179: Do You Struggle With Goals? Listen To This + My Goals for 2022

Introduction 

You're listening to Biceps after Babies radio episode number 179.

Hello and welcome to Biceps after Babies radio. A podcast for ladies who know that fitness is about so much more than pounds lost or PRs. It's about feeling confident in your skin and empowered in your life. I'm your host, Amber Brueseke, a registered nurse, personal trainer, wife, and mom of four.  Each week, my guests and I will excite and motivate you to take action in your own personal fitness as we talk about nutrition, exercise mindset, personal development, and executing life with conscious intention. If your goal is to look, feel, and be strong and experience transformation from the inside out, you, my friend are in the right place. Thank you for tuning in, now let’s jump into today’s episode.

 

Do you struggle with goals?  0:47  

Hey, Hey, Hey, welcome back to another episode of Biceps after Babies Radio. I'm your host, Amber Brueseke, and today, we're talking about one of my most favorite subjects and that is goals. I told you last week on last week's episode, that two of the least downloaded podcasts ever, are episode 13 and 14, where I talk about New Year's resolutions and my goals for the year. And it makes me laugh, that those are the two lowest downloaded podcasts because I actually love talking about goals. And it's something that I talk a lot about in my coaching. And you know, if you've been in Macros 101 you know how important goal setting is. So it just makes me laugh that something that I think is such an important topic, and has really been amazing, like created an amazing trajectory for me, and my life is something that people don't want to listen to. So because of that I'm approaching this week's episode from a little bit different perspective. And that is from the perspective of if you struggle with goals, or you have a complicated relationship, shall we say, with goals, why is that and how can you form a better relationship with goals? Because I feel like most people fall into one of two camps. Either you're like me, and you love goals, and you're like a list maker, and you want to check it off. And like achievement, right? Enneagram three, like achievement is your love language. And then there's other people who have a bad relationship with goals, they kind of have left a bad taste in their mouth that hasn't been effective, or helpful for them in the past, especially when it comes to New Year's resolutions. And so because of that bad taste, they don't end up setting goals. And what I would love is for if that's you, if you kind of resonate with that having a complicated relationship with goals is that as you listen to this episode, you might start to understand why that complicated relationship comes from and how can you improve it. Because I truly believe that the quality and what you're able to create in your life is directly proportional to your ability to set and achieve goals. And so you struggle with that. Let's get you better at it, so that you can have a better relationship with it. 

 

Your relationship with goals is really important  3:26

We made a point, I'm like pulling back on an old episode from a long time ago, when I interviewed Jody Mooore for the podcast. And we talked about the scale. And we made a point in that episode, that the scale is neither good nor bad. Rather, your interpretation of the scale is what you're making that number mean, the number 150 is not inherently a good weight or a bad weight. It just is a weight. And it's your story that you create around that meaning that you create around it that, you know, makes you feel good or bad about that number. And I think it's the same thing with goals. Goals are neither good nor bad. However, your relationship with goals is really important. And my goal is for you listening to this episode, by the end of the episode, that you will feel like you have a stronger, better relationship with goals. And if you already feel  like you're like me, and you're like me, I love goals. Goals are my jam. I'm into it. Awesome. I still think that there's going to be some key points in this episode that may make you think, and for my people who love goals, you'll want to stick around till the end of the episode because I'm going to share my goals for the year and recap my goals from last year.

If you go back in the archives, you can listen to episode number 118. It's titled “What worked and what didn't in 2020” Plus “My goals for 2021.” And so at the end of the podcast, I'll be reviewing my goals that I had set for the year, and sharing which ones I hit and which ones I didn't hit because there were some that I didn't hit this year as well. And I will also be sharing what my goals are for the new year. 

 

Previous podcast episode about goals  5:02

Now, before I dive into this topic, I would be remiss to not point you to another podcast episode that I did about goals that If you enjoy this podcast episode that you will likely find value in that podcast episode as well and that is episode number 92. It's called “Are you making these mistakes with your goals?” And I like a lot of the podcasts that I put out. I think you should like the things that you do, but I do have certain episodes that are kind of my favorite– my secret favorite episodes and episode 92 is one of those  favorite episodes. I'm really proud of that episode and I think it has some amazing content that really is going to shift your perspective on goals. We're going to start that shift today in this episode, but if you want more, Episode 92 is going to be for you. And we will link all of that up in the show notes as well. 

 

5 Reasons you have a difficult relationship with your goals 5:57 

Alright, so let's dive into the topic. As I was sitting, brainstorming and thinking about why some people have a complicated relationship when it comes to setting and achieving goals, I came up with five reasons that I've seen over and over again in clients that create that complicated relationship. And so I want to share each of those five reasons, and how– if you resonate with that, and that's maybe been something you struggled with in the past, how we can help you to work through that to improve your relationship as you set goals, whether that's for the new year, or at any point of your life, you can set goals on a Tuesday in the middle of July doesn't have to be at the New Year. 

 

Reason no. 1 Setting too many or too few goals 6:42 

So the first reason that I came up with is the number of goals that we set at one time, and I feel like this swings one way or the other. Either we're setting way too many goals that we have way too many aims or targets that we're trying to hit in our life, or we like to short ourselves and set not very many goals at all, and kind of short ourselves with what we are able to accomplish. When we're talking about New Year's resolutions in particular, you're talking about an entire year. A year is a really long time, and as the old adage goes, “We often overestimate what we can accomplish in a day and vastly underestimate what we can accomplish in a year,” and so I think there's this balance when we're talking about setting goals for the year because a year is a long time. 365 days is a lot, a lot, a lot, a lot of time to be able to accomplish things, and yet, if we have 500 goals, it makes it very hard to focus our attention on 500 different things. 

 

My 52 Goal Challenge Story 7:54  

I think I've shared the story before on one of my goals podcasts, but there was a year, I don't know, maybe 10 years ago that I did a 52 week– no, it was a 52 goal challenge. So at the beginning of the year, I set 52 individual goals. And then throughout the year, I blogged about those goals. It's like back when people blogged a lot. Personal blogs. And I remember I had the goals all up. And I would cross them off when I accomplished each of the goals. And I did that for about, I don't know, half of the year and then I kind of lost interest with it, but it was so many goals that it was hard for me to focus on any one of the goals. And so I haven't ever done that before because I felt, for me, 52 was way too many for me to focus on. And at the same time, I feel like I need more than one or two goals to be able to say, “Hey, I can spend a whole year working on this.”  So there's some wiggle room and obviously, individuality is going to play into here. But I know for me that I like setting goals, and I've shared this before, in different categories and in different areas. And this year, I'll share what areas those are for me and how I'm thinking about them and the number of goals that I'm setting.

 

Reason no. 2 Setting too lofty of goals 9:17  

Okay, reason number two that you may struggle with goals is that you set too many goals. However, and that's what you think, 'cause that you always think you set too high of goals. However, I don't think that this is ever the case. And this goes into my philosophy. I dive deeper into this in Episode 92 of the fact that our goals set a trajectory for our life. And we're going to talk about what happens when you don't hit a goal because that's also a fear that keeps people playing small in their life. They fear failure so much that they play small, and they don't play all out because they would rather play small and not lose, than play full out and have the option of failing. And that theme even looking at your life, are you currently in your life plain not to lose or are you playing to win? And what do those realities look like? What does that look like for you when you're playing not to lose? I think we've all been in experiences before where we are showing up in a way that we're playing not to lose. And then I think on the other hand, you probably can come up with an example of when you were playing to win. You're playing all out. You're giving it everything you had. And at the end of the day, I'd rather be someone who's playing all out and failing, than someone who's always wondering, “What if? What if I had tried that? What if I had done that?”

 

Dream big 11:00  

So this second one, the second reason that people I think struggle with goals, in my opinion, is actually backwards. People struggle with goals because often, they're like, “I set too lofty of goals, and then I don't hit them, and I get disappointed.” And I would say, “No, most people dream too small, and we play small.” And what would happen if you allowed yourself to really dream? Really– dream giant. Dream big. Like, “Out of this world, in a million years, this could never happen, but this is my dream.” And I think so often, we've been told over and over and over in our life that we have to be realistic, and I say screw realistic. Realistic doesn't have any play in my life. Realistic is boring. Realistic is basic. Realistic means, “I don't have to do any growth for it to happen.” And to me, goals are about growth. And so I say, “I don't want realistic goals. I want unrealistic goals. I want the most unrealistic goals possible.” And it's like the cheesy saying. I remember my third grade teacher wrote this in my yearbook and it's cheesy, but when things are cliche, there's usually a little bit of truth to them. She wrote in my yearbook. She said, “Amber, shoot for the moon because even if you fall, you'll be among the stars.” And I think of that in this way, “Screw realistic. Shoot for unrealistic. Shoot for the stars, and even if you don't achieve it, you're likely going to be so much further along than if you had not tried at all.“

 

Reason no. 3 You make it mean something if or when you don't reach the goal 12:37  

Alright, number three, you may struggle with goals, and I think this is like the sister to the prior problem, is that you make it mean something, if or when you don't reach the goal. And I would say this is probably one of the biggest things that I see when people shy away from goals because they set a goal in the past and they didn't achieve it, and they created all of this meaning. This negative meaning around themselves, “I can't do it. I'm not good enough. I'll never be successful. That's not for me,” all of this thought– these thoughts around the fact that they did not reach a goal, and that doesn't feel good. Why would you want to repeat that? So if that's been you in the past, and you've had a goal that you didn't reach, and it made you feel really, really bad, understand that it doesn't have to be that way, and this comes back to, again, not reaching your goal is neither good nor bad. It's neutral. What you make it mean, you can make it mean something that's negative, you can make it mean something even that's positive. You can reframe it and say, “I didn't– I actually share this in the goals episode. I actually think that if I'm hitting all my goals, that's actually a problem because I'm not dreaming big enough.”

 

Not hitting your goals is a bad thing  13:56  

The moment that I'm like reaching the goals, I know I'm not setting my sights high enough, and if I set my sights a little bit higher than I– then I might be reaching a little bit higher, even if I don't hit the goal, if I set my goal high, I'm going to reach higher. And so I think we can start to question this idea that not hitting your goals is a bad thing. What if it just means that you're dreaming big, and that you're playing full out and that you're achieving as much as possible rather than settling for something less. 

 

Sharing my aunts post on facebook  14:29

This last week, I was scrolling through Facebook, and I came across a post that my aunt wrote and it was so poignant and so good and landed so much with me that I asked her if I could share– share it, so I shared it to my stories. You may have seen it on my stories, but I wanted to read it here because I think the way that she approaches, and is working on her goals this year is something that can really change the way that you view and you know, have a relationship with goals, so my aunt says, “I've seen a few different takes on goals and New Year's resolutions already in this new year, and even a few that seem to think setting goals somehow devalues us or our past efforts, as if striving to be better means we're never good enough.” And, man. I mean, isn't that the truth? I could have a whole episode on how we can love the face that we're in. The state that we're in and want more and that those things aren't opposite. They actually can coexist in tandem but that's a whole another episode. Okay, so she continues, “Watching and then this is my cousin so this is her son, my cousin, choose his routes and set objectives for his next big adventure in the Sierra Nevada. I've decided that's the approach I'm going to take this year so my cousin is a big– a big huge outdoors mountain climber guy. He picks a peak, studies the route, figures out the best timing and mode of travel, skiing or hiking and how to link it up with other peaks to reach the bigger goal. He might hit bad weather, dangerous conditions, or other problems out of his control that keep him from reaching an objective but even then, the hike is still gorgeous and worth the time and work to get that far. Maybe he'll put that peak back on the list for another day. Or maybe not. The adventure was had. I'll choose experiences that I want to have this year then study the best way to get that experience. The timing and order and process. I'll choose objectives that are worth the effort and journey to get there. Whether or not I actually reached the actual target. I have some in mind that will let me team up with some amazing people who will help me learn new things and make the journey a grand adventure and so much fun. My objectives this year will be a few big adventures. Not a checklist of things I'll do every day or not do ever again but big inspiring metaphorical mountain peaks. High points that you can see off in the distance with a winding challenging path through ridges and valleys each as beautiful in their own right as the summit that brings me to them. ” 

 

Goals are much more about who you become in the process of working towards your goal  17:00  

I just thought that was so well-written and really outlines this idea of reaching for big goals and whether or not you hit them, you still had the experience of going through it, and you still had the fun of walking that path. I say and truly believe that goals are less about the goal, or achieving the goal, and much more about who you become in the process of working towards that goal. When we set goals that are out of our reach, we have to show up differently to achieve them because if we didn't have to change anything in our life, to me, these are like the stupidest goals or  goals that you set that you're already going to achieve. I already read 15 minutes a night, so I'm gonna set a goal that I read 15 minutes a night, but you don't have to change anything to be able to achieve that goal. What I love is setting goals that require something different of me. They require me to step into a different version of myself to learn skills and traits and knowledge that I didn't have in the past that I had to acquire in order to reach that goal. Goals are less about reaching them, and more about who you become along the way as you work towards reaching them.

 

Reason no. 4 Making a goal which was supposed to happen and yet it doesn’t and calling it as a failure 18:33  

Alright, number four, why you may struggle with goals. That when you set a goal, I feel  sometimes we have in the back of our mind whether this is your they're cognizant of it or not, you have an idea of a way that it's supposed to happen, the way that it's supposed to work out, a timeframe with which it's supposed to work out, and if that isn't met, something goes awry, away from the pathway you thought it should go or takes longer than you thought it should take, then you deem it a failure and you end up giving up. Rather than recognizing that your responsibility and the universe, God, source, whatever you want to call it, responsibility are separate. I talk about this a lot with my coaching academy clients. I talk about the difference between being responsible to your client, not responsible for your client. It's that line of demarcation that's really important in any coach-client relationship of understanding what you're responsible for in the relationship and what the client is responsible for not crossing that line and trying to take responsibility for somebody else's actions and it's the same thing when we start talking about goals.

 

You're responsible for what the goal is, and why you want to achieve it  19:57  

You are responsible for two things when you set a goal. You are responsible for the “what” Like, “What's the goal?” and you're responsible to come up with the “why”, “Why do you want to reach it?” Those are your responsibilities, and then we release, or I'm going to encourage you to release attachment to the other two things. The “how” it unfolds and the “when” and if you can release attachment and allow it to unfold the way that it's going to unfold within the timeframe that's going to unfold, recognizing that that may not be what you would have planned, goal setting is going to be so much more enjoyable for you. I've set many goals over and over and over in my business, especially recognizing that even if I don't hit them that year, I might hit them the next year, or the next year or the next year, and so I've set the goal for that year, but if I don't hit, I just lengthen the timeline in order to get it, so to recap that again because this is– I mean, if you take this one thing, and you start applying it to your goals, it's a game changer. You're responsible for what the goal is, and why you want to achieve it. The universe, God, source, whatever you want to call it, is responsible for the “how” it's going to happen and the timeframe, and when you can release that “when” and that “how” and say, “Take me on the journey, goals become a much more enjoyable process.”

 

Let go and have faith 21:35  

I think about it and– often like looking back, and you probably had this experience as well, and I would encourage you to do a little bit of reflection in maybe some of your past goals that you have set, but I can honestly say that some of the biggest goals that I've set, have not been achieved in the pathway that I would have guessed that they would have achieved, and so it reminds me– have you seen– there's a meme. There's a picture with a little child who's holding on to a teddy bear, and Jesus is standing by that little girl, and he's reaching out for the teddy bear to take the teddy bear away, and the girl is hugging the Teddy Bear tight because she doesn't want to give up her teddy bear and what– the girl cannot see but because you're the observer of the picture. You can see as that behind his back, Jesus has a much larger teddy bear to be able to give to the girl, so she feels like she doesn't want to let go of this little teddy bear, but what she doesn't recognize is that when she lets go of that teddy bear, what she gets an exchange is so much bigger and better than what she currently has, and I think about that a lot with goals that I've set in my life, that if I was to plan, the sequence of events, the perfect sequence of events, of how to get from point A to point B, I would be missing out on the much better way that it typically unfolds. And that doesn't mean that it's always fun. It doesn't mean that it's always easy but looking back, I can see how my life had to unfold in certain ways to bring me to the point that I am, and so since I can look back and see the wisdom in the path that I've walked, even if it hasn't always been easy, I can have faith moving forward that it can be the same way. That the path towards the results and the desires that I have, may not be what I think it should be but that doesn't mean it's wrong, and that if I can release the “how” and the “when,” and focus on the “what” and the “why,” I'm going to eventually reach that goal.

 

Reason no. 5 You created a wish rather than a goal and you didn’t have a plan to make it happen 23:40  

Alright, the last reason why you may struggle with goals is that you don't have a goal. You're just creating a wish and this one's on the list because I do this sometimes where I say it's a goal, I have a goal to do X,Y, and Z, but I literally create no plan to execute it, and anything that you say you want to do that doesn't have a plan behind it, is just a wish. It's not actually a goal. I love the book Atomic Habits by James Clear, and he says in  Atomic Habits, “We don't rise to the level of our goals, we fall to the level of our systems,” and I think that's so important to recognize that setting a goal is not just putting something out there. It's not just saying hey, “I want this to happen,” it's saying hey, “I want this to happen,” and then following up with a plan for success. 

 

Create a plan to be able to make it happen 23:40  

Let me give you a very good example of this in my life this past year. If you listen to the episode that I recorded at the beginning of the year talking about my goals, you will hear that three of my goals this year have to do with physical achievements that I wanted to unlock this year. Those were where I wanted to get strict handstand push ups. I wanted to get my first ring muscle up, and I wanted to increase my snatch to 135. I kind of got strict handstand push ups. I can do them if my hands are really wide but– and I was really happy with that because I like getting it near the beginning of the year. And then we had the worldwide open for CrossFit, and I made it to the quarterfinals, which is amazing and that was a huge achievement I didn't even know was– this was brand new this year and so that was awesome. It wasn't a goal that I had set, but I was excited to get there, but during the quarterfinals of the open, there were strict handstand push ups, and you had to be within a box. They put tape lines and it was a standardized width. You can't put– put your hands outside of that, and I spent the entire– I don't remember. What was it? Eight minutes, which I was supposed to like, complete this workout and the very first thing and it was handstand push ups. I completed– I spent the whole eight minutes trying to get a handstand push up with that narrower hand grip, and I couldn't do it. I was really sad, so anyway, that– that's kind of a side– a side note about those but those three goals, well, I'm gonna call them wishes that I set, were really just that. They were wishes. I didn't really even put– honestly, did I even try to ring muscle up in 2021? No, I did not. I didn't even try a ring muscle up, so I put out this idea of, “Hey, I want to get a ring muscle up. I had no plan. No way to execute. No system in place to be able to make that happen.” o as much as I love goals, and as much as I feel like I've gotten a lot better at setting goals over the years, I still slip up and I still fall into some of these traps. And that was definitely a trap I fell into last year of saying, “I want to increase my snatch to 135,” which for a little bit of context, I started the year at 105, and I PR this year at 115, so I did add 10 pounds to my snatch but I mean, 115 If you know snatching, is literally nowhere near what 125. 20 pounds on a snatch is not a small sack of potatoes. But again, I had no plan. I said I want a 135 snatch wouldn't that be nice? Wouldn't that be nice if I had a 135 snatch? And then that was it. I left it at that so don't make that mistake. If it's something that's important to you, if it actually is a goal and you have a reason why behind it other than it would be nice, create a plan to be able to make it happen, so I recognize my foible, and I still want to get a strict handstand push up. I want that to be something that I have in my tool belt that I can do. It's an achievement that– it's just fun. It's fun to be able to push myself and challenge myself and handstand push ups are one of those for me, so I recognize that I literally had no plan last year, and so I've already printed out a program that I'm following for handstand push ups. I've already done the first workout, and I'm committing to finishing what I think it's a four week plan, and then we'll kind of reevaluate after that. So this year, I'm learning from my mistakes last year. I'm actually creating a plan with the intention to go along with the goal to really be able to nail handstand push ups.

 

Recap of the five reasons that I often see people struggle with goals 28:07

So those are the five reasons that I often see people struggle with goals, and just to recap them, it's setting too many or too few. Setting too lofty of goals, which again, I kind of reframe that. I don't think it's the case. I actually think people set too conservative of goals rather than really playing all out in their life. Number three, is making it mean something if or when you don't reach the goal. Number four, is that you have a way in your head that it's supposed to happen a way that it's supposed to unfold or a timeframe that it's supposed to unfold and if it doesn't, then you call that a failure or wrong and then last, you created a wish rather than a goal and you didn't have any plan for success. 

 

Review  on my goals for 2021 28:49

All right, on to the second part of this episode, which is to review my goals for 2021, and kind of let you in as to how I did a little bit of accountability about how I did with my goals. I already reported on my physical goals when you heard how I did with my snatch and my handstand push ups and my ring muscle ups, but let me talk about some of the other goals that I had set for 2021.

 

Area of Business: To double our revenue and we did it!  29:16  

The first area that I made some goals in was the area of business, and one of those goals was to double our revenue for the year, and I'm happy to report that we actually hit this goal, and I say actually because when Carly, who is my right hand woman in the business, and I set this goal last year, it was a stretch it was, “Wouldn't that be crazy?”, “Wouldn't that be crazy if we doubled again?” because we doubled our revenue in the previous year. We're like, “Wouldn't it be crazy we did that again? “And now, it's a much bigger number because we made more last year and– but we're gonna play all out. We're gonna play big, and I don't know how we're gonna do this. I don't know how it's gonna work, right? We released the “how” and the timing of it, and we said, “Let's set this crazy, audacious goal, and I remember when Carly texted me and she said, “We hit it. We did it. We hit that. Remember that at the beginning of the year, we felt like that goal was so crazy? We hit that goal! And that's just a reminder of this idea that when we set those big lofty goals that sometimes even seem totally unreasonable, we may surprise ourselves. And having that vision of where you want to go, even if it feels like you'll never be able to get there, is important because it sets the vision for where you want to go. I t sets the trajectory that you're moving forward. 

 

Area of Business: From a team of 5 to 10 people  30:41

Also exciting, In 2021, we expanded the team from five people to 10 people. Now everybody on my team works part time and the reason for that is because I like to hire moms. I like to hire people who aren't necessarily working another job. They– many of the team members wouldn't really be working in another job if they weren't working for me and to me, that's it– it's part of fulfilling the mission that we have to empower women to be able to achieve whatever it is that they wanted to achieve and so for me, that mission is fulfilled with our clients, but it's also fulfilled with our team and giving moms, women who are staying home with their kids a really flexible job to be able to do something that they love, and that fills them up, that they don't have to commit to full time so to me, that's why all my team is part time, and we grow our team from five to 10. We added a new social media and podcast manager Crystal. Cassie is our customer service manager. Ellen is our executive assistant and is our customer fulfillment manager and our most recent hire at the end of last year is Amanda as our copywriter. And so we doubled the size of the team in a year and that was really exciting. It's hard to grow the team and it requires you kind of slow down a little bit. It's this idea of slowing down to speed up that takes time to train someone and teach someone and hand things off to them, but I feel like the team is in a really good space. With all cylinders running that this year, we don't plan to have any other hires. We're really just going to double down with the team that we have, and really kind of crank it out with the amazing team that we've been able to build.

 

Area of Business: Launch the Biceps after Babies Coaching Academy  32:22

Also in 2021, of our goals was to launch the Biceps after Babies Coaching Academy for the first time, and I'm excited that to say that we did that we had two launches of it, and in total, we've taken about 50 women through the program and last year at the beginning of the year, I had this dream to be able to expand the number of women that I was able to help, but I was able to help really, and having this realization that I'm able to and I had this– I've had this realization before. When I was doing a bunch of one-to-one clients, there was a limit as to how much I could do. Right? There's a limit to the number of clients that I could serve. Based on the number of clients I was able to take at any one time, and I wanted to do more, I wanted to dream bigger, I wanted to help more women, and so I realized in order to do that, I have to do something different. Right?What got you here won't get you there, and so that's when I made the switch from one-to-one coaching to doing more group style coaching, and that expanded the amount of women that we were able to serve, and we've hired coaches in the business and train them how to do coaches, and that's also expanded the number of people that we've been able to serve. But recently, I've been dreaming bigger. I want to help so many more women, and I feel like the methodology that I use in my coaching and that style of coaching can be so transformative for so many people that I want to get it out to as many people as possible and to do that, requires me to train more coaches. To teach more coaches so that they can go out and utilize the methodology and utilize the tools and the training and the transformational coaching that we use in our business with their clients and that's the next level of growth, and being able to serve so many more women is like, “If we have all of these coaches, we're able to go out and coach other clients. Now, how many more women are we able to serve?” so I get really excited talking about that. I hope that that's apparent. So anyway, that's what coaching Academy is about. For me, it's about increasing our impact. Increasing the impact that we have on the lives of the coaches that we train and then also the clients that those coaches are able to serve.

 

Area of Business: Live Event  34:36  

On the realm of goals that I didn't achieve, I talked about wanting to have a live event last year and we still have not done that, partly because of travel restrictions but really, and if I'm being really honest, it partly has to do with doing a live event is really expensive and it has to make financial sense for the business, and I just haven't figured out a way for it to make– to fit into our financial plan for the year, so I still have a desire to do a live event at some point, and the team and I have been tossing around ideas of, again, how we could support that financially, how we can make that financially feasible, but that is one of the goals that I did not achieve during the last year. 

 

Finish our home renovation  35:19

One of my goals was to finish our home renovation, which is funny because we didn't end up finishing our renovation until right before Thanksgiving. We started in May of 2020 and it took us until Thanksgiving to finish, and that's really because we started with this idea of taking down a wall and boy did it morph, and we essentially redid the entire interior of our house. All new paint, all new baseboards, crown, molding, floors, staircase, built-ins, lighting, ceilings, everything. Yeah, I'm thinking back through almost everything. We didn't replace cabinets. We did– we just painted cabinets, but new countertops, new appliances, all the new things. New fireplace, all of the things, so it's snowballed, and many of you who have gone through renovations, yourself may be laughing at me thinking that, “Oh, yeah, I've been there where you think you're just going to do just one thing and then, it's really hard to know where to stop with all of the other things but we did. We finished our renovation right before Thanksgiving. We're incredibly happy with it. We're really happy how everything turned out. It did take quite a bit longer than we had actually anticipated.

 

100 day of meditation  36:36  

Alright, here's another goal that I didn't actually finish, and this actually could have been used for the example of setting a wish rather than actually creating a plan to execute it, and I even was kind of wishy washy with this when I shared it in the podcast episode when I went back and re listen to it, and I think that was because of my heart, I knew that it was just kind of I was throwing it out there was this wish, but I didn't really have a plan to execute it. That was– that I wanted to do 100 days of meditation. Just for funsies, I went back and looked at my meditation app and in the last six months, because I don't have any data before that but in the last six months, I did 14 meditations, so I'm going to say that I probably didn't do 70 plus meditations in the first six months. I know I didn't do 70 plus meditations in the first season, so I did not achieve that goal and it really comes back to I– it was– it would be nice. It didn't have a real good “why” behind it, it didn't have a plan, it didn't have a way that I was going to execute it, and that's what you get when you don't have a plan.

 

To compete in a CrossFit competition  37:44

And then last school that I had, I wanted to compete in a CrossFit competition, and I did not complete that in 2021, but– we are at– we literally have a CrossFit competition this weekend at my gym that I'm competing in, so I'm going to say that counts, even though it's technically in 2022, that I'm going to finally be able to compete at a CrossFit competition. It'll be fun because it's just our gym. It's nobody else. We're– it's a partner competition, so I'm partnered with another girl in my gym, and we get to compete together, which always makes it a lot more fun to be in a team, and I'm really excited about that. Just excited to get a little bit of competition in, do some live challenges and just experience live CrossFit competition. Okay, so that's a refresh on my goals that I had set for 2021.

 

My goals for 2022  38:41  

Part three of this episode is I'm gonna be sharing my goals for 2022, and I do this a little bit as a selfish maneuver of I like to be able to have these to go back to to kind of reflect at the end of the year. So selfishly, I do that, but I also do it because I feel like hearing other people's goals will sometimes inspire me, and hearing other people dream big or have these big ideas, It's inspiring. It is exciting for me, and it starts to get my wheels turning for what I want to create in my life. So yes, this is a little selfish, and I also don't want you to miss the opportunity to get inspired. Maybe you'll hear one of my goals and say, “Hey, that sounds really cool. I never thought about that. How could I implement that in my life?” 

 

Amber B  40:11  

Alright, so first in the realm of business, 2022, Carly and I have decided that our mantra is, “Do less, do better.” Oftentimes, in business, in life, I don't know this is a generality in many areas of my life. I can see this show up, in order to improve or get better, I feel it requires more. My simple solution to be able to grow the business is just to work harder. Just to put in more hours, just to put in more time, and that works for a while until it doesn't work. I see this in the realm of training too. People think, “Oh, I want to get stronger. I want to build more muscle.” And so they think, “The more days I work out, the stronger and more muscle built, and so why don't I just work out seven days a week?” Not understanding that there's that tipping point of like, “No, actually doing more is actually counterproductive to what you want to do.” Working out five, four or five days a week with effective programming is going to get you better results than lifting seven days a week and so there's that tipping point of where no more isn't always better. More is just sometimes more and it actually can be detrimental and so that's our motto this year is is not about doing more, it's not about working harder, it's not about working more hours, it's about being more strategic, being more intentional, doing less and get doing it better so that's our focus for this year. 

 

Revenue goal: Serve more clients  40:56

We have a revenue goal, but I'm not really tied to it. Last year, we had a big revenue goal and that was really exciting, and that really drove me but this year, the impact that we're creating feels much more exciting to me, and so I'm tapping into that, and setting some goals in terms of number of clients that we want to be able to serve, so we want to be able to train 150 more coaches in 2022 inside of coaching Academy and my big, hairy scary goal, and I hesitated to share this because we talked about this in my our team meeting this last week but I don't have any context on how many numbers for you. But one of the goals that I set a long time ago, and I'm resetting it for this year, is this vision of being able to help serve 10,000 clients. We're definitely in the 1000s of number of clients that we've served, and on our team is putting together numbers so we actually have a data point of where are we at how many 1000s of women have we served through our programs, through our coaching through our you know, everything that we provide and offer. And the goal is 10,000. So I don't know if that's something that we'll hit this year. But we want to start tracking that because to me, like that's just such an exciting goal to think that the work that the team and I have put out has touched the lives of 10,000 women, not to mention all of the lives that those women touch their partners, their spouse, their spouses, their children, their friends, their neighbors, right like it just that that level of impact just spreads throughout the world. And it's one of the reasons that I love working with women, because I feel like when you change a woman, you impact so many other people. And that's true with men as well. However, I think you know, I have a special place in my heart for women, and especially moms who are, you know, raising the next generation. And when you improve a mother, you improve a family. And that means a whole lot to me. 

 

Create some more whitespace  43:00

Alright, so other things in business, my goal this year is to create some more whitespace. So I told my team that I'm taking one day off per month. And that's really to give me time and space to think and dream and have visions for where we want to go as a team. And so I booked it out for like the first I think five or six months. I already have my calendar. This is Amber's day off, we're not scheduling things this day, this is the day that Amber is gonna, I don't know, go shopping and get my nails done, like, do something that's not necessarily related. It's more dreaming related and rest and visioning for, you know, what we want to create in the business.

 

Taking a certification to build on my coaching ability 43:36  

And then I also want to take it, I want to continue to build my coaching ability so I think I'm a pretty dang good coach, and I think there's always room for improvement. I can sit here and say, “I'm a freakin amazing coach, and I want to do better,” right? We can sit in that dichotomy of “We're amazing” and we want to keep reaching for more, and so I'm committing to taking a certification to build on my coaching ability, and I have my eye on a couple, but I want to pull the trigger on that this year. 

 

To hit 3.4 million downloads  this year 44:06  

And then the last one in the business, is we're setting a lofty, crazy goal. I don't know if we'll hit it, but our goal is to hit 3.4 million downloads total this year. That would mean we're doubling the amount of downloads that we have had from this last year. So up until this point, we've had about 1.7 million downloads. We want to double that number in a single year, so that feels crazy and audacious and big and scary and how the heck are we going to do that? But that's it, and we have a plan for how it's gonna happen and we have some ideas, but that's our goal is to double our downloads. 

 

Personal Goals 44:43

Okay, I don't know why, but I just got a little nervous. Talking about business goals feels very easy to me. Talking about some of these other more personal goals, I don't know, feels a little bit vulnerable for me, so I'm gonna roll with it. I'm gonna suck it up and do it. It's just interesting to me that business is like, “Yeah, I'll share all those goals,” and then this is a little bit more personal and a little bit more vulnerable.

 

Realm of money 45:09  

So in the realm of money, my husband and I really want to and we're committed to deciding on a long-term investment strategy beyond just retirement accounts, and we're really good about saving a percentage of our income for retirement. We've been doing that for a really long time, and we feel really comfortable with that, and we also want to start looking outside of our retirement accounts of what other investments we need to make? What are the other things that we do need to be thinking about? To create financial independence for ourselves, so that's a goal for this year is 2022 is a year that we dive into figuring out what our long term strategy is, and where we're going in terms of our financial independence. 

 

Realm of social connections: Rekindle an old friendship 45:53 

In the realm of social connections, I and maybe the reason that this makes me uncomfortable is I feel this is an area that I want to do better at, but that does not come naturally to me. I have never naturally been really good at maintaining connections, which is kind of funny. I feel I'm a very personal and warm person. When I know you like I make friends easily, but I don't maintain those friendships long term and because of my husband's job and his pathway, we in the past 18 years of our marriage, we've moved about every two to four years. Mostly every two to three years, and so I've gotten very good at showing up at a new place, making really good friends and then moving, and then having to be in a new place and make new friends, and then move again. And I'm not intentional about maintaining those friendships, and I can make a lot of reasons and excuses as to why that is but the truth is, is that I haven't done a lot to maintain the friendships that I've had in the past, and I think if there's one area of my life that I feel I could use a lot of improvement on, is in the area of friends. In the area of creating connection, social connection with people. I have a really good relationship with my husband and he is absolutely my best friend, and I think that there's room for that connection with other women, so that's something I'm not very good at, so one of my goals this year is to rekindle an old friendship, and I have some ideas of like how I'll do that and who I'm thinking about rekindling, but I have some really great friends that I've made throughout the years of all of the different places that we've lived and it just takes a little bit of effort, and I haven't given that effort as of now and I want that to change. I would like to rekindle some of those old friendships. 

 

To nurture more my family relationship  47:58 

And then I also have a goal to call at least two family members a month, and get on the phone with my siblings. I went home for the holidays and spent it with my siblings. And it's just so good to be around family, and I– the older I get, the more I recognize how important those bonds are and just like the friendships that I feel have kind of dwindled over the years because I haven't kept them up. I haven't put the time and energy into nurturing the plant nurturing the relationship. It's the same thing with my family, and I did this a couple years ago. I was a little bit more lofty back then. When I said, “I wanted to call my– every single one of my siblings, I'm one of seven and my parents once a month, every month for the year,” that was a little ambitious. I fell quite short of that, and I also felt like sometimes it just became like, “Oh, I just got to call this person,” rather than being like, “Who can I connect with? Who do I need to connect with? Who would I benefit from connecting with this month in my family? And reaching out and making that gesture of connecting with that person.” So, okay. Now you know my deep dark secrets. I'm not great at making and sustaining friends. Actually, I feel like I'm good at making friends. I'm not great at sustaining. I might want to get better at that. 

 

Publicity: Getting published somewhere  47:58 

Okay, publicity so I guess this is kind of in the realm of business, but I'm  labeling it something different because publicity feels a little scary to me. Feels a little bit nerve wracking. One of our big, hairy scary goals and I guess it's not hairy scary, but one of our big goals that I don't really know I'm releasing the “how” and the “when” on is getting verified on Instagram. When you get that little blue checkmark on Instagram. We've been trying for over a year to get verified, and every time we apply for it, we get denied and that's fine. And I'm pretty sure I know why it is you really need to be published in some way on some platform outside of the stuff you put out to become verified, and so that's been something that I've been thinking about for a long time is how can we get more publicity? How can we get published somewhere? Have an article written about us or– just get out there, get on a TV show, or whatever, news broadcast, it's really just becoming more out in the open and having more people know about your brand and just increase in awareness. So on the realm of what we need to do to get published, or to get verified, is getting published somewhere, so that's my goal for 2022 is to get published somewhere, so I'm going to ask for some help because I've been doing a little bit of research on publicity, and one of the things that one of the ladies I was listening to recommended as she said, “You probably already have people in your sphere who know somebody, who could help, they'd like have an aunt who like works at a magazine, or they have a neighbor who is a news anchor or something like that,” and so she recommended reaching out and seeing just putting it out there that, “Hey, I'm looking to have more publicity to be able to serve other people's audiences. Do you, fellow podcast listeners, have any ideas for me? Do you know anybody who maybe could help? If you do, that would be amazing. Shoot me a message on Instagram, or email us at [email protected]. But that's my goal. Get out there, show my face, expand the brand, and be able to serve more people.

 

Getting on 24 other podcast  51:34  

And on that same vein, I also have a goal to get on 24 other people's podcasts this year so that's like two a month, so if you also have somebody who you would recommend, “Oh, hey, I'd recommend you for this podcast,” or you want to reach out to your friend who runs a podcast or, I don't know, some fitness trainer has a podcast and you're like, “Oh, you'd be perfect for that podcast,” let me know. Help me out. Help a girl out in reaching her goal for the year of getting on 24 other podcasts.

 

Handstand pushup goal  52:18

And then I already talked about my handstand pushup goal. That's happening this year. It's done. In my mind, it is done. It's gonna happen, and I'm pretty excited about it. 

 

The feeling of excitement was back  52:18

Okay, wow. I have a lot to say today. In fact, I wasn't even planning on recording this afternoon because I really wasn't feeling– I wasn't feeling into it to be honest, and I got off a phone call with somebody, and I felt really inspired. I felt really excited, and I was like, “I'm gonna capitalize on this excitement. I'm gonna sit down. I'm gonna record this podcast episode right now,” and I just have to let you know that excitement was back. As I sat down to record, I was excited to record. I was itching to say all these things and get into talking about goals, and if I'm being truthful, I haven't felt that excitement for the last couple of months. Which is exactly why I decided to take a break in December. It was because that sparked that excitement that inspiration had kind of dwindled. But what's really exciting is that I felt a comeback today, and it reminds me of how important, again, comes back to our mantra that we have for this year for the business to last you do better. It's not about doing more, it's about doing better and that doesn't require more. And so to kind of round out from last week's episode, the recap of “Why I took a break and why I'm back,” the reason that it was so important for me to take a break was to reignite that spark and that inspiration, and I hope that you felt it. I hope that you felt my excitement and my itching to get this out into the world because I think this topic is so incredibly important.

 

Continue to support and share, and leave a rating and review the podcast  54:10

And on that note, if this is something you enjoyed, or you got something out of this episode, it would mean the world to me for you to share it. Text it to a friend, post it to your Instagram stories, email it to your mom. Whoever you feel like would benefit from this, would you do me a favor and share it with them? And if you have not yet left a rating and review on the podcast, I know so many of you had, so many of you have left rating the review and I'm so grateful for for you if that's the case, but if it's not, because there's plenty of people we have way more downloads than we have of people who have left eight ratings and reviews, so if you would take a moment and leave a rating and review for the podcast, that would also mean the world to me. Thank you so much for being here. It feels dang good to be back. Feels good to be here with you and I am excited for what's to come in 2022.  That wraps up this episode of biceps after babies Radio. I'm Amber now go out and be strong because remember my friend, you can do anything

 

Outro

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