Ladies, we’ve all been there. Day one of a new month, week or year and we are super pumped about our goals and the progress we’ll be making to reach them. Day 8, 9, or 10 rolls around that excitement has withered. Withered to laziness, uncomfortability, or a pure lack of drive.
No one is designed to be inspired all day, every day, and that’s perfectly fine. However, getting inspired about your goals and staying motivated to keep working towards your goals is a necessity for success.
If you’ve been working on a few goals for a while but find yourself lacking inspiration and motivation, this post is for you! I’m sharing 8 ways to help you spark inspiration within yourself to get you excited about your goals. I’m also sharing a free downloadable goal-tracking template. Success with achieving goals is significantly higher when your goals are written down and progress is tracked!
#1 Learn Everything You Can About Your Goal
Nothing gets me more inspired to reach my goals than learning about the topic of my goal. For example, I’ve been studying online course creation because one of my goals is to expand City Girl Savings’ services to include training classes and courses. Just the thought of it sounds overwhelming, right? Well, learning about online course creation has really gotten me excited to start working on my first course!
When you are working towards something, getting as much knowledge as you can around the topic can help give you the inspiration you need to keep grinding on. Here are some great ways to learn about your goal’s topic:
- Research influencers who are successful with that goal and watch their videos or read their stories.
- Take classes (online or at a local college)
- Attend seminars and events related to that goal
- Read everything you can to help get you closer to achieving your goal
#2 Get on Pinterest
It’s embarrassing for me to admit that I am SO late on the Pinterest train! I just started really getting into Pinterest. I’ve created boards for content I create and content of other people’s that inspires me or gets me excited to learn. You can literally create a board for each goal topic you have and get inspired by all of the great reads and pictures related to that goal.
For example, if one of your goals is to travel to Europe next year, create a Travel board – or get more specific and title it Europe Travel Inspo! Do a search for the specific countries you want to see or places you want to visit and you will be amazed at how much cool information and pictures come up. Pinterest has really got me excited about all of the goals I’m currently working on.
#3 Do One Small Task Every Day
Not only will doing one task every day that gets you closer to your goal help you keep your goal fresh in your mind, it will help you feel productive. That feeling of laziness or unproductiveness is what causes people to quit their goals and move on. Avoid those negative feelings altogether by keeping your goal on your mind and taking baby steps. With time, those baby steps will turn into major progress, if not completion, with your goals.
To ensure you know what task to do every day, or how to actually track those daily tasks, I’ve created a super-cute, super-easy goal-tracking template. Download the template and save it on your computer. Fill it out weekly and refer back to it each day to see what your new task is. I personally do better with physical writing, so I print my tracker out and make copies for each week. Whatever works for you, just get your goals and action items tracked!
#4 Take Time for Yourself
I am a certified “workaholic”. The work never stops for me because there is so much I want to do, so many goals I want to achieve. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing (it’s what keeps me going), but a burnout is inevitable. In fact, I’ve been burnt out before, and it stinks.
You work, work, work until there’s nothing left in your engine and you can’t do anything. That’s why it’s so important to take some time for yourself. Not your boyfriend, family, or friends, but just for you.
I love reading. Whether it’s a book or a magazine, when I’m reading, I literally forget about everything else until I’m done. It’s a great way for me to mentally check out of my responsibilities and when I’m done I get back to it.
Whether it’s one day or 5 days, take the necessary time you need for yourself. You will come back to your goals feeling rejuvenated and re-energized. Remember to try and keep up your small, daily tasks though – or put in your tracker that you’re taking the day off!
#5 Change Your Scenery
Changing your scenery when working on your goals can break you out of the normal routine and spark that excitement you’ve been missing. If your goal is to lose weight, and you’ve been going to the gym every day, change it up. Over the weekend, do your workouts outside – take a hike or go for a jog in the park. You can also take a class. Anything that changes your normal routine, but still allows you to work towards your goals.
Here’s another example: If your goal is to save $1000, change up how you save. One month, focus on skipping coffee purchased at a café or coffee shop. The next month, focus on doing your own hair and nails. Changing how you save will keep it interesting, keep your brain going, and help you avoid a binge-purchase because you’ve been depriving yourself!
#6 Have a “Productivity Session”
Remember how I said I was a workaholic? Well, it runs in the family. My mom worked full-time (well, is 12 hours full time or double time?!) all her life. My dad started his own business and turned it into a million-dollar, publicly traded company. My brother and I have both started our own businesses. Even my boyfriend has started his own business!
The result of this is many “productivity sessions”. This entails quick-hit sessions to brainstorm ideas on success, time management, different ways of reaching goals and more. It makes a huge difference to get other people’s opinions on how to reach a goal. You may get ideas you never thought of before.
Find a friend or family member who is positive and always leaves you feeling inspired and schedule a “productivity session” with them. Just bounce your thoughts, goals and ideas off of them and see what they have to say. This also helps keep you accountable to your goals.
#7 Get in the Zone
When it’s time to work on your goals, or complete your daily tasks, make sure your environment is conducive to progress. Turn off the TV, exit out of social media (except your inspiration board on Pinterest), and get to work. Getting rid of the distractions can help you stay focused on the task at hand. When you’re in the right zone, you can make major progress.
#8 Do a Time Audit
Maybe you are feeling uninspired because you haven’t made as much progress towards your goals as you wanted. This could be a result of poor time management, especially if you haven’t been tracking your tasks and action items to help you reach your goal. Do a time audit! What this means is every day for one week, track how much time you spend doing each task, chore or anything. Get as specific as possible.
A proper time audit for a day should look something like this:
- 5:15am – Alarm went off, snoozed until 5:45am
- 6:15am – Got to the gym (daily task for goal 1)
- 7:15am – Left the gym
- 7:30-8:15am – Ate breakfast, showered, got ready for work
- 8:30am – Got to work
- 8:45-9:15am – Checked emails
- 9:15am – Scrolled social media for 5 minutes
- 9:20am – Worked on a project
- 10am – Meeting at Work
- 11am – Took a 15-minute break to walk
- 11:15am – Scrolled social media for 5 minutes
- 11:20am – Went through emails, then worked on a project
- 12:30pm – Took a 30-minute lunch (ate and walked outside)
- 1:00pm – Meeting at Work
- 2:00pm – Published an article on my blog (while at work)
- 2:30pm – Went through emails, then worked on a project
- 3:15pm – Scrolled social media for 10 minutes
- 3:25pm – Went through emails, then worked on a project
- 5pm – Left work
- 5:30pm – Cooked dinner, ate and scrolled through social media
- 6:30pm – Watched a video on course creation (daily task for goal 2)
- 7:30pm – Read articles on course creation (daily task for goal 2)
- 8:30pm – Watched TV
- 9:30pm – Scrolled through social media for 10 minutes
- 10:00pm – Went to bed
This time audit shows how productive I was during one day. I spent 30 minutes scrolling through social media (which doesn’t help me get to my goals). I also spent an hour watching TV. This doesn’t help get me to my goals, but it felt well-deserved after a productive day. Overall, my time is spent working and doing things to help get me closer to my goals.
If you complete your own time audit, see where you could be wasting time. Use this information to make changes and factor in more time to work on your goals.
Speaking from a person who always has goals they are working on, all of the tips above help me stay inspired to keep working hard. The most important tip is to take time for yourself. If you feel stressed, agitated or uninspired, do something YOU enjoy doing. Go to the mall, watch your favorite move, get your nails done. Take that time for yourself and then get back to work!
Related: #11: The Power of Visualization to Help You Reach Your Goals
Don’t forget to download your goal-tracking template so you can stay on track! How do you keep yourself inspired and motivated to keep grinding? What tips can you share to help others stay focused on the end goal? What do you find distracts you? We want to hear from you, so leave a comment below to share!
2 thoughts on “8 Ways to Get Inspired About Your Goals”
I LOVE this article! A few things really stand out to me:
1. Do one small task every day – Yes, yes, yes! I have found that simply making time to do this each day keeps my mind on my goals and what I can do to achieve them. If we don’t make time to think about it, it won’t happen – or it will be unproductive, wishful thinking without action. (That’s fine with some things, but you never want to put your life goals in the “wishful thinking” category. Make them happen!)
2. Take time for yourself – When I am really honest with myself, this one is particularly tough for me. (This is a recent lesson to myself, too.) I often do small things for myself, and that’s not the problem. I take the time to do things for myself, but…my brain isn’t in it. I’m still thinking about work when I should be enjoying my chocolate cupcakes with cream cheese frosting. I have a difficult time transitioning my brain from work to fun time. Though it’s a challenge, I get a little better at it each day. The trick is to REALLY enjoy what you’re doing, and don’t just go through the motions of treating yourself. Put your mind into it.
3. Change your scenery – Some days, my desk EXPLODES with clutter. Papers, to-do lists, pens (who knew I had so many??), and the list goes on. It doesn’t happen often, but when it does, I have to stop and clean up. My clean space puts my brain in a better place to think and do creative work. I also recently hung new curtains and rearranged a few things near my workspace, and I was amazed at what a HUGE difference it made in my productivity. A few bucks spent at IKEA and about an hour of hanging/rearranging a few things actually improved the quality of my thinking time. That was pretty cool!
My comment turned out to be WAY longer than I intended. Your post has me thinking about a few ways I can fall in love with my workflow all over again. I’m saving it for a rainy day, too, when I feel like my battery is running out. 🙂
Thank you for sharing your awesome advice, Raya!
Thanks so much Hannah! @smartyskirt Sometimes we all are in need of inspiration to keep working hard, and sharing what works for me, may work for others! Definitely let me know how you recharge those batteries – I know you have a lot going on also (but that’s a great thing)!