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Writer's pictureLisa Kelly

The importance of checking in with yourself when it comes to long term goals.

Welcome back to the Self Love Blog. This blog post is all about checking in with yourself when it comes to long term goals. so let's get stuck in.


Have you ever set yourself a long term goal, or made a long term plan and by the time you’ve achieved it - you don’t actually want it anymore?


I’ve been having lots of conversations about this recently and I thought I would share my thoughts with you on that.


Sometimes, we can get so fixated on an idea and work towards something that just isn’t our truth anymore. Which is why checking in with yourself is so important. In my experience we set ourselves goals or realise a dream that we spend a long time working towards. It’s in this time that we change as people. Our wants change. Our priorities change. We step away from the person who once wanted the thing we are working towards.


And that’s ok. You’re allowed to make a decision and choice about something and then change your mind. We do not have to be fixed and stay fixed on a particular idea or thing that we have once decided.


For example, I had a client who was working towards a qualification. It was quite intense and quite stressful. And she was close to finishing but the closer she got, the more she realised that this dream that she once had was no longer aligned with her. It takes great courage and bravery to step away from that and decide that the goal she once had wasn’t actually what she wanted to pursue any longer - especially as close to the finish that she was.


This often happens. We set goals, we decide things and then we work towards them relentlessly without actually checking in if that’s what we still want. I’m not sure this is mainstream advice - but it’s definitely something I like to consider periodically.


If you do work by setting goals, how often do you assess them and their relevance to your current life (I’m talking long term goals here). I was speaking with a friend as well who also shared that when she was younger and not necessarily loving her current life she had always wanted to go travelling and working as she travelled. In the time it took her to achieve that goal to make it a reality, she had really built up her home life and didn’t feel the same way about getting away anymore. Therefore, when she did - she realised that travelling and working wasn’t actually what she wanted after all.


So hopefully you can see the importance of checking in on your goals. I can think of versions of me that associated stopping things I was doing with being a quitter. Or a failure. But actually - I think it makes you a brave person, a strong person and a person with clarity to reassess your plans in line with your current life. As we know - life unfolds in mysterious ways!


And not just life, we change. We change all the time. One of my favourite quotes that I like to recite is


“If you knew me yesterday - you don’t know me at all. My growth game is strong … let me reintroduce myself.”


This applies to our wants, needs and desires too. So I invite you, to check in with yourself. Who you are and what you want. Are you still connected to that version of you who wants those things? Or do you need to make some adjustments?


Life doesn’t need to be lived following the same dream you set yourself 5 years ago. It changes. Things happen. And perhaps as we grow, heal and develop - what we want from life does too.


Don’t be afraid to take a different turn, a new path or try something you always swore you would never do. It might just be the change that you need in your life!

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