Have you or your child ever tried to set a healthy lifestyle goal and didn’t make as much progress as you hoped? Here are some tips that will help make your healthy lifestyle goals easier to accomplish.
Whenever we set a healthy lifestyle goal, it can be beneficial to make your goal a SMART goal- meaning a goal that is Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Timely. Making your goal a SMART goal will set you up for success and lead to long-term behavior change.
S – Specific
Sometimes when we set goals, they tend to be broad goals such as “I want to be healthier.” However, it can be more motivating to adjust that goal to be more specific. Instead of wanting to be healthier in general, I can pick a specific area to focus on such as physical activity or healthy eating. For example, instead of having the broad goal of “I want to be healthier,” I can change that to be more specific and say “I want to drink more water.” Drinking water is more specific than aiming to be healthier in general.
SMART Goal Step 1: I want to drink more water.
M – Measurable
After I identify my specific goal, I then need to make that goal as measurable as possible. I might decide how much or how often I want to accomplish the goal. Using my water intake goal, I might decide to drink 4 water bottles per day instead of drinking more water in general. In general, we want to try to make our goals as measurable as possible.
SMART Goal Step 2: I want to drink 4 bottles of water each day.
A – Attainable
Then it is important to think about if our goal is realistic for us. Using the example from above, if I am currently drinking only 1 one water bottle per day, it might not be realistic for me to increase my intake to 4 water bottles per day. It can be helpful to think about what is actually realistic for us. If we set goals that are realistic, we are more likely to be successful.
SMART Goal Step 3: Drinking 4 water bottles per day is realistic for me.
R – Relevant
Thinking about reasons why accomplishing your goal is important can also increase motivation. Using our example, reasons I might want to drink more water include wanting to stay hydrated and have more energy.
SMART Goal Step 4: I want to drink more water to stay hydrated and have more energy.
T – Timely
Whenever we set a goal it is important to give ourselves a timeline or due date to accomplish the goal. Using our water intake goal, I might want to drink 4 water bottles each day for one week. Setting a timeline gives us the chance to keep making progress or tweak the goal as needed.
SMART Goal Step 5: I want to drink 4 bottles of water each day for the next week.
Try to use a SMART goal next time you set a healthy lifestyle behavior goal!