Goal Setting

Goal Setting Reduced Me To Tears

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I set my 2023 goals, then excitedly started crunching numbers to figure out my action plan…

… then promptly burst into tears.

Because no matter how I massaged the numbers, there literally weren’t enough hours in the day to reach my goals.

It’s hard to describe how helpless and hopeless I felt. The sheer panic in the pit of my stomach took my breath away.

Finally, forcing myself to take a deep breath, my thoughts clarified.

The truth is, there aren’t enough hours in the day to reach my goals in the future, if I pursue my goals the way I have in the past.

Was I was going to have to completely reformulate my business? (gulp!)

Luckily the answer came to me quickly and with a rhyme:

Elevate, don’t recreate.

Yes. Yes. YESSSSS.

Because I do not have time to add 3 new networking events to my schedule or triple my referral generation activity. But with planning, I can make small, quality-elevating adjustments so I can reach my goals without working nights and weekends.

Elevate messaging.

Elevate team.

Elevate client care.

Elevate speaking standards.

Elevate mindset.

Stay tuned: I’ll be blogging about the steps I take so you can follow along.

100% Open Rate, Lesson 2 (an email program I love)

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If you read Lesson 1, you know the lesson is to get started imperfectly.

Lesson 2 is about getting started simply.

And one of the biggest barriers to simplicity these days is technology.

Let’s go back to my client who had just 1 person on her list. Once she made the decision to start sending emails, the next hurdle was: which program to use?

To dip a toe into the overwhelming number of options, do a quick search for “email sending programs.” You will see endless ads and articles that “narrow” down to the top 23 options (ugh).

In the spirit of true simplicity, I’m going to narrow it down to 1 for you.

The program I recommend is Constant Contact.

Yes, I know, it’s kind of old school, but here is why I recommend it:

  1. Customer Service. Seriously, I shouldn’t even write #2 or #3, because this is SO huge. While there are free programs out there like MailMonkey and SendPurple (names have been changed) – the sheer time and frustration you’ll spend on trying to figure out the answers on your own or dig through community forums to get answers… believe me, the $10-20 a month is worth it.
  2. Simple Tech. So easy to build an email, add your contacts, send an email. Years ago, a 70-year-old client of mine who was not super tech-savvy built and sent her first email within an hour (with the help of their outstanding customer service).
  3. Scalable. Start simple with email. Then if you want to add a landing page? Constant Contact can do that. Event marketing? Social media marketing? Integrations with other programs? Yep, CC can do that too.

This is a very specific example, of course. For whatever you’re trying to accomplish right now, here is a quick-start approach to simplifying:

  • What is the goal or project?
  • What are all the things getting in the way? (brainstorm)
  • Regardless of what you’ve done in the past and all of the barriers, what is the SIMPLEST way to reach the goal? In particular, consider how to make it technologically easiest.
  • What is the first step? When will you take it?

100% Open Rate, Lesson 1

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My client got a 100% open rate the very first time she sent an email to her list.

WOW. How did she do that?

Well… she only had 1 person on her list.

So – surprise! The open rate isn’t the lesson.

The lesson came in an earlier conversation after she said to me, “I’ll start keeping in touch with my list once it’s bigger.”

To which I replied, “Start now. Build the habit and systems. Create a container to put great people who want the gift of your content and resources into.”

Too often the pursuit of perfect, polished, ready, or even just “good enough”, derails getting started.

But the truth is, it’s the trying, the trial and error, actually putting yourself out there and DOING IT, that gets you the result you want.

So send the emails before you have a big list… and you will grow your list.

Do the speaking inquiries before your presentation is perfect… and you will get great at speaking.

Record that video before you fully understand how it fits into your strategy… and you will get comfortable in front of the camera and attract a following.

My client will likely never get a 100% open rate again, but she embraced the lesson of getting started imperfectly.

[Guest Post] Ultimately the Analogy Falls Short for Me

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I decided my word of the year would be failure. I kept fairly quiet about it because, who does that?

It’s a funny thing. Kind of like when you decide to buy a Honda Accord in Lunar Silver Metallic, and you start seeing Honda Accords in Lunar Silver Metallic everywhere. A friend posted her word of the year in our mastermind: Failure. Then another. Other friends texted me quotes about winning being the result of many failures. Failure was everywhere.

As a recovering perfectionist, I’m working to not avoid failure. But it’s one thing to get it intellectually. Like when people say, “What if a baby stopped trying to walk because she failed the first time?” Well sure, but the baby has a low center of gravity so it doesn’t really hurt. Plus, people are standing around cheering and clapping for her, even when she falls.

Not to mention, it’s expected. The baby isn’t given X number of tries and then we give up on her.

Ultimately the analogy falls short for me. Humans evolved to walk.

But there’s a critical take away: the muscle strength, coordination and balance gained by falling (failing) and getting back up – many times – is what made it eventually possible for each of us to walk.

Here are three ways I’m working with my clients – and myself – to build the strength we need to get from failure to win:

  1. Determine what muscles have atrophied. Or, where you need to strengthen muscles that you never knew you had (like how you feel the day after a strenuous workout). Failing is an opportunity to see what we’re missing. What information, strategies or support do you need to build those muscles so that you succeed?
  2. Because we’ve evolved to avoid danger, failing feels uncomfortable. So, plan for it. I prepare my clients that losing weight will bring discomfort. They make peace with difficult feelings, rather than give into the temptation to blot it out (e.g. the urge to snack at night in front of the TV). When you’re willing to feel discomfort and move through it, anything is possible.
  3. Self-flagellation is the worst response to failure. Have compassion for what you’ve been through, for the discomfort you feel…be kind to your “sore muscles.” Then, have good conversations with yourself. Ones that are helpful and serve your highest good. Asking “What can I change to get a better result?” is so much better than asking “What’s wrong with me?” There’s no good answer to that last one.

Avoiding failure means never really going after what you want. And to me, that’s the worst possible outcome for my life, both in my business and personally.

Professionally, if I’m not willing to pick up the phone and make a request, for example, because it’s too uncomfortable, I’ve already lost. I’d rather have the temporary embarrassment of rejection than the long-term angst of wondering “what if…?” Personally, when I set out to see what’s possible, I’m amazed at the results. Being willing to do hard things is the best thing that happened to my body and my health.

The thing is, you and I are only familiar with what’s possible in our past, so we can’t allow that experience to define – to limit – what’s possible for our future. Saying “I can’t lose weight, build a successful business, grow a large following… because I tried it before and it didn’t work” is nonsense. The only way to our goals is through failure. And the more we’re willing to experience it, the better our results.

Heather Moreno is a weight loss coach who helps women stop agonizing over diets and break the patterns that hold them back from losing weight. Her greatest desire is for her clients to enjoy food, love life, and feel like themselves again. Download her free 10 Hacks to Start Losing Weight and Feeling Better.

2017: Successful? Yes. Peaceful? Not so much.

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Walking along the beach on New Year’s Day, I reflected on how I felt exactly one year earlier: filled to overflowing with a sense of wonder and possibility.

Feeling inspired last January, I picked up pebbles on the beach, wrote a blog about them, then mailed them out across the country.

My intention was to remind us all to keep that sense of wonder and possibility with us throughout 2017.

How would you rate your success with that intention?

I give myself a B minus.

I took plenty of time off for friends, family, roller coaster and otters. And grew the company by about 25%.

But a consistent sense of wonder and possibility? Not so much.

In between the fun time off and the accomplishments was a lot of fretting. “Am I going to get this done? When can I take a breath? Am I doing the right things? What if I never get another client?”

I can track all of this fretting to a serious lack of space for thinking. For exploring. For analyzing and creating. For wonder and possibility.

This year, I want to get an A+.

So for 2018, I budgeted and protected time for wonder and possibility. I shared my calendaring process for the year in this recent blog, because I do not want to repeat the intermittent crazy of 2017.

I want to know… how’d you do?

How She Wrote 5 Books

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Several years ago, I had the pleasure of consulting with a wonderful woman named Lakota.  When we began our consultation, she had three primary activities that occupied her time. She wanted to determine how she could best utilize her time to make these successful and meaningful.

As we worked together, it became clear that one of her activities was not in alignment with her goals, and was also emotionally taxing, pulling energy from other areas of her life.  Together we determined she should phase out the most stressful activity, leaving more time to focus on other valuable things. With a newly aligned course of action, Lakota took steps in a direction more to her liking.

For the next four years, she devoted much of her newfound time to her passion for writing. I happen to know that throughout those years she still faced serious adversity— she wasn’t just holed up peacefully writing in a cabin in the woods! Despite the adversity, she continued writing, and today I’m happy to report that Lakota has created not one but FIVE novels! Her books are slated for publication over the next 18 months, beginning with her first mystery novel, Death in Copper Town.

In a recent email, she wrote me to express her profound thanks for offering clarity and helping her succeed at this accomplishment. I’m so proud of Lakota’s drive to pursue her goals, first by asking for some guidance to find the right path, and then by persevering with her passions! She’s achieved a great win over the last four years.  What win are you willing to spend years to achieve?

If you’d like to draw inspiration from Lakota’s win, check out Death in Copper Town, available now on Amazon!