Is this why you have been putting it off?

I love September because it feels like new year and with a new year comes new goals, a fresh start and new energy. It’s a great time to shake things up and achieve those goals that you set earlier in the year but you’ve just been “too busy” to work on over summer.

Personally, I started achieving my Autumn goal in July but only now do I feel like SUPER motivated to achieve it. I’ve got that sense of urgency that goal-day is now NEXT month and not so long away.

I started talking about your health, fitness & weight loss goals quite early too because I wanted you to be prepared to start achieving them as soon as the kids went back to school and normal routine could resume. Hopefully you’ve set out WHAT you want to achieve, WHY you want to achieve those goals (that’s the motivational part) and have an idea of HOW you are going to achieve those goals??

If you haven’t, check out the past 3 weeks of blogs for help here

When you’ve done that I want you to take THE most important step you can ever take (the FIRST step). Some people put off for ages (perhaps yourself for the first 8 months of this year?) and actually some people NEVER take this next step because most likely you/they are scared… Scared to fail. Scared of what people might think. Scared in case it’s too much effort and you can’t cope. Scared of change. Scared you can’t afford it and you’ll run out of money. Scared you’ll get overwhelmed/stressed. Scared that other people will be better than you. Scared because you have no clue what to actually do to achieve your goals and there’s no point even starting if you’re not sure if it will even work.

You probably didn’t even realise it was FEAR that was holding you back until you read that last paragraph. And even now you’re probably telling yourself that you’re not scared and it’s really just that you don’t have the time or money to start… am I right? Well, actually that’s just fear in disguise again because it’s easier and more socially acceptable to say that rather than “I’m scared”.

In the past, I used to let fear put me off achieving my goals too. Mostly the fear of failing and what people will think about that. But then I learnt this technique called ‘unravelling’ which is great for changing a negative mindset to a more positive one. I will point out, however, you have to WANT to change your mindset for this to work.

So let’s have a go with unravelling some fears.

The main question you have to ask is “what’s the worst outcome that you can imagine?”

For example: You want to be able to run 5K by the end of the year but you’ve been putting it off.

Me: so what’s the worst that could happen by running for the first time?

Client: people could laugh at me in the street

Me: and what will you do if that happens?

Client: I’ll stop running and go home and cry

Me: ok so what happens after you stop running and go home and cry?

Client: I’ll probably eat a chocolate bar, text my husband and carry on with my day

Me: ok so worst case scenario from you running for the first time is you eat a chocolate bar? Hmmmmm. Doesn’t sound too bad to me!

Let’s take it a little deeper

Me: so how will you feel when you go home and cry?

Client: I’ll feel humiliated and like a failure because I couldn’t even do one run

Me: and what will you do if you feel humiliated?

Client: Eat the chocolate bar and think about where I can run that people wont see me

Me: great, so you’ll want to persevere?

Client: definitely, I’ll want to prove them wrong and burn off this chocolate bar!

Ok that’s just a hypothetical scenario and maybe it doesn’t always work out like that but my point is  the reality is generally never as bad as you imagine it will be and this unravelling technique helps to face your worst fears head on just in case they do happen.

Give it a go this week and see how you get on with taking the first actual step to achieving your goals.