With January coming up quick New Year’s Resolutions are on many a mind!

Whenever I think about New Year’s, I think about what goals I’ve set for myself for the past year and for the future.  If you’ve never set goals for yourself you’re missing out!  Goal setting has been shown to enhance performance and keep you motivated to work with others as well as on your own.

When goal setting, make sure to take a step back and think about how your goals can help you achieve what you want.  That means, you may have three or four goals, or just one.  Taking a look at your lifestyle, your personal values as well as what you would like your ultimate achievement to be can enhance how your experience is and make your likelihood of achieving the ultimate goal more manageable and the experience more enjoyable.

Make sure your goals are SMART! Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time Based goals can really set you up for success.

So, for example if your goal is to have more healthy family meals at home, how can you set a SMART goal to make that happen?

Let’s first break this goal down and make it smart:

S (specific) – Make a healthy recipe with my family in the kitchen at home on Thursday nights at 6:30pm.

M (measureable)-I can measure our success with a calendar. I will put up a calendar in the kitchen for everyone to see that Thursday night is our dinner night and each person can fill in a healthy meal they would like to cook. I can measure if we are achieving our goal by making sure I check the calendar when we have our dinner nights.

A (attainable)-Thursdays everyone is home and is a slower night for our family, so this is the consistent weekly night we will cook at home. I know that I can pick up things at the store for our family dinner night when I do weekly grocery shopping and I know that each family member can have a list for the grocery store when it is their turn to pick a meal.

R (relevant) – We would like to learn how to cook healthy meals and eat out less.  By cooking healthy meals together, this can help us achieve that ultimate family goal.  We are all interested in cooking and will enjoy the new recipes.

T (time based) – We will cook once weekly for each week of the year. That means 52 times this year we will have cooked together at home.

 

SMART GOAL: In 2016, every Thursday night at 6:30, our family will cook one healthy meal for us to enjoy together.  We will check accountability for this monthly on the calendar and keep this up for one full year.

Whatever your goals are for 2016, whether they have to do with cooking, family fun, making sure Fido gets out for regular walks, or even just that you take 15 minutes daily to yourself, make sure that your goals are not only SMART, but that they help you achieve an overall improved feeling about your health and wellness!

Erin

References:

Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. The Position of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics: Interventions for the Treatment of Overweight and Obesity in Adults. Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics; Volume 116(1): 2016

Kleingeld,A.,Heleen, M., Lidia, A. The Effect of Goal Setting on Group Performance: A Meta-Analysis: Journal of Applied Psychology; Vol 96(6): Nov. 2011, 1289 – 1304

Hey Everyone,

With the holidays rapidly approaching and yummy cakes and cookies on every counter I got to thinking, what is one holiday dessert you traditionally eat during the winter holidays that could use a nutrition makeover.  Fill out the poll and I’ll come up with a recipe!