have allowed you successfully make changes in yourself?

The Most Wonderful, Stressful Time

We are deep into the holiday stretch! The present-buying (the panic shopping), the parties, and the cookies. 

This time of year is wonderful for some, and brings up painful memories for others. Whether you love this time of year or can't wait until it's over (or both!), one thing is for sure - creating a magical holiday season is A LOT of work.

For every beautiful gift purchased and wrapped, and every dessert made and party planned, someone is working hard behind the scenes to make it all happen. While these traditions are special and help us focus on family rituals as we close out the year, we do all of this domestic work on top of closing out work at our jobs as well. Deadlines abound, performance reviews are being prepped, and time off at the end of the month often means compressing 4 weeks of work into 3 weeks or even less.

For many, by the time the end of December rolls around, we are exhausted. And an extra long To-Do list plus being tired means higher-than-usual stress levels.

Finding ways to maximize the joy part of this season, whether you celebrate holidays this time of year or are simply looking forward to some time off as things slow down, means also investing time in strategies to manage stress.

Here are a few of my favorite ways to manage, and even try to enjoy, December:

1. Acknowledge that this time of year is hard. 

The starting place for coping well with anything difficult, including the stress of being overly busy, is to acknowledge and embrace the reality of what is happening. 

So pay attention to how you are feeling. Be honest with yourself.

If you can, talk about how you're doing with someone else too. It can be unexpectedly soothing when we experience pressure to feel a certain way, and then open up to someone we trust. When we feel seen and understood, we often then feel relief from sharing the experience and remembering that we're not alone. 

2. Create a project plan. 

Meeting our personal goals and achieving excellence in that sphere requires the same organization and clarity that we bring to our careers. I know for me, I've got a plan/ calendar for my cooking schedule, my holiday activities with my family, and my gift giving (with a clear budget drawn up in excel). Keeping track of multiple moving parts and achieving excellence across the board means having strong plans and systems in place. 

 

And if you’re reading this thinking, “Nope nope nope that’s not me”, it’s never too late to start. Often when something doesn’t go well for me, I write out a plan for my future self that's like “Hey- this document exists to remind you just how bad that was. Here’s how to do it better next time!”. Then send yourself a calendar invite to read the document when you need it next year. Your future self and your cortisol levels will thank you.

3. Self-care. Rest. Fun. Whatever it is that works for you to recharge.  

In the wise words of Viola Davis, “Sometimes you gotta be ambitious about rest. About nurturing your soul and your heart. You know, they say the only way to treat being overwhelmed is to do absolutely nothing. It’s in those spaces that you find who you are - that you connect with your life.”

Get clear on what restores you, and do that! See friends. Have adventures. Enjoy the parties. Or, if that's not your speed or you need some balance, carve out some "Me-time" before the new year starts to simply relax, enjoy a hobby you don't often have time for, or to just be.

4. Look for opportunities to infuse more joy into this time.

Laugh and embrace feeling lighter. I co-planned and co-facilitated the most wonderful retreat in Austin a couple of weeks ago with some dear frolleagues (friend-colleagues). 

So many lessons came out of that weekend, and one powerful moment for me was my peers encouraging me to bring more humor into my everyday business activities. Their point was, "You're making us laugh. You should do that more at work." While I pondered this advice, a few also shared, "I need to laugh more. I can be too serious."

This led me down a rabbit hole of reflection and reading about humor, and the relationship between pain and joy. Heaviness and Levity. More to come on this in the new year, but for now, I'll say that the VIA Character Strengths Survey, which you can take for free here, classifies humor as "transcendence", a virtue they define as "a strength that helps you connect to the larger universe and provides meaning." 

Humor can help us better understand what is happening in our lives while also providing us with a cathartic release, which is such a helpful companion during stressful times. Plus there are opportunities for humor nearly everywhere, since life is filled with absurdities!

Wishing you a wonderful December filled with joy, laughter - and even rest!

A Regular Gratitude Practice

I adopted my own regular gratitude practice a few years ago.

Most weekdays I start my workday by writing down three things I'm grateful for, and then meditating for about 10 minutes. It helps me start my day focused and calm, and it has also taught me a few valuable lessons about myself:

1. I am often most grateful for very simple things.

Of course, I am grateful for the big things—the big win at work or when something great happens for my kids. 

But mostly, I find that I am grateful for small things. When I read my gratitude journal back, I can see that I am most often grateful for things like:

• Feeling cheerful and energized

• A walk outside on a beautiful day (and even in terrible weather, soaking up the elements rather than fighting them)

• Feeling connected to someone I love or care about

• Supporting others in the moments they really need it

• The opportunity to not rush, and to enjoy the flow of the day

• Seeing my children grow and develop 

• Building a day that matches my energy level

2. The things that I feel most grateful for are largely within my control.

Most of the things I am grateful for, because of their simplicity, are things I can make happen most days.

While I can't control many things, such as exactly how upbeat or energetic I feel on a given day, I can increase the odds by going to bed on time, and making time for exercise. It is within my power to make sure that each day includes at least a few of the key things that make me feel thankful and happy.

3. My happiness and fulfillment are not contingent on the "big things" like a vacation or an exciting development at work.

Because having a gratitude practice has shown me how much contentment small, daily acts bring into my life, it has helped me to shift my perspective: I do not need to be "waiting" for vacation or a big opportunity at work to feel happiness. 

Yes, those big moments are exciting. They bring on the dopamine and they feel GREAT.

But those events are more infrequent, and daily joy and contentment feel wonderful too, albeit in a calmer way. And best of all, daily happiness is within our reach and we can increase it by designing a life that is a good fit for us.

I would love to know: Do you have a regular gratitude practice, and if so, what has it taught you?

Developing a Courageous Mindset

Stories, Life Lessons & Tips

Courage is key to Growth

A story

For the past few years, I have thought a lot about Courage. In particular, that the way we talk about courage is very different than what it feels like to actually BE courageous.

We admire courage, and for good reason. When we talk about it, we express our respect and our awe for the actions people have taken. We praise what courage looks like in action, and also its impact.

 

But we don’t often talk about what courage feels like.

Courage means feeling fear, and taking action anyway. Moving forward, and putting one foot in front of the other, even as we feel filled with anxiety and thoughts like “Do not proceed”.

So the personal experience of courage is actually feeling discomfort, but not letting that discomfort prevent us from taking action.

 

There is much written these days about the importance of discomfort. And for good reason. Discomfort is hard to sit with so tempting to avoid. It can be painful. It doesn’t feel good. It’s easy for our minds to interpret discomfort as, “Danger! I need to get myself out of here immediately to be safe.”

On the flip side, when we feel comfortable, we think we’re safe. That all is well in the world and with us.

 

Discomfort is tricky, because it doesn’t necessarily mean there IS danger that should prevent us from taking action. Discomfort can arise because of feeling tension due to: 

• Ways we were socialized that were never in our best interest/ made sense in the first place (like being told to “go along” and not ask for what we want or need)

• Self-limiting beliefs that we’ve internalized as “truths” (such as, don’t talk to the person 3 levels above you when you pass them in the hallway, or don’t ask for the raise)

• Self-doubt (I don’t have what it takes or I’ll never be good at it so why try)

 

Discomfort, while not something that FEELS good, is actually an important key to our growth. In fact, the more can learn to sit with our feelings of discomfort, rather than trying to run away from them, the more we evolve and expand our range. We open up possibilities for ourselves when we get better at staying with our discomfort, and not letting it stop us from taking action.

 

A couple of years ago I decided to try out an experiment. An experiment around courage. While I don’t consider myself a risk-averse person, I’m not sure that how risk tolerant we are really matters when it comes to courage. Because courage is taking action at the exact moment we feel discomfort. And we ALL feel discomfort when we get to the limits of what we know and what feels familiar or safe.

I called my experiment around courage “Assertiveness experiments”, and basically anytime I wanted to take action but felt uncomfortable, I would force myself to do the uncomfortable thing.

It was hard each time, but the benefits were incredible. People shared information with me that I thought I shouldn’t ask for. I learned all kinds of things! People said yes to things that I didn’t think they would. And they said yes happily, with no angst.

So much positive momentum came from these assertiveness experiments that I continued to do them. I was of course feeling uncomfortable each time, but loving the wins each time too.

 

I brought this experience into my work with my clients, and challenged them to engage in their own assertiveness experiments. One of my clients said to me, “Right! And once I get good at it I won’t feel the discomfort anymore!”

“No”, I said. “By definition, you always feel the discomfort. That’s built into the equation each and every time. It is always about feeling discomfort, and taking action anyways. But you will learn, deeply, that you can withstand the discomfort. It won’t kill you. It won’t even harm you. It just won’t feel good. But you can take it.”

 

This sentiment has been shared in many ways, and one of my favorites that I have heard recently is: “It’s like carrying a rock around all the time. It does get easier. The rock never gets lighter. But we get stronger.”

Lessons in Life & Leadership

Discomfort is a way to show us what the current end of our range is. Perhaps you feel comfortable delivering on your key projects, or managing your team. But maybe client presentations or the feeling of not knowing an answer right away in a meeting scares the crap out of you.

 

We often interpret discomfort as a sign of danger, and then think we should retreat. But when we adopt a courageous mindset, we can remind ourselves to interpret our discomfort differently: places where we are uncomfortable show us the next step we can take to expand our thinking to create new possibilities for ourselves. We evolve by taking action steps and moving forward even as we sit in feelings of fear or anxiety.

A Tip

Let fear and discomfort act as guides. Tune into your body and into your mind. When you feel fear or anxiety or discomfort, but you know that taking action can help you move forward, take action. Pay attention to the benefits you create in your life. 

Revising Goals Mid-Year to Finish the Year Strong

Stories, Life Lessons & Tips

Why Revising our Goals Matters

A Story

A few years ago, during the pandemic, I launched a group program for working moms, which has evolved into a program for working women.

It was a time when all of us felt overwhelmed. We were working full time and our kids were at home full time. The world felt defined by uncertainty, and constant anxiety and busyness seemed to permeate life. In addition, we were all isolated, which I’ve decided is one of the most painful aspects of being human.

 

The group program was (and still is!) centered around setting goals across four key areas of life, to live life in alignment with your values and move forward intentionally across the board. So often when we think of goals work comes to mind immediately, quickly followed by health goals typically related to eating better, exercising more, and losing weight.

 

However, our relationships are one of the most important aspects of our lives, and so closely aligned with our happiness. This includes both our relationship with ourselves, and our relationships with others.

 

So I have my clients set goals in four areas of their lives each January: Career, Personal, Key Relationships, and Care work, which can include parenting or caring for aging parents.

I also started setting my own annual goals in this way several years ago, and it led to some important transformations in my life. Most notably:

 

• Setting goals in my business each year has helped me create a more realistic sense of time. Sometimes a goal I thought would take a year to achieve has actually taken me 2-3 years. This realization is one I have been building on, reminding myself that things often take 2-3x as long as I think they should in my optimistic initial estimate.

• I now talk to my closest friends twice a month. To me, the two hardest parts of achieving a goal are A) starting, and B) actually making the time. I have “phone dates” scheduled at regular times in my calendar, and I feel more connected to my closest friends than I have in years.

• I know that my goal is to spend 15 minutes of quality time each day with each of my kids. There are many days when I don’t achieve this goal. But having it clearly articulated helps me know where I want to be, and it reminds me to put down my computer and my phone in the evening when my night-owl daughter wants to talk and I am dead tired.

 

Being intentional, and knowing what we want does not mean we’ll achieve success all the time, but it does act as a north star to lead us in a direction that we want to be going in.

The Life Lesson

We can’t identify and write our goals down in January and never look at them again. Goals need to be written down initially, revised, and they need to be living, breathing documents that we look at regularly.

 

Some of the goals we set at the beginning of the year we’ll achieve, some we’ll scrap, and for others we need to change the timeline around because new important things have come up.

Summer is a wonderful mid-year change of pace, filled with ice-cream and swimming and camp and vacations.

September is a time to start again. The crispness in the air, and the kids back in school is the perfect time to get the January goals out, see what still fits, and get clear on what you’d like to achieve by the end of the year to feel like, “Hey 2024, you may have been filled with ups and downs, but you brought me some key wins that I feel grateful for.”

A Tip

Dig out your goals from January and revise them by Sept 15.

If you did not set goals in January, no worries, set them now. Think about how you want to feel on December 31, 2024, and backwards plan what you need to do between now and then. Your future self will thank you!

 

(And here’s a bonus for parents navigating the back-to-school season – a one-pager I created for each of my kids to get clear on their responsibilities, internalize them, and to learn how to manage their time. Edit and adapt for your child!)

Supporting and Retaining Working Mothers

This month we celebrated Mother’s Day. Motherhood is deeply important to me, both because of how much my relationship with my own mother has shaped my life, and because of what becoming a mother myself meant to me. It is also Mental Health Awareness Month, which seems fitting to me, as mothering and the mental health of our children are intertwined.

 

It is common knowledge that our relationships with our mothers are one of our earliest and most significant, and that our experiences with our mothers have a lifelong impact on us. I have met people who lament that they had uncaring or unattuned mothers, and I have met people who have had close and caring relationships with their mothers. In both cases, the impact of the relationship is profound. We also know that our relationships with our mothers during childhood shape who we become as adults.

The quality of our relationships with our mothers when we’re children impacts our psychological adjustment in adulthood, how we respond to stress, how we relate and communicate in our closest relationships, and even our overall satisfaction with our lives.

 

The comfort that a mother can provide is one of the deepest sources of comfort there is. You can see this calming relief whenever you see an upset child in their mother’s arms. And we see it later in life too – soldiers cry out for their mothers at their most vulnerable moments, when hurt in battle.

 

Given this intuitive and universal understanding, I find us to be behind-the-times in that our workplaces generally don’t honor this important relationship through policies that allow mothers to excel in their roles at work, while also having the time and space they need to attend to their children in the moments that require it.

 

Many mothers will make decisions that negatively impact their career progress in order to prioritize their children, including not pursuing a leadership role because of the time required for the position, turning down jobs with extensive travel, and leaving one industry for another one that offers more flexibility. Each woman will make the decision that is right for her and her family, with many of us choosing paths that allow us to succeed in our careers, and to also feel successful as mothers.

 

Making a deliberate decision to support mothers benefits both women and workplaces. High achieving women whose jobs allow them to feel successful professionally and personally are more likely to stay in their roles.

Retaining working mothers serves employers by eliminating the costs associated with turnover, retaining institutional knowledge and being able promote from within, and reaping the rewards of gender diversity. And when companies build a reputation for supporting women, they are positioned to attract top talent.

One of the key policies that workplaces can adopt to retain this important segment of workplace talent is flexible work.

Why Flexibility is Important

Many highly educated professional women quit their jobs due to lack of flexibility. I was one of them.

While I was pregnant with first child, my daughter, I thought that when she arrived she would simply “slip into my well-established life”. I had children later in life on purpose, was very focused on my career, and had no intention of scaling back professionally.

However, when I met my baby, things changed for me. I found that this sensitive little person, much to my surprise, wanted to me held or breastfed by me, all the time. If those conditions were met, she has happy. If they were not, she let her unhappiness be known. Loudly.

Having no desire to leave the workforce, I tried to negotiate for flexibility with my employer. I was told “No” unequivocally. So I quit my job. I didn’t want to quit—I wanted to stay on the professional path that I had worked for years to create for myself. And I needed to continue to pull in a paycheck. But now, as a mother, I also needed to take care of my child in the moments when she needed me the most. And when she was an infant, I had no control over when those moments were.

 

When flexibility is not an option, women who want it are faced with a stark choice: be away from your children more than you are comfortable with, or leave a job you want to be in. For me, I wanted flexibility when my kids were little. For some women, the need for flexibility comes from having a child with special needs, the work involved with caring for an elderly parent, or the desire to have better work-life balance given the combination of caregiving, career, and the responsibility of running a home. Whatever the motivation for an individual woman, the end result is the same: workplaces that don’t offer flexibility will not be able to recruit or retain women who are prioritizing it.

What led me to leave my job over the lack of flexibility is that I am someone who wants a challenging, engaging career, AND I want to be present for my children when they need me. I want both. While I don’t believe we can “have it all,” flexibility allows me to feel successful in my career and as a mother. It is common to hear working mothers say, “I’m spread too thin between work and home, and I feel like I’m not doing anything well. I feel like I’m failing at everything.”

Flexibility doesn’t solve this completely. Working mothers do have way too much to do, and likely always will. But flexibility does make it easier to get all of the important things done, to feel like you’re growing and excelling in your career, and are also a great mother.

Flexibility gives mothers ownership over their schedules. It allows us to decide: What is most important this week—is it the client presentation, or my child’s soccer game? Is it business development, or do I need to shift everything because someone is sick or having a hard time emotionally?

 

Flexibility allows mothers to do what strong business leaders to everyday: Continually look at all of the new challenges coming up, and prioritize and re-prioritize each day to make sure the most important and time sensitive things get managed well, and the other work gets pushed off. I was running a meeting with high-level women leaders recently, and it became clear—every single one of them was excellent at prioritization. High achievers are great at this skill. And so we must make sure that high achieving mothers have the flexibility they need to prioritize across their professional life AND their personal life.

When We Won’t Allow Flexibility

Without flexibility, we lose many talented mothers from the workforce.

Without flexibility across all workplaces, women will:

• Stay in jobs they don’t love or that don’t allow them to grow as much as they could because their workplace does offer flexibility, and they’re afraid they won’t be able to find it elsewhere

• Quit their jobs altogether even though that’s not what they want

• Leave established organizations to start their own businesses. Some will never return to working for someone else. Others will go back to roles in-house after their children are older and need less from them.

• Be forced to grapple with feelings of failure. It is very common that mothers feel spread too thin, and either like they are not good enough Moms or not good enough workers.

• Not feel valued for the incredible contribution they are making to society by prioritizing their children’s wellbeing.

 

When flexibility is offered, workplaces gain:

• Dynamic, strong women who are effective leaders

• The segment of the workforce (women), who overall bring higher levels of interpersonal awareness and sensitivity to their management roles, and are more likely to prioritize diversity and inclusion initiatives in the workplace

• Money. Because gender diverse companies bring in more revenue.

 

Motherhood and Time Poverty

Time poverty occurs when people face intense demands on their time due to work, caregiving, and other responsibilities.

Time poverty can look like constant rushing, and/or feeling like there is not enough time to complete all of the tasks that you are required to get done to meet all of your responsibilities.

Time poverty means there is not enough time to rest and recharge, or to invest adequately in your health and in self-care. It also means there is not enough time for fun and socializing. Time poverty leads people to feel stressed, run down, exhausted, and it lowers overall quality of life.

 

Working mothers are one of the groups of people most likely to experience time poverty in their lives for several reasons:

• The combination of working, commuting, providing care for their children, and running a home creates a never-ending task list that can’t realistically be finished

• We live in a world where expectations for professionals have intensified—many professionals feel the pull to be plugged in at all hours of the day

• The expectations around parenting have also intensified, and mothers are striving to hit a very high bar in terms of the care they provide for their children

• Most families today do not live near extended family. This means parents are raising their children without any help or additional childcare, unless they are able to hire and pay for it.

 

Flexibility does not solve time poverty completely, but it does alleviate some of the stress working mothers feel by giving them back a portion of the time they would spend on commuting and getting ready to go into an office.

Flexible work also allows parents to multi-task domestic and professional responsibilities by making adjustments to their day such as getting laundry or cooking done while they’re working, or by taking a call while on a walk and getting some exercise which they might not be able to squeeze in otherwise.

Flexibility for All

Flexibility benefits working mothers the most when it is utilized by all employees, including men.

When flexibility is only used by women, it hurts their careers by perpetuating stigma and stereotypes, such as women being less committed to their careers. Similarly, if men are in the office disproportionally more than women, it gives them more access to developing relationships or receiving mentoring, which are key factors when getting promotions or increases in pay.

 

When both men and women have flexible work, it provides many advantages to BOTH women and men, such as allowing mothers and fathers to spend more time with their families. It also gives people more time to invest in their health and their self-care, such as being able to exercise, get more sleep, and see their friends.

When men have flexible work arrangements, it also provides benefits to working mothers specifically, such as:

• More equally distributing the work of running a home, with men being able to take on more childcare, cooking, and cleaning at home

• Changing the perception that mothers are more engaged parents than fathers

• Improving work-life balance for women, because sharing the domestic load more equitably gives women more time to spend on their careers, personal development, and stress reduction

Flexibility can help level the playing friend for women, while also providing men with a richer personal and home life.

***

Flexibility allows working moms to build a happier and healthier life. Flexibility reduces stress and empowers women to take ownership over all of their various responsibilities, allowing them a greater chance at feeling successful across the diverse key dimensions of their lives.

Flexible workplaces reap benefits as well. When organizations offer flexible work, they enjoy greater productivity, a more diverse talent pool, reduced absenteeism, higher retention, and higher employee satisfaction.

What’s good for individuals is also good for organizations.

 

 

 

5 Tips for Women Leaders + a Bonus Tip for our Male Allies

Women leaders bring many benefits to the workplace – including a collaborative leadership style, effective communication skills, and a commitment to social impact. When companies have gender-diverse leadership teams, they typically have stronger bottom lines.

Women leaders also face a range of challenges at work.

I was facilitating a group coaching session with women leaders recently, and at the end one of them shared, “When I’m with other women leaders in spaces like this, it has given me the gift of knowing that the problems I face as a woman – well, it’s not me. It’s not in my head. It’s real and it’s happening to many, many women.”

To be successful professionally and personally, which is my goal for myself and my clients, it’s helpful to name common challenges that we face. Knowing that we’re not alone, and that these difficulties are shared by many women helps us to overcome what gets in our way and feel more at peace, empowered, and confident.

Here are 5 tips for women leaders, and one for our male allies, to help women succeed across the board.

 

1.     Know that “it’s not just you” – it’s sexism

We live in a society where some groups of people are given more power and privilege than others. Many of us are familiar with the fact the certain groups of people face less challenges due to aspects of their identity, such as being white, male, heterosexual, or able-bodied, to name just a few.

Women are harmed by living a world shaped by sexism. This is not only in the ethos around us – sexism includes a set of messages that we internalize.

These messages may sound like:

• “Don’t talk too much or take up too much space.”

• “Thinking about your own needs is selfish.”

• “If you’re not perfect, you don’t deserve to be taken seriously.”

• “Look good. But not too good. But really, it’s important you look good.”

 

Consciously we may disagree with these messages, yet on an unconscious level we often have absorbed these messages and on a deeper level, internalized them as true. 

Compounding this problem is the fact that society doesn’t consistently name a dynamic like sexism openly, or talk about it in a way that identifies what it is, what it looks like in a variety of contexts, and how we can manage it as individual women.

Instead, often these dynamics that surround us, like sexism or racism or homophobia, are thought of as someone’s “personal problem.”

As in, “It’s me – I just have a problem with perfectionism,” or, “I have a problem being timid about speaking up in meetings.”

Tip #1 is to remember that it’s NOT “just you”. It’s internalized sexism. You didn’t create sexism, but YOU CAN decrease its impact on your life by identifying it and working to unlearn the harmful thinking you’ve internalized.

 

2.     Rewire your internalized sexism

When you get better at identifying internalized sexism, you can begin the process of unlearning what is harmful, and replace that thinking with healthy, empowering, and accurate messages.

But unlearning takes time.

It may begin with simply noticing and naming what you’ve internalized. I’ve heard it sound like:

• “I don’t want to ask for too much money.”

• “I really can’t make a mistake.”

• “I can’t make time for myself – I’m too busy with work and family.”

 

When we begin to see these thoughts as internalized sexism – messages that tell that us that asking for what we’re worth, messing up (AKA being a human), or taking care of ourselves is not OK – we can question them and tell these inner thoughts to be quiet. Thoughts like these do not help us to grow or to become our best selves. We can become better and better at poking holes through them, and instead replacing them with thoughts that help us to grow such as:

• “I’m going to ask for what I’m worth.”

• “Everyone makes mistakes. It sucks in the moment, but we all do it, including me! Anyone who doesn’t understand that is being unreasonable, and I don’t have to accept that.”

• “Taking care of myself is what allows me to show up calm, clear-headed and patient at work and at home.”

 

Rewiring takes time, so be patient with yourself. After all, you didn’t internalize sexism in a week or a month, and so you won’t be able to undo its impact on your mind quickly either.

But poking holes through unhealthy thoughts, and rewiring your brain with messages that help you to be your best self, is daily work that is always a worthwhile investment in your own wellbeing.

3.     Summon your courage, and let your fears guide you to success

I often think that the way we talk about courage is strange. We only focus on the positives. We talk about courage being admirable, and look at all of the wonderful changes it can make in our lives and in their lives of others.

And that is true.

But when we talk about courage in this way, we’re focused on OUTCOMES.

The PROCESS of being courageous, can often feel quite terrible. It can feel like anxiety, or fear. It can feel like a pit in our stomachs.

My definition of courage is feeling fear and anxiety, knowing that we can withstand this experience, and taking action anyways. Courage is taking action THROUGH these feelings, rather than seeing them as danger signals that should stop us in our tracks.

When we do take courageous action, and move through these feelings, many times the results we see in our lives are incredible. And when we don’t see outcomes right away, we still gain increased motivation to keep being courageous, which will lead us to future wins.

 

The more we behave courageously, the easier it gets to withstand these difficult feelings. It never becomes EASY. But it gets easier.

It’s counterintuitive, but often if we take action and consistently move forward towards our fears, it can guide us to great success.

 

For example, a client I worked with for many years went through the following cycle: She would be afraid of something, go for it anyway, and it would lead her to her next victory. At the start of our work together, she was nervous about an upcoming job interview. This new role would require her to manage 30 people, and in the past she had only managed a team of seven. However, I reminded her that “she had not managed seven people BEFORE she managed seven people.” Meaning – there was no way to manage 30 people as the strategy to prepare for or become qualified to manage 30 people. To manage seven people, she had to use her existing skills, harness some courage and try something new, grow, and then – voila!— she had managed seven people.

It would be the same with this new challenge. She experienced several things like this, from giving a talk to a huge audience, to managing a budget bigger than she’d imagined, to taking over an even larger team. Each time, she felt fearful and self-doubting. But each time, she took action anyway and did the scary thing. Each nerve-racking challenge brought her success (with mistakes and growing pains too, of course), and following her fears day-by-day led her to land her dream job a few years later.

4.     Support other Women by adopting an Abundance Mindset 

I was listening to a client recently, who we’ll call Zoe. She was talking about a boss she had in the past who became abusive. As Zoe’s story unfolded, it became clear that her boss was threatened by her. When I asked her about this, Zoe shared, “it’s so hard for me to see it that way. All I wanted was to do a good job and excel in my role. My boss was also smart and great at her job. I thought together we could achieve great things. Why would she be threatened by me? I have no interest in taking anything away from her!”

 

The pie is big enough for all of us. When we believe that ONLY we can succeed, OR the other person can succeed, we are engaged in scarcity thinking. When we adopt an abundance mindset instead, and know that there is a role for each of us and enough success to go around, we can work together rather than compete or try to tear each other down.

Competition and fighting are not unique to women or to men. But for us as women, who already have extra challenges to overcome, we are stronger overall as a group when we support each other and help our peers achieve their own successes. When we celebrate others and help them climb towards their own victories, it is also a sign of our own internal strength and confidence. When we make a commitment to support other women, we can begin to pave the way for those who will come after us.

5.     Get clear on what you want and ask for it.

I cannot say this one enough. One of the defining stages of adult development is getting clear on your own value system, and making decisions out of that value system, rather than making decisions because they align with institutions you are a part of, or relationships you’re in with others.

Knowing what we want requires continual reflection. Because what we want changes over time. It can change because of the circumstances in our lives, such as a new job opportunity. It can also evolve because our life chapter has changed.

For example, if we have young children and want greater flexibility, or our children have left home, and we want to take on a new challenge. Or we’re closer to retirement, and we’re thinking about our legacy and giving back. What we want changes because WE change. Perhaps your purpose has changed, or there are things at work that you’re no longer willing to tolerate, or a new interest has evolved that you’d like to explore.

 

The key to staying true to ourselves amidst all of this change is self-reflection. When we check in with ourselves regularly, and make time for reflection, we are positioned to make choices that are in line with our values, and to feel authentic, engaged, and that we are living meaningful lives.

 

A tip for our Male Allies

Men have an opportunity to make an impact on the lives of women, and their workplaces, by acting as allies to support women both in the workplace and also at home.

What is allyship? 

I love the definition shared by the Center for Creative Leadership:

“When we talk about the meaning of allyship in the workplace, we’re referring to the actions, behaviors, and practices that leaders take to support, amplify, and advocate with others, most especially with individuals who don’t belong to the same social identities as themselves. (Note that we say “advocate with…” rather than “advocate for…” because advocacy should be done in partnership with those we intend to serve.)

At CCL, our approach to this work has been less about answering the question “What is allyship?” and more about reframing that question into “How can we act as allies?”

 

Allyship is complex. A few ways it can show up:

• Ongoing actions and behaviors that make an impact on other people

• An awareness of the different aspects of our identity, including areas in which we have power and privilege

• Learning about and listening to the folks we are aiming to support (without asking them to educate us, because that is asking them to do the work that we should do ourselves)

A few examples of how men can act as allies to women in the workplace include:

1.     Listen to the experiences that women share

Believe that these experiences are true and not exaggerated, even though in some cases they will be very different than your experiences.

 

2.     Help interrupt bias towards women

A common way this plays out at work is men speaking over women in meetings. Another way it can occur is a woman states an idea in a meeting, the idea remains unacknowledged, and a few minutes later a man will say the same thing, with peers responding as though it wasn’t just said by his female colleague a few minutes before.

This is an opportunity to shift the dynamic in the room and give credit where it is due, by saying something like, “That’s a great point Eric. I appreciate what you added on to the idea that Sherise voiced earlier in our conversation.”

 

3.     Know that when you help women, you are becoming a more inclusive leader yourself

Growing as a more inclusive leader is something that all of us will need to work on for our entire careers. Inclusion is complex, and there is always more learning to be done, whether that is about our own social identities, the dynamics between ourselves and folks with other social identities, or thinking about how to interrupt bias as it’s happening, which can be difficult.

To our male allies – when you invest the time in becoming even more effective allies, you certainly help the women with whom you work, but you also grow yourselves, becoming more effective leaders in the process.

 

In closing, I’d like to share a quote by Malala Yousafzi, a Pakistani education activist and the youngest Nobel Peace Prize laureate: “I think realizing that you’re not alone, that you are standing with millions of your sisters around the world is vital.”

 

Women leaders bring their myriad talents and lived experiences into the workplace, and also face a special set of challenges. By understanding yourselves as individuals, your working relationships, and the dynamics that shape your workplace and the world around you, you position yourself to move beyond self-doubt, fear, and barriers created by sexism, to reach even greater heights both yourself, and in partnership with other women.

Love as a Core Value at Work

One key source of the stress and overwhelm we all experience at times is our complex relationships at work.

 

A client once shared with me that he went into the office early one morning to take a delicate call. He locked his office door to focus. In the middle of the call, he heard a knock at the door. He was at a crucial point in the conversation, so he ignored the knock. The colleague who had knocked was irritated that he hadn’t answered the door and complained to his supervisor.

Later his supervisor approached him, listened to his perspective, and asked, “How do you want to handle this?” He replied, “I’d like to speak with my colleague directly rather than go through you.” His supervisor replied with a smile, “Knowing you, that’s what I thought you’d say.”

He approached the colleague, listened to her perspective, and respectfully asked that in the future, she come to him directly before contacting his supervisor.

 

Sometimes our interactions feel difficult, but our relationships with our colleagues are essential.

When our alliances are strong, we viscerally feel the positive effects of many brains and talents put together. We are more engaged in our roles when we feel connected rather than isolated, and we also generate greater creativity and better thinking. When we create our best work, we do it together.

 

The key to building consistently strong relationships is developing our skills around communication and navigating the conflicts that inevitably arise when we work together.

Speaking with our colleagues openly and knowing that we can work through moments of tension builds trust and psychological safety, which are two foundational ways that the core value of love is demonstrated at work.

Core Values Rooted in Love Strengthen Professional Relationships

The two ingredients in every relationship, at work and personally, are simply—you and the other person. For our relationships to thrive, we must ensure that both perspectives are voiced and heard.

To be effective in our approaches with others, we must begin by creating a strong relationship with ourselves. When we know who we are as leaders and what we value, we are better positioned to be consistent in how we show up with others, ready to honestly share our own viewpoints and to listen empathically.

One way to know ourselves deeply, and therefore be consistent in how we interact, is by getting clear on our core values. This helps us as leaders and also simply as human beings—by having a clearly identified set of values that guide our choices. We are all busy, and we face competing demands. When we are clear on what we value most, it is easier, less stressful, and faster to make the decisions that will feel good to us in both the short and long-term.

 

Many of the great leaders I’ve had the pleasure of working with identify at least one core value that is rooted in love. I’ve heard it called many different things: “connection,” “care,” or “relationships.”

The particular word that resonates with each of us varies, but the root is the same—love.

How can we bring love, or care, empathy, compassion, and kindness into our work lives to build connected professional relationships?

Here are three different approaches to help build collaborative and caring relationships at work.

#1: Self-Assertion 

Creating connected relationships begins with ourselves. When we’re clear on what we think and feel, we can be straightforward. When we’re engaging with our colleagues, it’s important to say the things we need to say, directly. Speaking with candor while also being diplomatic demonstrates that we know what we stand for, and we are also aware of our impact on others, which is one way love is expressed at work.

There is often confusion about what assertiveness means and what it looks like in action. Assertiveness means clearly stating your own point of view. Some people call this “speaking your truth.”

When people have trouble putting assertiveness into action, typically they are either coming on too strong and being aggressive by steamrolling over others, or they become passive and don’t directly state what they’re thinking or what they need.

Many times, when people over-rotate into aggression, or under-rotate into passivity, there is discomfort in clearly and calmly stating what is true from your own perspective.

In moments of frustration, I have heard people who have struggled with being perceived as coming on too strong say, “I’m just going to hold my tongue and not tell my boss what I think anymore.” The thing is, that approach doesn’t work. It may work for a day or a week, but over time feelings will build up and come out all at once, typically more aggressively than we would like. 

Similarly, other folks vent their frustrations to their colleagues, but do not summon the courage to have a direct conversation with the person with whom they are feeling frustrated or stuck. When we give into passivity, we often hold onto our anger rather than letting it go, and we don’t give the other person an opportunity to hear us and work things through.

 

Feeling confident and empowered to state what you think is a form of self-love.

 

When you clearly and calmly share your point of view, maintain an awareness that it is your perspective and not an ultimate truth, and remember that you do deserve to say what you think aloud—you are not only benefitting yourself. You are also modeling the core value of love at work, expressed as assertiveness and candor, for your peers.

Your own assertiveness benefits your entire team in several ways. It creates clarity and reduces the need to guess about or decode what you think and where you stand. It promotes dialogue, encouraging your colleagues to speak honestly as well. Open exchanges then create a ripple effect, and drive creativity and innovation, spark problem-solving, and strengthen your team’s ability to work together.

#2: Empathic Listening

To build authentic and open relationships with others, we must first understand their perspective, even if we don’t agree with it. Demonstrating respect for others is another way love shows up at work. And it needs to be done daily, whether we’re interacting with someone we see often, or collaborating across teams or departments that we cross paths with more infrequently.

One way to show respect is to listen actively to what others are saying, and try to put ourselves in their shoes to see why they feel the way they do.

When truly listening to another person, I imagine a stage curtain coming down in between us. This curtain acts as a boundary between us, which can help us to be better listeners. The stage curtain allows you to stop focusing on what you think or want to say next (this is what’s behind the curtain), and instead really take in what the other person is saying (what’s in front of the curtain). When we take on the perspective of another person, we leave our side of the curtain where we’re immersed in our own opinions, and we step into their space, and their thoughts and feelings.

While we’re listening and empathizing, we want to stay steeped in the other person’s perspective.

As we listen to our bosses or our peers, we may have different feelings come up. We may disagree, feel frustrated, or even experience disrespect. When we remind ourselves that we don’t have to agree, it can free up the space we need to try to focus on understanding. To put ourselves in their shoes and process how they are experiencing the situation.

It’s important to know that when we listen, we don’t have to see things the same way. This is a place where things get murky for many of us. We can set up a black-and-white situation in our heads, where we think of our perspective, and the other person’s perspective as right or wrong.

However, if we can shift our mindset and understand that “I think this” and “they think this,” we can allow for two truths at the same time.

What’s important is to understand where our colleague is coming from. Taking the time to summarize what you heard the other person say and identify common ground can help you collaborate effectively with a coworker even when you disagree in places or have different visions for how to move the work forward.

Showing people that we hear them lowers defensiveness and typically result in people becoming calmer. A fundamental way to demonstrate love at work is to show people that you are really listening to them and respect their point of view.

When we stay connected to our colleagues, even as we disagree, we can keep our relationships strong and not let our differences become divisive. This is key to expressing love at work: communicating that holding different viewpoints does not have to harm our connection with the other person. 

#3: Prioritize the Relationship

Building strong relationships with our colleagues means we’re both asserting what we think and feel, and understanding what the other person thinks and feels.

While the relationship is made up of you and your co-worker, it’s also a connection that goes beyond the two of you as individuals. To work together effectively, we must think about the relationship as its own bond, and identify what it needs to stay strong and productive.

 

This will mean compromise. It will mean setting boundaries. And it will mean grappling with the difficult question, “How can I show up as my best self?”

As I listen to my clients share their frustrations about work, I have heard time and time again, “I don’t respect what my colleague is saying,” or “I’m so frustrated by their behavior.”

Being in a relationship with anyone will always mean that we experience frustration, or don’t agree with how the person approaches or handles a situation. 

However, to collaborate and make decisions as a team, or to work through conflict constructively, we need to think about what our working relationships need to function, grow, and thrive.

 

Sometimes the best strategy is compromise. To do this, we need to get clear on the distinctions between what we need (our non-negotiables), and what we want (our “nice to haves”). Our non-negotiables are things such as decisions that reflect our integrity or our ethics, or staying within the budget. Our “nice to haves” may be more about approach or the style of the work.

To create a satisfying compromise, we’ll need to set boundaries, and also respect the boundaries of the other person. This may look like stating that a certain aspect of our vision is really important to us and we don’t want to let go of that. Or it could look like insisting that certain staff are woven in to execute on the project. To honor the other person’s non-negotiables, we’ll have to let go of some of what we want. But by ensuring that each person gets some of what’s most important to them, we prioritize the health of our working relationships.

 

Finally, we can demonstrate love at work by prioritizing our relationships by asking ourselves the difficult question, “How can I show up as my best self?” when we’re in tough spots with others.

This is hard to do. One of my clients shared that she was working with a colleague who continually interrupted her in meetings with her senior peers. It was a situation that left her doubting herself, and unsure of how to proceed. When we explored the question, “How can you show up as your best self here?” she was able to decide that she wanted to have a candid conversation with one of her allies who could back her up when she was interrupted, and that she would not pause but rather would hold her ground and finish the point she was making even when her colleague tried to speak over her. Reflecting on who she is and how she wants to be helped her to choose asserting herself instead of shrinking, even though the situation made her uncomfortable.

When we ask ourselves the best-self question, it reminds us to pause and that we have choices about how we respond. It is an opportunity to make choices that are in line with our values and also to value the relationships by respecting both ourselves and the other person.

 

Infusing our working relationships with love, kindness, and mutual respect means:

• Thinking about what BOTH people need to feel satisfied

• Identifying where you need to stand your ground, and where you can let go (getting clear on your own boundaries)

• Respecting the other person’s non-negotiables (honoring their boundaries)

• Taking responsibility for our actions and how they impact others

• Forgiving mistakes

• Looking for creative solutions that work for both people

• Remembering that the long-term health of the relationship is more important than the short-term difficulties you’re experiencing right now

 

Finally, at its core, prioritizing relationships means making sure that both people feel seen and heard. When we do this consistently, the greater impact for our organizations is that we build inclusive workplaces.

There are few greater acts of love at work than creating cultures where everyone is invited to be authentic and contribute to the conversation, show up as their full selves, and know that they belong.

 

Demonstrating love as a core value in our workplaces can positively impact ourselves, our interactions, and our organizational cultures. As you reflect on how you want to nurture the connections you have, and approach the new relationships you will build, think about how you can bring love, kindness, and empathy into the equation for both yourself and the other person.

You will grow and your relationships will flourish.

Setting Goals to Guide Your Year & Create Impact

Happy New Year!

Our brains like opportunities for new beginnings. The feeling of a fresh start can help us get one step closer to being our best selves. In Daniel Pink’s book, When, he talks about how we can start over at any time – every Monday, our birthdays, or the first day of a new season. Once we imbue a day with meaning, we are positioned to begin again feeling invigorated and re-energized.

Nowhere is this more powerful than the start of a new year.

I’ll get this out of the way up front: we’re not talking about New Year’s resolutions here. For me, those have become a marketed and manufactured way of quickly changing things that we may not have liked about ourselves for a long time. That is not how change works. Real change takes time, mental preparation, adopting new behaviors, failing, and then getting back on the wagon.

One impactful strategy to create changes that stick is setting intentional goals to guide your year, that help you move forward in the ways that are important to you.

Setting Annual Goals

Our goals for the year ideally set us up for success both professionally and personally. How do we approach this? By starting with the fundamental question: “What do I want”?

This question is deceivingly simple. First of all, there are many different aspects of our lives to consider. And second, what we want changes over time. Our circumstances change, we have new opportunities, new challenges, our relationships evolve, and WE change. So to feel a sense of meaning and purpose in our lives, we need to continually revisit this question: “What do I want?”

The process I use to set goals helps us to answer that question.

Every year, I set goals across four key areas of my life: career, personal, key relationships, and parenting.

Like the Wheel of Life activity that I talked about last month, which you can use as a year-end reflection exercise to take stock of your life right now (and really, it’s a great tool to take stock of your life at any time when you want to do that), these four areas can be adjusted so they feel right for you.

So for example, if you’re not a parent, you could omit that category altogether, or that category might be more aptly called “care work” if you’re helping with aging parents or other family members.

You also have choices around how to define “personal” goals. Many people set health goals here, but you may also want to set goals around learning, travel, finances, or special experiences you’d like to have.

A great way to start this process of annual goal setting is to ask yourself, “How do I want to feel on December 31, 2024?”

Where do you want to be in your life? What would you like to have happened in your career? For yourself personally? In your key relationships?

This will help guide you to think about what you want to make happen in your life this year.

Achieving Different Types of Goals

The type of goal we set determines how we approach pursuing it.

When setting annual goals, there are two key approaches: backwards planning for 12-week spurts, and habit formation.

Different goals require different strategies.

Say for example, that one of your personal goals is to “get more fit”. How do you intend to do that? Take a weights class? Or run a 5K?

Taking a weights class is more about habit formation. Running a 5K requires backwards planning. I’ll explain…but first- let’s talk about the importance of WHEN and routines.

Living the Process

When we think about a goal, such as “getting more fit”, we’re talking about an outcome. And we should start there. The result is what we’re after. The result also helps us measure whether we’ve achieved the goal.

How we work towards our goal, however, is actually about changing our lifestyle. It’s about how we spend our time, and WHEN we are doing the things we need to do to achieve our goal.

So if we want to get fit, this means we are spending a portion of our days exercising. That’s the lifestyle we’re choosing. We’re exercising often. To do that consistently, we need to know WHEN we are exercising. Without that time earmarked, we will fail.

So are you exercising in the morning at 7:00am 3 times a week? In the evening at 5:30 four times a week? Without this specificity around timing, you cannot “live your goal”.

Living the process also means focusing on the silver lining when we’re doing something that we don’t want to do or find difficult.

The more we can embrace the process, and find ways to enjoy it, the more likely we are to achieve success.

So getting more fit actually ends up meaning “Finding a way to enjoy exercising Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at 7:00am”. There it is.

Other goals are similar. Leading your team towards more effective communication means setting aside the time to do that regularly. So it could look like “weekly team meetings” and “one on one meetings with my direct reports” and “two retreats as a whole team per year”.

You do not just “have effective communication”. You spend part of your days actually communicating with others and helping them to learn how to communicate more effectively as well.

You get the idea.

Ok, so let’s talk about our 2 key strategies: Backwards planning and Habit formation.

Backwards Planning

Again, let’s take this goal of “getting more fit”. We’re all familiar with SMART goals. What are the specific action steps you’ll take to achieve this goal? And how will you measure whether you’re achieving it?

Let’s say your approach to getting more fit is to run a 5K. That goal is specific, and it’s measurable. It’s also attainable, and if you decide to run the 5K in June, and you sign up for it, now it’s timebound. Check. Check. Check. It’s a SMART goal.

There’s a lot written about approaching goals in 12-week chunks, or quarters, or seasons. (While some goals take longer than 12 weeks to achieve, we can still approach our goals this way and reinvest in a second quarter when we need to.) When we backwards plan, we’re figuring out when – which quarter or month – we want to achieve the smaller objectives that help us to reach our overall goal.

So for running a 5K in May, we would plot our progress milestones as looking something like:

Q1: Jan: Sign up for the race; build training plan; join the gym; find an accountability partner

Q1: Feb: Begin training plan of 3 days cardio/ 2 days strength/ 2 days rest

Q1: Mar: Continue training plan; increase run/ walk progression times

Q2: Apr: Continue training plan and increase run/ walk progression; check out course map

Q2 May: Run 5K

We’d use the same approach if our goal was to “Launch a new initiative by September”.

Our milestones might look something like:

Q1: Assemble team and assign roles; build out processes and timeline for successful launch; begin building out service offerings

Q2: Finish building out service offerings; get feedback from users; make updates to services

Q3: Soft launch in July; course correct in August; launch in September

But let’s say our goal of “getting more fit” is to engage in weightlifting for health. Backwards planning may not make as much sense here. To achieve this type of goal, we need to think about habit formation.

Habit Formation

When we want to create a new habit, just like with any new behavior, we need to know when we’re going to engage in our habit.

The habit needs to be set up similar to a SMART goal – it needs to be specific and measurable, and we need to know how often we’re engaging in the behavior.

So again, let’s take our example of lifting weights. Stated as a SMART goal, it could look like “Lift weights for 45 minutes 3 times a week.” This goal is ongoing. Unlike with backwards planning, we won’t be changing our behaviors too much each quarter. We might work out different body parts when we lift, or we may lift heavier weights. But unlike with our 5K, there is no end date to our behavior. So the “T” for the Timeline aspect, or by when, does not apply. We will lift weights every week. Period.

What is crucial with habits is knowing exactly when we will do the behavior each day or each week.

Knowing WHEN is essential. If you ask someone who has a well ingrained habit going when they do the behavior, they will be able to answer without much thought:

When do you meditate? “Right after I wake up.”

How do you eat enough vegetables? “I have a salad every day for lunch”

When do you work on your job search? “Every Saturday afternoon, and I set up two networking coffees each week.”

How do you create effective communication with your team? “We meet as a team every Monday from 11:00-12:00, as well as sporadically throughout the week, and I have weekly 1:1 meetings with each of my direct reports.”

For our weightlifting goal, what makes this behavior a habit is when we know that we go three times a week “Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday at 5:30pm”. 

A Note on a Realistic Approach to Goals

We cannot do everything we’d like to do. And it’s not possible to add to our plate, and keep adding, without removing something. Many times it’s enough to maintain what we’re already doing.

So setting annual goals is not about constantly doing more. No one can do that. It’s not realistic, nor is it sustainable. But goals provide us with direction, and help us decide how to spend our limited energy.

I have set annual goals for the past two years. I’ve achieved many of my goals, but not all of them. Some of them have been abandoned for other pursuits and some took me well over a year to even start.

James Clear, in one of his many fantastic blogs about goals, uses an analogy of being in a boat. He says goals are like the rudder – they point you in the direction you want to go in. The oars are all of the effort you put in, and the system you set up in your life to take effective action (such as using backwards planning to build your running schedule, or creating a habit of lifting weights three times a week).

Goals are meant to guide us, so that we are moving in a direction that is aligned with what’s important to us.

I have some goals that I stick to religiously: 2 cups of spinach at breakfast; deep work in the morning and meetings in the afternoon; yoga on Sunday morning. And I have others that I don’t hit all of the time, like “spend 15 minutes of quality time with my daughter each day.”

My daughter doesn’t want to chat about her day after school, when I am full of energy. Right before she goes to bed, when I am DONE, with no energy left, she wants to tell me all about her day.

There have been so many times when I’ve wanted to kiss her goodnight and say, “Let’s talk in the morning sweetie.” But then I think of my goal, and know that if I don’t listen in that moment a new opportunity to hear about this day likely will not appear. There are some days where I do simply kiss her goodnight, because I have no energy left. But many times I think of my goal, and remind myself to stay powered on for just 15 more minutes, and how important this small amount of time is for our relationship. Having the goal itself helps keep me anchored in what’s important to me. I don’t get it right every time, but I am consistently guided in a direction that’s important to me.

So if you try out this approach, of setting goals across your career, personally, in your key relationships, and in your care work, you will be guided to create a year that feels meaningful and important to you across all of the domains of your life.

We’ll knock some of our goals out of the park, defer some in favor of other important things that come up, and fail on some of them. But you’ll be moving forward and creating a life that is in line with what you value and what you want most. Happy goal setting.

10 Strategies for Ending the Year Feeling Strong & Balanced (and Set up for Success in 2024!)

Over the last couple of years, I’ve honed my approach to starting the new year feeling calm, focused, and ready to tackle new goals.

As I’ve improved my process each year, I’ve realized that there’s a step BEFORE the planning many of us do in January. And that is using December to take stock of the year, reflect on lessons learned, wins, and missed opportunities, to prepare myself to get clear on want I want in the next year so I feel successful professionally and personally. This process helps me build on what I’ve learned and create a throughline from year to year.

Here are 10 of my strategies to end the year feeling strong and balanced, and to set yourself up for a fulfilling 2024.

#1: Take stock of how you feel about your life right now

Get clear on where you’re satisfied with your life, and where there are opportunities for improvement.

The Wheel of Life is a great visual tool to help you do this.

Wheels of Life can have a range of categories — I like this one from positivepsychology.com. But you can also grab a blank template and customize it with the areas that feel important to you.

Simply rate each area of your life, on a scale of 1 – 10, with 1 being “Highly Unsatisfied”, and 10 being “Highly Satisfied”. This will help you identify two important things:

A: The parts of your life you’re feeling good about. These are places where you want to maintain your current habits and approaches.

B: Opportunities for meaningful changes. These areas can begin to inform some of your priorities for 2024, as you work towards feeling successful both professionally and personally.

#2: Reflect on wins and lessons learned in the past year.

As you think about the past year: 

A.   What were your big wins?

• At work?

• Personally?

B.    Where were there missed opportunities?

• At work?

• Personally?

C.    What were some key lessons you learned?

• At work?

• Personally?

Understanding where you’ve been is a great way to begin to identify how you’d like to see your life evolve next year.

#3: Look ahead professionally and personally

Once you’ve reflected on where you’ve been, envision the future. But in a low-pressure, brainstorming kind of way. Next month I’ll share my approach to setting meaningful annual goals, but for now, simply identify 3 key things you’d like to pull into your life or increase in 2024. These can be both professional and personal — spanning your whole self.

One fascinating thing I learned this year is that the brain is like a light switch. Once we’ve gotten crystal clear on the problem we’re solving for, and then we stop thinking about it (and instead do things like open gifts and eat cookies and relax), our brains will continue to ping pong these ideas around outside of our conscious awareness. Our brains will still work on answering our open questions even as we’re doing something else entirely.

This means that by assessing our satisfaction about our lives now, doing some reflecting, and then simply pausing to rest, we will have a head start on feeling clarity on January 1 with minimal effort. A win-win!

#4: Double down on self-care

The end of the year is a very busy time. I don’t know about you, but I’ve been tired this month. There’s wrapping everything up at work and striving to hit certain targets before year-end, and it is also a busy time personally. Between holiday parties, gift buying, and making special family recipes, this is one of the busiest months of the year at work and at home.

Making time for sleep and exercise sets us up to actually enjoy the festivities and quality time with the people we care about, rather than making each of these celebratory steps feel like a slog. It can be easy to focus on our tasks and deprioritize ourselves. But actually, we will be much more efficient at our tasks if we show up rested and energized rather than depleted. So invest in yourself.

#5: Plan ahead on the holiday prep side as much as you can

For me, I have realized that if I get the shopping done early, it takes a lot off of my mental plate. Same for the cooking and the baking. I enjoy all of these activities, but I don’t enjoy feeling rushed or like I have constant deadlines ahead of me.

To make things feel easier, I make cookie dough throughout the month and freeze it so no effort is needed for freshly baked cookies other than scooping the finished dough onto a baking sheet. And while I make dinner the night of for Hannukah and Christmas Eve, a few years ago I switched over to lasagna for Christmas day. I can do it ahead of time, and on the big day all that’s left to do is make a salad or some sides.

Planning ahead allows me to enjoy the time with loved ones and savor the process of gift buying, cooking, and baking, which are some of my favorite activities this time of year. It shifts things from feeling like a never-ending To Do list, to taking care of business early and then allowing myself to slow down and enjoy the season.

#6: Share the load 

Women often bear the brunt of the holiday load. A colleague told me years ago that divorce filings are highest in January because after all of the domestic work in December – people are pissed and DONE. I don’t know if that stat is true or not, but the take-away stayed with me.

Sometimes when I talk to my female peers, I’m amazed to hear that They. Do. Everything. ALL of it. For me, that’s too much! And this is a great place where professional skills and personal skills align: it is all about the art of delegation.

In my house, I like to do the planning, but I also go to bed early. It’s easy for me to have bought all of the gifts by early December, but the wrapping still remains. My husband however, loves staying up late, and will happily wrap a pile of gifts, which means…drum roll…I don’t have to do that!

We’re sharing the load. I’ve planned. He’s wrapping. I’m sleeping. Victory.

#7: Focus on gratitude

When we’re very busy and stretched thin, it can be easy to feel meh, or disconnected from the meaning of what we’re doing.

I know for me, I have been more tired this December than I remember being in the past (although I just saw a mom at the playground and she said her husband reminded her that “she’s always this tired in December,” so perhaps I’m deluding myself).

The other day I was feeling especially tired, and also looking at a long To Do list for work and for family. I was feeling depleted. I love this time of year, and want to feel excited, relaxed, and joyful.

I had to remind myself to lean into gratitude. Focusing on what we’re grateful for makes us feel happier, because we’re focused on what we have, rather than what we don’t have. And it’s quick and easy to do – just pausing for a couple of minutes and identifying what we’re grateful for can shift our perspective and turn a bad mood around.

#8: Block off some time for yourself over the holidays

Escape everyone and everything. Your family, your beloved children, and your To Do list. Whether it’s watching holiday movies, taking time for journaling and hiking, or seeing your closest friends – burrow deep into the coziness of this season.

I loved the Danish concept of hygge the first time I heard it. It means taking pleasure in everyday life and being comfy and content. The image it evokes is snuggling by a fireplace.

Take time for hygge. And have some hygge alone. You’ve more than earned it.

#9: Connect with loved ones

When I set goals for the year, I do it across four dimensions: career, personal, key relationships, and parenting. It helps me to be intentional in all of the most important areas of my life.

A couple of years ago, I set a goal to talk to three of my closest friends twice a month, for an hour. I do it on my daily walk, so it allows me to double up on tasks without adding anymore time to my day.

I can’t tell you how much joy it’s brought into my life to be so connected, and so current, with these three women.

Time with loved ones is fundamental to our happiness, and I see it as a part of self-care. And it is the opposite of the loneliness epidemic we’re experiencing right now as a society, which is harming both our mental and our physical health.

So take some time to connect with people you care about, who get you, and make you laugh.

#10: Have a new experience

For the last few years, we’ve started a holiday tradition of having a special experience as a family each December. We live outside of NYC, so to take advantage of that we’ve headed into the city to do something spectacular like see the circus or a Broadway show, and have a delicious meal.

(Although maybe don’t follow our lead on going into the city for the last two years during SantaCon. Unless of course you want the opportunities I’ve had to explain concepts like “Drunk Santa”, and “Sexy Mrs. Clause” to my 7 and 11 year olds :)

Public drunkenness aside, these trips break up the To Do list feel of December for me, and they bring novelty into my life, which I appreciate during a time of the year so flanked by responsibility and schedules.

Novel experiences activate our dopamine system. And while a long To Do list can make us feel overwhelmed, stressed, or even sluggish, dopamine improves our mood, our motivation, and it helps us be more creative in managing our stress. Novelty can help is improve our mental health – which is key for ending 2023 feeling relaxed, and starting 2024 ready and focused.

I hope the end-of-the-year, and the holiday season, despite its busyness, ultimately leads you to a place of reflection, calm, and comfort. Take care of yourself – you deserve it and it’s one of the best investments you can make!

Protecting the Wellbeing of Parents: Resisting Untruths

What’s happening in our surroundings impacts our mental health and our sense of self. It’s especially easy to see examples of this in the present moment. COVID has created ongoing uncertainty. As a result, many of us are anxious and less happy. A key reason we’re feeling so much anxiety internally, is that we are surrounded by unknowns externally. We’re immersed in murkiness and uncharted territory.

Anxiety is future-facing emotion. It springs up when we feel nervous or uneasy about an impending event or unrevealed possibilities. The future has felt uncertain for most of us for nearly two years. That feeling has settled inside many of us, as persistent anxiety and worry. We have internalized what’s happening around us. What’s outside is now also inside.

We see the same pattern around social justice issues and our mental health. Working parents, and mothers in particular, experience this internalization everyday as we see the impact of inflexible policies that are not family-friendly on parent's identities. The result is parents who perceive themselves as not doing well enough either at work or at home.

What’s surrounding us seeps inside our minds. We adopt external messages as “knowledge” about ourselves. But really, it’s not about us at all. In fact, many of these messages aren’t even true or accurate. Yet they impact how we feel about ourselves, and at times they harm us. When our environment is feeding us distortions as “objective information,” it’s a threat to our mental health and our sense of ourselves. Therefore, we must be deliberate around protecting ourselves from harm, so that we can move through the world with more ease and a greater sense of wellbeing.

Working parents & systemic untruths

Working parents have always been stretched thin. They were before the pandemic. We live in a country that is inhospitable to parents and doesn’t value the needs of children. As a result, we have millions of mothers who identify with the sentiment, “I feel like I’m either failing at work or failing at home. I’m not truly successful anywhere.” These mothers live in an unsupportive environment that reveres work. We claim to value family, but as a culture, we don’t put our money where our mouth is by way of policies and social supports.

Collectively, we have a social problem around working and parenting. This is quite solvable, given that we see it managed much better in other wealthy countries. Here in the U.S., we accept this reality day-to-day, and have lost sight of feeling empowered enough to ask for more. Typically, we’re grateful for the meager scraps we get. This includes short maternity leaves, or insufficient workplace flexibility. Yet instead of, or simultaneous to, being outraged by our policies, we internalize the challenges we face as “personal problems.”

When millions of mothers and fathers are experiencing the same things, it’s not personal—it’s systemic. Yet like with other systemic problems that surround us—racism, sexism, homophobia, to name a few—those of us who experience these issues in our day-to-day lives often internalize them as our own problems. Oftentimes we are even blamed as the cause of the problem itself by society.

That’s simply not true. In fact, it’s an unconscionable distortion.

While parents have not created these problems around work and family, in our current climate it is on them to come up with solutions for their own lives. How can we stop internalizing what’s happening around us? Can we instead protect ourselves, and acknowledge our own hard work and dedication to managing two full time jobs—work and parenting? How can we change the narrative to reflect reality, and reward rather than punish ourselves?

Greater wellbeing

Three strategies to help us create a barrier between harmful external messages and our inner world include: defining success for ourselves, setting better boundaries, and carving out time for rest and reflection.

Defining success for yourself, and yourself only

We live in a society where success is often shorthand for money and prestige. That definition may work well for some. However, working professionals increasingly want to define success more holistically. When you have all the money and accolades that you want, but have neglected other parts of your life, how do you feel?

When we define what success looks like for us, it’s important to think about what we want out of the most important aspects of our lives. This does include our careers and finding work that’s meaningful and engaging. However, it also includes thinking about how we want to show up as parents, what we need out of our key relationships, and what we want for ourselves personally.

Joy and satisfaction are about more than money. We can resist a one-dimensional definition of success. Instead, we can identify what success looks like for us given what we value across the board in our lives. We can also embrace the realization that how we envision success will change based on the chapter of life we are in. Therefore, we will need to keep revising our definition. When we are clear on what success looks like for us, right now, we have more freedom to make the choices that will truly make us happy and fulfilled.

Setting boundaries

Once we know what we want, our boundaries allow us to continually say a resounding “Yes!”, or a firm “No”. Our boundaries are how we protect our time. If we can identify priorities that reflect our values, setting boundaries then allows us to build a life that’s in alignment with our deepest inner wishes. Maintaining our boundaries is also a skill that can help us. This allows us to build a life of balance between the parts of our lives that we value. Each of us must get clear on where it’s difficult for us set boundaries. We can then strive to eliminate what’s getting in the way.

One way to improve at setting boundaries is to integrate delay tactics into your vocabulary as automatic responses. This is a way to give yourself time to think. It allows you to respond deliberately rather than react automatically. We are then able to choose more intentionally. A good way to approach this is to think of some quick responses that you can begin to say in almost any situation you find yourself in, such as:

“Thanks for thinking of me- sounds like a great opportunity. I need to look at this in the context of my other responsibilities, and then I’ll get back to you.”

Or, “That sounds like fun! Let me check on whether I have the time to devote to that right now, and I’ll let you know later this week.”

These types of responses allow us to express gratitude and thanks, and also to take some time to be thoughtful about whether we want to say yes or no.

Often, women want to express kindness in some way. We’re socialized to easily feel badly for not being “nice enough.” Unfortunately, sometimes this leads us to say yes to something that we don’t want to do, or don’t have the bandwidth to take on. This can result in feeling overwhelmed, being overscheduled, and ending up stressed. Using a tactic like the ones mentioned above can allow us to meet our need to express positivity or to “be nice”. It also helps us to separate that need from whether we’re able to take on another commitment.

Consistent rest and reflection

Most of us are aware of the research that rest allows us to be more productive and to perform better. But in our culture of workaholism, it is often difficult for us to give ourselves permission to restore. When we listen to our bodies, and rest when we need to—whether it’s sleeping, reading a book, or taking a stroll outside—we can bring ourselves back to center. We can come back to a place where we feel calmer and more peaceful, rather than overstimulated and frantic. Calming down allow us to be our best selves, and to enjoy our day to day lives. And ironically, when we rest we get more done over time.

Similarly, reflection is an opportunity to check in with ourselves, to keep clarifying what we want and need, and to refine what we believe. Both rest and reflection are important protectors and replenishers so we can feel good each day.

Career + Work-Life Reset

I began the Career + Work-Life Reset program for working moms in response to this idea that moms often feel like they are not 100% successful in their careers or as parents. Because we have cultural ideals around work that encourage always “being on”, and we have expectations that women should be supermoms, mothers are left in a bind. How can we feel that we are making enough of an impact in two distinct areas of life, that are each full-time jobs in and of themselves?

There is no magic bullet to solve this problem, because true solutions would need to be carved out on many different levels of society. Yet working moms can take back the reins, and assert their own power, by defining for themselves what success looks like for them, right now. They can reward themselves for their hard work each day, and give themselves the credit they deserve for being successful across the board.

In our program, we support women in this work of reclaiming what achievement looks like by having participants set goals across four important areas of life. This encourages a holistic approach to defining success, across career, parenting, key relationships, and personal. Women come together for a 12-week transformative journey with like-minded women, and connect, brainstorm, and at times commiserate as they work towards their goals. We talk about a range of topics to remove blocks that get in the way of achieving your goals, help you to shift your mindset, and allow you to develop new skills, so you are more effective in reaching your goals.

When we as working mothers can recognize that we are not the problem, and free ourselves of that false narrative, we are positioned to take control of our own lives, and to assert what we want and need. When we can resist what society has told us, and dig deeper into our own values, we can begin to carve out a path that is uniquely ours, and is right for us, no matter what chapter of life we find ourselves in. By owning that we’re enough, creating realistic expectations for ourselves, and celebrating our successes—whether traditional or not—we can seize greater joy, contentment, and satisfaction in our lives.

Why airborne toxic mold is a blessing

This past fall, I had more things go wrong in a 2-month period than I ever have in my adult life.

A carbon monoxide leak that led to a visit from the fire department. Our boiler broke. A deep cut in my 5-year old’s tongue that landed us in the emergency room. And several other big things went wrong as well—we couldn’t seem to catch a break.

One of the many problems that arose was discovering that we had airborne toxic mold in our basement. This turned out to be a blessing, and I learned some life-changing lessons. But it didn’t start out that way.

Awful Possibilities

It was a couple of weeks before Thanksgiving. Apparently, we had water damage from Hurricane Ida. We didn’t know at the time since there was zero visible water. Yet there it was- black spots behind the washer dryer. The mold guys came, and we talked through all of the terrible possibilities.

The absolute worst-case scenario was airborne toxic mold that had wafted up to the first-floor from the basement. It would mean evacuating the house, and doing Thanksgiving out of an Airbnb with my husband and young kids. The stress of that thought was overwhelming. I reached down deep to all that I’ve learned from mindfulness and meditation and reminded myself, “This is not happening right now. It’s a possibility, but it’s not happening now.” Onward we went.

The mold guys came and confirmed the (almost) worst— the mold was toxic, and it was airborne. BUT—it was not airborne on the first floor. They would seal the basement off, but we could stay. No moving my kids. No Airbnb.

Lesson Learned:

When the worst is not happening,

allow yourself to experience deep gratitude for that.

Imagine the inside of your junk drawer. What’s in there? Probably all sorts of horrible things that don’t go together—a band aid, 3 markers, some sentimental item that you can’t throw away but don’t know where it goes, and a hundred other random things. That was our basement. To keep our house uncluttered, we’ve moved all of the stuff that we didn’t know what to do with down to our basement…for years. Always with the best of intentions about going in and sorting, reorganizing, and donating.

One of the most stressful aspects of this mold, in addition to potential health effects for our kids, and the price tag, was that we were going to have to go through Every. Single. Thing. in our basement, and either throw it away, or pay to have it cleaned by the mold guys. What was down there? Oh god—I had to hold my head in my hands just thinking about it. All my kids’ Christmas presents, their artwork, old toys, clothes…SO many things. I thought going through all our stuff be the worst part, but it was liberating, and it turned out to be a blessing.

Diving Into the Overwhelm

The dumpster arrived. We had our respirators on. We couldn’t find a babysitter— so too much TV, here we come! We blocked off 4 mornings, and we went in. I basically did a Marie Condo in reverse. Instead of asking myself, “Does it spark joy?”, most of the time when I picked something up, I would think “Oh god”, and my stomach would feel like I’d been punched. Whenever I felt like that, I threw it into the dumpster.

The thing about airborne toxic mold, is anything you want to keep, you must pay to have it cleaned because spores have settled on every surface. This forces you to make a deliberate decision about whether or not you actually want the thing and will invest even more money to keep it. It also removes all guilt—you cannot donate it or sell it. You must let go of the fact that you spent money on something that didn’t get used. You must accept that you are putting piles of plastic into a landfill.

I let go of the dining room table that was in my childhood home, when my parents were still married and my family was intact. I let go of the early childhood toys that my aunt had gifted me and I had wanted to pass on to her daughter when she has children.

I had to let go, and I had to do it quickly. About 10% of the time I felt like- “You know what? I want this. I will pay to have it cleaned, and I will keep it.”

 Lighter. More free.

Before I had kids, on Friday nights I would buy trashy magazines and settle into a cozy night of relaxation with my now husband. Through all of my rag mags I learned that the stars go to Promises, a fancy rehabilitation for alcoholism, when they need to recover from addiction.

After I’d thrown 90% of what was in my basement away, and simply let it all go, I felt lighter, and freer. I felt grateful that the albatross of all this stuff was no longer weighing me down. It inspired me to go through the rest of my house and purge wherever I could.

I started telling people that our airborne toxic mold was my Promises experience- it was my $13,000 Hoarders remediation program. And I learned many lessons.

Here is What I Know Now

1.     Unless it’s a genuine YES, it’s a No. An enthusiastic yes to something in your life means you feel clear, and you truly want this.

2.     We must let go, again and again. We hold onto jobs we don’t like, relationships that no longer serve us, and even ideas about our identity that are outdated. When you allow yourself to shed and say goodbye, you will feel clear, and you will be more free.

3.     Letting go allows us to start fresh. New chapters are always within our grasp—we just need to identify what we want and go after it.

4.     Positives stem from our negative experiences. It’s healthy to feel sad or angry in the moment, but there is also so much to learn—don’t squander these opportunities to gain something from your low points.

So ask yourself, “What do I truly want? What do I need to let go of?”

Like many bits of wisdom, it’s simple — but not easy. The time is now. What will you leave behind and where will it allow you to go next?

Creating Habits that Stick

There are many great strategies to build habits that help you make meaningful, and long-term, changes in your life. Some of my favorites include habit-stacking, the power of timing, and keystone habits.

Habit Stacking

I created some beneficial new habits in 2020, and I did it using an approach called habit stacking.

It’s overwhelming for most of us to imagine piling more responsibilities onto our already very full plates. Habit stacking is simple—if you want to do something, you have to pair it with something that you do already, automatically. Think adding greens to your lunch every day. You’re already eating, you just need to tack on a healthy addition to your routine.

Want to build meditation into your schedule? Do it first thing in the morning every weekday when you sit down in front of your computer. Want your kids outside for more frequent but brief intervals to reset their energy? Take them with you every time you walk the dog.

You get the idea—now stack away and see how great you feel with these new behaviors in your life.

Timing

I read an excellent book this summer, When, by Daniel Pink. It’s filled with many gems, but one of my favorites is about using timing to create change in our lives. Pink says that it actually IS easier to make changes in your life on January 1. It’s because the beginning of a year is imbued with so much meaning around being able to start over. He calls these moments when we can start over more easily “temporal landmarks,” and says that when those times arise, it’s due to the significance that YOU have given the particular month or day.

These times are ripe for a new start, allow us to shed parts of ourselves that we don’t like, and those versions of us can be stored away as our “old selves.” Temporal landmarks allow us to begin again as our “new selves.”

The great news is that you can “restart” many, many times in a year. You just need to find times that are imbued with meaning for you—like the first day of the month, or your birthday, your child’s birthday—even every Monday. Temporal landmarks are special times because they also allow people to step back, take a big picture view of their lives, and identify key goals that are important to them.

Keystone Habits

Another book I read years ago, but I loved it and it stayed with me, is The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg. He writes about how to transform behavior. I found the book to be a good opportunity to reflect on my own habits, and to think through how to alter my daily practices to best manage myself. One of his most important ideas is the concept of keystone habits, which are key positive behaviors that need to be in place for other good habits to be maintained.

Think of keystone habits as the foundation—once the fundamentals are in place, you can build from there. I initially found identifying my own keystone habits to be a bit challenging. I couldn’t be sure which habits were my keystones until I had some data. So I prioritized certain behaviors and paid attention to what actually worked in my own life.

I discovered that my keystone habits are sleep and exercise, which is true for many people. Once those are in place, other helpful habits are easier to maintain, like eating healthfully, managing time wisely, and being patient with your kids.

Starting new habits often also involves hitting periods of time where we pause on our helpful habits, stop them altogether, and then bring them back again when we can.

There is no failure—only setbacks. Know that you can restart as many times as you need to in order to gain momentum and create helpful, lasting changes in your life.

Say No to New Year's Resolutions

I’ve never liked New Year’s resolutions. Making personal changes in my life that are dictated by the calendar just never made sense to me. And here we are, mid-January, with many people already giving up their resolutions and feeling badly about themselves as a result. 

Now don’t get me wrong, I LOVE setting goals.

I love big picture plans, and breaking those bigger goals into smaller steps. Then getting clear on what I need to get done in shorter timeframes to make this larger vision become a reality. On my most effective days I write down what I will achieve that day, and watch as my life is transformed by meaningful action.

Extrinsic vs. Intrinsic

New Year’s resolutions seem misguided because they strike me as extrinsically motivated. No matter where I am in my life, with all of its complexity, does the calendar switching to January 1 mean that I must decide that aspects of my life will be different?

What’s more, often the “different” is fairly predictable and draws from a few key categories, weight loss being the most obvious one that comes to mind. And let’s be honest, after the overindulgence most of us experience starting at Thanksgiving, and carry through the rest of the year, by January the idea of losing weight and feeling cleaner is pretty appealing. However, like any faithful gym-goer knows, for most of us, these promises of making change drop off by early February at the latest. And once we fall off that wagon, we’re often left berating ourselves for failure and feeling badly about our inability to make change. This is the cycle that results from extrinsically motivated goals.

But there is another way! It is a path of personal growth, learning about the self, and making true meaningful change in our lives. It’s about setting goals that are intrinsically motivated… and have nothing to do with the date on the calendar.

What sets intrinsically motivated goals apart from extrinsically motivated ones is having developed the readiness for change. This means getting clear on our process for how we will change, as well as defining the outcome we’re working towards.

Are you Ready?

My favorite way to think about “readiness for change” is through Prochaska and DiClemente’s Stages of Change. Originally developed as a way of thinking about how people break out of addiction, it’s a fantastic framework for thinking about how to change habits in our lives. The basic idea is that there are six stages of creating change:

1.     Pre-contemplation

2.     Contemplation

3.     Determination

4.     Action

5.     Maintenance

6.     Relapse

Stages of Change

“Pre-contemplation” is when you’re not-at-all ready to change. Interestingly, trying to make changes when you’re in this stage can actually lead you to doubt your ability to makes changes overall. You’re simply not ready yet.

During “Contemplation,” you are beginning to think about making a change. You’ve identified that there is a change you’d like to make, and you can see clearly what it is. You’re aware of the benefits of changing, but you’re also aware of the cons.  

During “Determination”, you are getting yourself ready. For many who begin weight-loss efforts on January 1st or 2nd, determination is when you’re eating pancakes for breakfast and saying to yourself “One week from now, these pancakes will be replaced by a green smoothie”.

“Action” means you’ve started! You’re doing it! You’re feeling good executing this new habit and motivation is high!

“Maintenance” means you’re fully in the groove now—you can do this regularly and it’s become a part of your lifestyle. You will also feel more likely to break your new habits from time to time than when you started out so strongly in the “Action” phase.

But then—“Relapse.” All of us, no matter how well we do, will fall off the wagon at some point and engage in a behavior that takes us further away from our goal rather than moving us towards it. This is probably my favorite part of the model.

WHAT? I’m saying I LIKE relapse?

Well, not personally. Not when I’m experiencing myself. But as a legitimate phase, one that can be expected and normalized? Yes, I adore it.

Here’s why: When I experience relapse in pursuit of any of my own goals, I have found it easy to then engage in a range of self-defeating behaviors—from black-and-white thinking (“I’ve already f’ed up, so now I may as well go hog wild…”) to generalizing and self-punishment (“I’ll never achieve my goal now…”).

What I love about articulating relapse as a predictable phase is that it allows me to see it as common and acceptable, so when it does happen I can think about it productively...

“Of course I messed up. That’s to be expected and everyone does. Tomorrow, right back on the wagon with the healthy, productive habits I’ve developed... right back towards my goal.”

The Right Time for YOU

So, you can see how when January 1st rolls around, and you’re in the “Pre-contemplation” stage, it’s not quite the right time yet to set a goal. At this point, getting ahead of yourself can predictably lead to failure and result in self-defeating thoughts and behaviors. If you haven’t first gotten very clear on the change you want to create, identified the process you will use to get there, and developed the personal resolve and the will to get there, you will fail. All of the external incentives in the world could be available, as is often the case on January 1st, but if you aren’t there internally, genuinely, and intrinsically, it’s not the right time for you. 

So say the new year rolls around and you do want to make a change but you’re not ready yet? There are still things you can do!

Most importantly, it’s time to build up your motivation so that you will be able take action when you are really ready. Read about the positive impacts you will see in your life once you embark upon your goal. Contemplate and research and talk with friends about how much more awful your life will be if you don’t take action. Thinking about both the pros and the cons of making a change will build readiness.

Regardless of the date on the calendar, there are still steps you can take to begin building a new habit that will last.

I have spent much of the past few years reading about goals, thinking about goals, helping others set and achieve goals, and transforming my own life with new goals. In short, I’m a bit obsessed with goal-setting and pretty much adore it.

So when you’re ready, here are a few tips:

1.     Write your goals down. You need to be able to see them in your mind AND see them on paper

2.     Break bigger goals down into smaller steps and be realistic about what you can achieve in a given period of time. It’s all about incremental change. It’s the only way to get things done (as frustrating as I personally find that reality to be, it’s true.)

3.     Keep a list of discrete tasks you need to complete.

• The more granular you can get the more helpful it will be

• Complete action steps weekly or daily—doing 1-2 small steps every day will let you will see progress being made.

4.     Use your brain for thinking, creating, idea generation and problem solving—never for storage. This is why writing things down is so essential—it clears space in your brain and reduces the tension that creeps in from trying to remember tons of important details. Use your brain to wonder and envision- not to keep track of things.

• This is an oldie but goodie—my favorite article on reducing overwhelm. Written for business owners, relevant to all of us.

5.     Use an organizational tool. Personally, I like ToDoist, but there are many, many of them out there. Find one that works for you and use it consistently.

Long-term success

Finally, to prepare yourself for long-haul change, it’s important to remember that relapse, or failure, is part of the cycle.

Failure is not a reason to give up and abandon your goal completely. Know that it's normal, so expect it. And don’t use it as an opportunity to engage in all-or-nothing thinking and sabotage your grander plans. Get back on the wagon right away and keep working incrementally towards those bigger goals. Over time your successes will far outweigh your failures and you will see significant and meaningful changes in your life. 

Enjoy this time—or the time that is right for you—for a fresh start and the hopefulness that accompanies making changes.  

Happy goal setting!!!