5 Steps to Aligning Your Actions with Your Goals

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Okay sister, I have a serious question to ask you: What goals are you trying to reach? AND how’s it going trying to reach them? How long have you been working towards this goal?

So many of us say we want to reach certain goals, yet our actions don’t align with the goals we want to reach.

We say we want to “lose weight” but continue to indulge in our old habits.

We say we want to work out more but we continue to skip our workouts time and time again.

We say we want to achieve this, or become that, but all we are dong is saying it, and we aren’t actually doing what we need to do to get there.

So how do we combat this? How do we actually align our actions with our goals? That’s what I’m going to dive into today with you in this episode of Embrace Your Real.

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TRANSCRIPT:

Hey there, beautiful human. You're listening to Embrace Your Real with me, Julie Ledbetter, a podcast where I empower you to just be you. With each episode, I'd issue a dose of real talk and actionable advice for building your confidence, honoring your body and unconditionally loving your authentic self. Stay tuned if you're ready to embrace your real. Let's get it. Let's go.

Welcome back to another episode of the Embrace Your Real podcast. I have a series question to ask you. What are the goals that you are currently trying to reach in your life? And how are you trying to reach them? And how long have you been working towards these goals? I feel like so many of us want to reach certain goals, yet our actions don't align with the goals that we want to reach. We say that we want to lose weight, but we continue to indulge in our old habits. We say that we want to work out more, but we continue to skip our workouts time and time again and not prioritize them. We say that we want to achieve this or become that, but all we're doing is saying it, and we're never actually doing what it takes to actually get there.

So how do we combat this? How do we actually align our actions with our goals? That's exactly what I'm going to dive into in today's episode of Embrace Your Real, but first, I wanted to share their review of the day. It comes from SusieB16400. She says, "Thank you. Just finished my first podcast. Oh my gosh, this is me. I needed to hear this. Thank you." You guys, I want you to know that I love these super short reviews just as much as the long ones. Any reviews that I get fill my heart and my soul, and it truly keeps me motivated to keep on sharing more and more with you.

If this podcast has impacted you in any way, shape or form, please let me know in a review. Plus, it helps the podcast grow, which actually in turn helps impact the lives of more and more women who need to hear these messages. So thank you in advance. Take out that Apple device, type in podcasts. It's the beautiful purple icon. Click on it. Make sure you're subscribed to Embrace Your Real, and then scroll all the way down and you will see where you can rate and review. It's not intimidating at all. It takes less than 15 seconds, but like I said, it truly does help us out. Thank you in advance. I appreciate you.

Okay. Let's dive into discussing the six steps to aligning your actions with your goals. Step one, make your goal as specific as possible. It's hard to align our actions with our goals, if we really don't even know what our goals are. Saying that you want to lose weight is not a specific goal. Saying that you want to eat healthier is not a specific goal. Saying that you want to work out is not a specific goal. Saying that you want to rest more is not a specific goal. And saying you want to make more boundaries in your life, that's not a truly specific goal.

What is healthier actually look like? What does working out more actually mean? Is it way you want to lose, or is it muscle you want to gain? How can you make that more specific? Clearly define what those things are. Instead, try something like this. "I'm going to commit to hitting my macros within 10 to 15 grams per day." "I'm going to commit to working out four days a week for at least 45 minutes." "I'm going to prioritize getting eight hours of sleep per night." Or, "I'm going to take one day off of work per week, and after 7:00 PM, I'm prioritizing time with loved ones or myself device-free." Those are a lot more specific than what I mentioned earlier. Can you see the difference?

The next step is setting a specific goal and adding a deadline, because let's be real, how many of you guys have said, "I want to lose weight," for years. "I want to start working out more." for years. "I want to start nourishing my body with what it needs."? For years, you've been saying that over and over again, but it's been so open-ended you haven't actually reached the goal. You haven't lost the weight. You haven't committed to working out more. You haven't properly nourished your body the way that you know you could. For example, you say you want to start hitting your macros within 10 to 15 grams.

Tell yourself that you're going to meal prep on Sunday, which will ensure that you will hit your macros within 10 to 15 grams per day. That is a lot more specific, and that also gives you a deadline. Or say that you're going to commit to working out four days a week for at least 45 minutes, starting this Monday, and put a date, put it on a calendar, schedule it in. You have to create a deadline for this, or it will never actually get started. Or you will constantly keep putting it off.

Our brain thrives on deadlines. I know that we might not like the pressure. Some of us do. Some of us may hate the pressure that comes with a deadline, but I'm telling you that deadlines are so effective, because they do put that pressure on us and in our brain to propel us forward, to encourage us to get started. And give yourself an ultimatum and say, "If I don't do this by this, then I'm going to X, Y, and Z," which could be something that makes you not want to fall through on this deadline that you're setting yourself. So maybe it's that you're going to have to donate to something that you actually don't stand for, like something that actually means a lot to you, that creates higher stakes. Because like I said, oftentimes, we just will say something and it's not even specific, or maybe do get specific, but then we never put a deadline on it, or we never put ourselves in a position where we could feel the pain a little bit.

We have to have a price to pay if we don't follow through on these deadlines. I know that might sound harsh, but girl, your goals, your dreams, the results that you want in your life, they are worth it. They are worth going through the discomfort that you might feel initially by putting additional pressure on yourself. So I just want to encourage you to try to do that. That could also be telling someone, "Hey, if I don't do X, Y, and Z, I need you to take my phone from me," or, "I need you to..." Something you fill in the blank that will give you a sense of pain that will hopefully motivate you and propel you forward towards what you actually said you're going to do, so you can follow through on it.

Step two, define what you need to do first and then daily in order to reach your goals. We can't just say that we want to hit our macros daily, or that we want to work out four days a week for 45 minutes. You need to know exactly how you are going to make that happen. Hitting your macros daily within 10 to 15 grams first includes getting your macros properly calculated. If you don't have your macros calculated, you can't really do this effectively. So that's going to be your first step. Second, determine what meals or snacks fit into your macros best. Third, you're going to go grocery shopping, so you actually have all of those foods. Fourth, you're going to meal prep so that you can have macro-friendly foods, recipes, meals, snacks at your disposal, and then lastly, you're going to plan ahead and bring those macro-friendly snacks with you on the go, or plan ahead if you plan on eating out.

I will never tell you to not eat out, that's not sustainable, but I will say that you can absolutely plan ahead. You can plan ahead by entering that meal or what you think you're going to get at the restaurant first and then plan the rest of your meals and snacks around that. Or another example, working out four days a week, includes first finding what time works best. Second, rearranging your schedule to make sure that you have time or get someone to watch the kids or whatever you need to do to ensure that you have that free time available for you. Then you're going to figure out where you're going to be working out. Is it going to be at home? Is it going to be at a gym? Is it going to be a mix of both? Then lastly, you have to determine what workouts or what workout plan are you going to follow? Because it's not just as simple as saying, "I'm going to do this." You need to say, "I'm going to be doing this by doing X, Y, and Z."

This is why so many ladies keep coming back to my Honor Your Body challenge, you guys, because I make it super simple for them to implement reaching their goals into their daily life. Not only do I give them a checklist of what they need to do, but I give them all the tools that they need and the accountability and support that they need. So if you know what your specific goal is, but you're unsure of what exactly you need to do to reach those goals, I want to encourage you and invite you to just learn more about my Honor Your Body challenge. Enrollment is now open for the fall 2021 challenge. The challenge actually starts on Monday, October 4th. So you definitely still have time if you're listening to this when this episode goes out. But I encourage you to get plugged in. I encourage you to invest yourself, invest your hard-earned cash into your health. That is one of the best investments that you can make.

I always, always say that when you pay, you pay attention. That's why it's super easy to look on Instagram and save tons and tons of workouts, and then you look back at your saved items and you're like, "Oh, I never followed through on any of these things," because you're not paying to pay attention. When you invest your hard-earned cash, the cash that you work hard for into something like a program, into something like the challenge that's going to give you all the tools that you need to succeed, you're more likely to pay attention because you have a little more skin in the game.

Step three, make your goals a part of your identity. In last week's episode, I mentioned Atomic Habits by James Clear, which is an amazing book, if you haven't already read it, but I'm going to mention another kind of tidbit that he mentions in that book this week. He says that the best way to adopt any habit is by changing your verbiage around that habit. I believe that the same can be done and said for your goals. So instead of saying something like, "I'm going to be counting my macros," say, "I am someone who counts my macros." Or instead of saying, "I am going to work out four days a week for 45 minutes," say, "I am someone who works out four days a week for 45 minutes." Or instead of saying, "I want to be balanced, healthy, and fit," say, "I am a balanced, healthy and fit woman." Because the more that you say, "I am," the more natural it will be to do the habits that align with that.

If you are a macro counter, you're obviously going to count your macros. That's what macro counters do, and they wouldn't think anything otherwise. The same would go for a healthy and balanced and fit person. They make decisions aligned with being balanced, aligned, with being fit and healthy, because that's what fit and healthy and balanced people do. It's who they are. It's an identity shift. And when you shift your identity into these things, it propels you into making decisions that align more accurately with your goals, which leads me to step number four, with everything that you do, you have to ask yourself, is this helping, or is this me? Is this moving me closer or further away from my goals? Does this align with what I want to become, or align with who I am right now? Or, if I continue to do this, where will I be in one day, one month or one year from now?

We need to start becoming more aware of our day-to-day actions, the little actions that we take daily that add up to the grandiose things. Remember, every choice that we make plays a role in the person that we become, whether it's big or small. If your plan is to work out four days a week and you skip two workouts a week, it's going to take you twice as long to get there, to get where you want to be. Let's say you do four workouts a week, but you fail to track your macros daily and you're always eating way more than your body needs. You're going to struggle to get to where you want to be. So you have to have awareness of the choices that you're making and how they are affecting your goals. And if you do choose to make the decision that doesn't align with their goals, at least you have that awareness, because many of us don't actually have the awareness with our day-to-day decisions. So we continue to make these decisions over and over again, that don't align with our goals, and yet we get super frustrated when we can't reach them.

Remember, if we have awareness of the choices that we make, that don't align with our goals, then we can make a choice that does align next time, instead of continuing in the wrong direction. Step number five, ask yourself what is stopping you from aligning your actions with your goals? If we don't figure out what our obstacles are and we actually don't address them, they will continue to be obstacles and they will continue to pop up. For example, you can't just say, "I won't skip the workout again." Saying you won't do something doesn't actually address anything. It doesn't address why you skip the workout in the first place without actually addressing it. Because without addressing it, you will skip the workout again when the same obstacle arises. You can't just say, "I'll start over on Monday." Why are you starting over on Monday? What caused you to have to start over in the first place?

You have to figure out what got you off track and make a plan of action, moving forward. That's the key. We need a plan of action. We need to have a clear plan or solution in place for every obstacle that we regularly face, so when it arises, we know exactly what we need to do to move through it without letting it take us off track. Step number six, you have to visualize yourself after you have reached the goal. Have you ever practiced visualization? If you would have asked me this four years ago, I would have said, "That's a little woo woo. That's a little... I don't know about that. I don't know if that works," but I'm telling you, girl, visualization is a gift. It is truly a gift.

When you visualize you are how you look, how you feel, how happy you are after you've reached your goal, something in our brain is triggered. And when you visualize it so much that the image gets ingrained in your brain, it starts to become a reality. But here's the thing. If you can't visualize it, you won't accomplish it. If you can't see yourself actually doing it or being it, it likely won't happen. You must believe that it is possible for it to actually be possible. And visualization is truly one of the best things to ensure that you truly believe what you want to accomplish.

I've said this before in the podcast, but your brain actually cannot differentiate between what is real and what has been vividly imagined. That's why I'm always so picky on the words that I say to myself, because the more I say negative things, the more my brain starts to believe then to be true, and ultimately, that creates my reality. But on the flip side, if I only start to focus on positive things, if I only truly visualize good and positive change in my life, and I only focus on that, it can be single-handedly life-transforming because it's so powerful. I have gotten to a point where if I want something in my life, I have to visualize it first, I have to believe that it is possible.

Yes, the first couple of times of the visualization, it might be hard, you might find your mind slipping backwards, telling you, "No, you can't," or, "You've never done that before. What makes you think that you can do that?" But keep reminding yourself, keep trying to place yourself in that visualization. Keep going through all of the vividly imagined parts of what it looks like to accomplish your goal, and eventually, your brain will actually start to believe that that is real. The beautiful thing about what happens in our brain is that when it can't differentiate what is real or what is vividly imagined, it's going to kind of take over in our subconscious, and it's going to help us align our actions to our goals. That is why visualization is so powerful.

You can set aside and start with five minutes each morning. I want you to sit and close your eyes and visualize yourself being the best version of yourself. Or if you want to be more efficient and you have not gotten to the point where you can sit down and close your eyes without thinking about a million different things, try visualizing while you're doing something that's mindless, like brushing your teeth. Try vividly imagining what it looks like to show up as the best version of yourself today. First, you have to identify all the roles that you play in your life. Second, identify the goals that you have for the day. It could be health and fitness goals. It could be relational goals. It can be profession goals. And you can start with one aspect and start to visualize that first.

If you're really let's go with the health and fitness aspect of our life, if you want to count your macros within 10 to 15 grams every day, and you want to hit your macros within that, and you want to work out for 45 minutes that day, and you want to prioritize your sleep, let's say those are your three top goals. You want to get eight hours of sleep a night, you want to work out for at least 45 minutes, and you want to hit your macros within 10 to 15 grams. When you're brushing your teeth, or if you can, close your eyes, take five minutes. I want you to go throughout your day, and I want you to vividly imagine what it looks like, what are the meals? What are the snacks that you are eating? How are you feeling when you are properly nourished? Think about the energy that you're going to have when you're hydrating your body with what it needs in terms of water intake, and think about all of the amazing benefits, that fueling your body properly has.

Then I want you to think about the exact time that you have scheduled in for your workout. And I want you to go through that. If it's a lower body day, I want you if possible to look ahead and say, "These are the movements that are on today's schedule for my workout, and this is the how I'm going to feel, and I'm really going to dial in and stay focused. I'm not going to be on my phone during my workout. I am going to give it my all," and actually start to feel what it feels like to be in that intense workout, and the sense of accomplishment that you are going to have after that workout. Then lastly, if you're prioritizing eight hours of sleep, you have to figure out what time are you waking up tomorrow? What time does that mean that you are setting your phone down at night so you can go to sleep?

For me, I've talked about this before, but I typically set my phone at least an hour, if not an hour and a half, before I go to sleep. I try to not look at my phone. It has really helped my sleep quality, but I set the timer and I set the timer for about 30 minutes before that one hour, an hour and a half before I go to sleep, to remind myself, "Hey, you're going to be winding down here in the next 30 minutes. So if it's a show that you're watching, or if it's something that you're doing, just remember that you have about 30 minutes before you start winding down and you put your phone down for the night," and go through that visualization. What is it going to look like to go to sleep and have a restful sleep, to actually get in a deep REM state so that you can wake up tomorrow feeling energized and feeling your best self so that you can show up in your best capacity. That's kind of what a visualization would look like in terms of health and fitness.

Going through that and actually trying to put yourself in the position of what it would feel like I'm telling you, visualization is hands down one of the most powerful techniques that you can do when it comes to actually reaching your goals. I want you to stay consistent with it. I want you to commit to doing it for two to three, start with two to three minutes a day, and then work your way up. I've done visualizations as long as 15 minutes. I know that can sound daunting right now, but I'm telling you if you make it a habit, if you make it something like an identity, "I am a woman who visualize her goals and dreams, because I know how important it is to the success of where I want to be. I am a woman who visualizes every single day because it is so important and it is vital to the success of my goals." Make it a part of who you are.

Okay. I'm going to recap those six steps to aligning your actions with your goals. Step number one, make your goal as specific as possible. Step number two, define what you need to do first and daily in order to reach your goals. Step number three, make your goals your identity. Step number four, with everything that you do, ask yourself, is this helping or hurting me? Step number five, ask yourself, what is truly stopping me from aligning my actions with my goals? And step number six, visualize yourself after you have reached your goals.

Again, if you have goals but you are unsure of the steps that you need to take to reach them, I give you the foundation that you need in my four-week Honor Your Body challenge. I give you four weeks worth of workouts. I personally calculate your macros for you based on your goals and where you're at. I teach you how to count macros. I give you over 30 macro-friendly recipes and snack ideas that you can implement into your weekly meal prep. And I give you the accountability and support that you need to reach your goals. The best part is in the four weeks that you make honoring your body a habit, it becomes who you are. It's not something that you just do. You will continue to live this lifestyle. You will take the tools that you learned over those four weeks, and you will implement them into creating that sustainable lifestyle so that you can see results long-term.

If you are interested, the challenge enrollment is now open. We start the challenge on Monday, October 4th. You are not going to want to miss it. I'm telling you, thousands of women have gone through these challenges and they continue to keep coming back, simply because they keep building on the habits, the foundation that they have created every single challenge. Be sure to head over to honoryourbodychallenge.com, or you can click the show notes because I have linked that in the show notes as well. You can easily go learn all about the challenge, and be sure to enroll. We are capping this challenge. So once it is completely full, enrollment will not be open. If you are seeing the Honor Your Body challenging, you are seeing that enrollment is still open, that means that your spot is still available.

Be sure to go to honor your body challenge.com. I hope to see you inside this fall challenge, we are committing to honoring our bodies through movement, macros and mindset for the next four weeks. We are changing the narrative for the rest of 2021, so that we can close out this year as the strongest version of ourself. Head over to honoryourbodychallenge.com, or click those show notes below as I have also linked that. I hope that you found this episode helpful. I hope that you got some practical tips or tricks. I would love to hear your aha moments. I would love to hear your notes from this episode. So be sure to screenshot this, post it up on your story. Tag me, Julie Ledbetter. Tag Embrace Real account. We love connecting with you. We love seeing all of your notes and your aha moments. We appreciate you so much, and I'll talk to you in the next episode.

All right, sister, that's all I got for you today, but I have two things that I need you to do. First thing, if you're not already following me on the gram, be sure to do so, Julie A Ledbetter. Yes, it's with an A in middle for that daily post-workout real talk, healthy tips and tricks and honest accountability to keep your mind and heart in check. The second thing, be sure to subscribe to Apple Podcasts, to never miss an episode. Thank you so much for joining me. It means the absolute world, and I'm going to leave you with one last thought. The most beautiful women that I have met in my life are the ones who are completely confident and secure in being authentically themselves. Remember that beauty goes so much deeper than the surface. So go out there and embrace your real, because you're worth it.