Aim Low to Reach High

This seems apt at the moment because many people are, of course, setting goals and making plans.

My motto at the moment is "Aim Low to Reach High" it sounds counter intuitive but bear with me.

You see part of my CBT was learning about S.M.A.R.T. goals (you can read about them here)which I found very helpful. But I still struggled sometimes with making my goals. Then when I was making a goal about starting a crochet project I knew I can knock out something like 30 rows in a couple of hours, but when I went to make my goal I stopped. Instead of writing that I'd do 30 or 20 or even 10 rows, I said I'd do 5. I picked a time I'd work on it and when I sat down to do it I did more like 50 rows. I not only felt the satisfaction of attaining my goal but the even better satisfaction of over achieving.

That felt great, and during the rest of the week I did even more crochet and actually achieved more other things. What I think happened is by making my goal easy to achieve it took the pressure off, then when I got to the doing it the goal felt easy to do.

I've kept to that and made small goals and consistently over reached them. Yes I knew I'd over reach it but more often then not I'd over reach past what I thought I could actually do. I think by aiming below what I think I'm capable of I give myself confidence, that then means I don't tell myself what I can't but instead say what I can.

For instance, this year I want to start a running program. It's usually 9 weeks. Well I won't be doing it in 9 weeks, not with my fibromyalgia. In fact I think it's going to take me a month per step -9 steps, 9 months. However I'm giving myself 2 months for each step.

So what I'm saying is that I've decided to set myself up for success instead of failure.

I think I prefer it.