How We Do Goal Setting: Habit Tracking, 90-Day Windows, and Heart

Just finding us and wondering whether this is goal setting you can get behind, especially in this season? Here are a few things you should know:

1. The Cultivate community is not about pressure-filled goal setting. You know the kind—it starts with “big dreams” that are often born of comparison, chasing perfection, fear, and a desire to keep up with others. Traditional goal setting tells us to conquer the world and that we can’t mess up along the way or we won’t achieve our big dreams. Traditional goal setting tells us that our worth is hinged on our performance and progress—or lack thereof.

Have you had it with traditional goals, too? We’re going to be fast friends. You’ve found your people! 

2. This is a community of women who wants to spend their time on things that really matter. We know our days are numbered, and we want to live like it! Rather than starting with “big dreams” and adding more to our plates, we strategically examine what matters in the big picture using some key questions. This changes everything. It changes the goals we focus on and it gives us motivation to make them happen—no matter how many times we mess up along the way.

We know goals will not change our life.
Knowing what matters will.
Goals are just how we get there.

3. This is a community that believes their goals—their lives—matter enough to be taken seriously. We're not willing to just "wing it" on the things that matter, and so we use good tools and insights from research to make our efforts as effective as we can. We track our habits to grow good things, we use the power of handwriting, we plan in 90-day windows to keep our motivation fresh, and we keep what matters most in front of us every single day.

4. This is a community that leads with WHY. When something matters to you in the big picture, how you do it doesn’t matter as much as why you do it. What will you be glad you spent your time on in the big picture—and what won't have mattered? The answer to this question is the secret to setting goals that matter—goals you can’t wait to get started on. This is the question at the heart of the PowerSheets Prep Work, and in your PowerSheets, you’ll get even more clear on your life vision through a series of additional exercises and questions.

Time and time again, despite their reputation of being foolproof, SMART goals fail. SMART goals are missing one key component (the secret sauce of our community’s success!): purpose.

When the goal you want to achieve matters to you in the big picture, you will follow through. No matter how many times you mess up along the way, you’ll get back up—because you care! How perfectly you get there doesn’t matter as much as why. And the why behind your goals is what keeps you from jumping ship at the first sign of imperfection.

5. This community believes in the power of little-by-little progress. We know that consistent, small steps forward add up. Daily movement means more than big leaps every so often (though we love big leaps, too!). You won’t make perfect progress—and you don’t need to!

And—we believe in starting now. When you have an idea of where you want to go, don’t waste time—take that first small step! No need to write it down or have a perfect plan. Get the momentum going while it’s fresh on your mind and you’ll be more likely to take the next step, then the next, and the next… and before you know it, you’re there!

Friend, maybe you’re feeling frustrated as you look at your life right now. You didn’t make as much progress as you hoped on some of your goals (on the things that really mattered)—or you forgot about them completely. Perhaps you feel defeated already thinking about the new year. 

BUT—if you feel like your life is flying by, and you want to finally live your life like it’s the only one you’ve got, high fives! You're in the right place.

Whether you’re a mom, a student, a business owner, an empty nester, in a season of transition, or a season of starting fresh—in any place where you are in life, you can let go of guilt-filled, fleeting resolutions and embrace a whole new way of doing this goal-setting thing.

You can decide to take action on goals that cut through all the things to get to the things that matter.