In one of my earlier post, I gave a review on the book “Atomic Habits” by James Clear. Powerful book with a bunch of ideas that are easily relatable and can be quickly implemented in your lifestyle. The book gave a good idea on how to form powerful habits by taking tiny steps. Improving ourselves 1% better.
Assuming that I am now ready to implement ideas mentioned in the book. I plan to use the ideas in the book to loose my weight. For this, I go to nearby Health Diagnostic Center and find my BMI and it shows that I am overweight by 15 kg. My goal is to loose 15 kg weight in 3 months. Goals should be MASTER (Measurables, Achievable, Specific, Time Bound, Enthusiastic, Realistic).
I have ticked all the right boxes, set my goals, followed the routine, made myself sweat. I am unable to loose any weight and on top of it seems like I gained some in the process. Dejected I return to my old lifestyle and avoid looking back at my goals. Where did I go wrong?
Process
A good part of any meaningful effort goes in deciding the process that I will use to achieve my goal. What is it that I want to achieve? Why was it important to me? What are the ways by which this could be achieved? Who is my inspiration? What are the actions steps that are involved?
If I can work out the process in achieving my goal, I believe my job is 20% done. So if my challenge is to loose weight, what are the factors involved in loosing weight? I prepared a small list that I believe are the factors according to me. You could add / remove your own:
- Which activity will help me loose weight? (Walking, Exercise, Gym, Zumba)
- What will I do in those activity? (Warm up – 15 min, Yoga – 30 min, Zumba – 45 min)
- How much time will I allocate each day? (30 min, 45 min, 60 min)
- What frequency per week? (6, 7 days a week)
- What would be my diet? (Low carb, High protein, No restriction, No sugar)
- What are the milestones?
- How and when would I track? (Fortnight, Monthly)
Detailing the process also helps you make emotional connect with your goal. I had already mentioned in my earlier post how emotion makes a very big role in shaping your success. A very important if not the most important part of this process is the tracking part.
My Tracker
I am always reminded of an example of a man going to point B from point A by car. We do get milestones stating that point B is now 100 km away, 80 km away, 20 km away while we are moving. Milestones help us understand where we are. In the same way, tracking our action steps also help us understand how we are doing and are we consistent with our effort.
Tracking our action steps helps us fine tune the process and helps us make the necessary adjustments needed so that we are on track. I will show you a Tracksheet that I use to help me keep track of my action steps.
This is a Habit Tracker that I am using to track my actions. So you could either focus on just 1 part of a habit that you wish to improve of take up 2-3 areas of life that you want to work upon.
Track & Go
To continue with my example, I will focus on loosing weight and so for it, I decide to loose weight by running. I will have to decide what time will I run, how much will I run and where will I run.
I will also have to take a decision on the food aspect as I know that 60% of loosing weight is diet dependent and I might have to do intermittent fasting, eat low calorie food, exclude dinner from my day. Now there are some action points that I can track on my Habit Tracker.
- Getting up at 6 am
- Running – 30 mins
- Skip Dinner
Now, I have very simple plan for which I will have to follow only these 3 steps. I know that by getting up early, I will have no other job than to focus on my fitness and my full concentration will be on making myself run for 30 mins. I also know that by skipping my Dinner, I am making a choice to loose my weight and I am giving my vote to my fit self.
My continuously tracking my goal, I can track my habit and see how I am performing. I can also see if I am lacking the motivation to push through the routine during my weekends and make the necessary amendments. After 2 weeks, I will again check my weight and see what kind of progress have I achieved.
By reviewing my progress, I would be in a better position to judge if my actions are in the right directions and if not, what changes can I make to course correct. At the end, it is all about the iterations that you do during the process to achieve your goal.
Using a Habit Tracker will help me track my progress and also make me more aware about my actions. It will not just be a monotonous exercise but will be a more engaging one.
End Note
I have realized, during the last couple of years that I will not be able to realize my goals if they are just in my head. I have to really work it, make it convert into numbers, divide it, create steps, create milestones, track it and review it. Habit tracker is a great tool to help you track your habits or actions steps that are part of a larger goal that you have set for yourself.
I hope that you would have enjoyed reading the article and got inspired to track your goals. There are a couple of Habit Trackers available in the market but I like this one by Unnati Success Academy. You can buy it here.
“Goals are overrated, Process is underrated”
~ RG ~
P.S
- Thanks to ICIWF – ILEAD for the Success Track Sheet.
- Photo by Matthew Henry from Burst