I hope this episode finds you well and well on your way to achieving your goals. This is the last episode of the month so as promised I will be giving you an update on my goals.

The Accomplished Intensive has kicked off and I am very excited to be partnering with the women who said yes to invest in themselves and allow me to guide them through the next phase of their journey. It’s not always an easy decision and the benefits begin right away which is so cool to witness and be a part of.

If doing a group program was not in the cards for you at this time but you still feel like you need some insight, some support or some direction I’m going to suggest you take the Energy Leadership Assessment. This is the assessment tool I am licensed to administer and I use with my clients to get right to the heart of what is holding them back from having the business, the career and the life they want.

We oftentimes think it’s the circumstances that are keeping us stuck but that is rarely the case, and we have way more power than we realize. This assessment tool reveals where your power lies and where you have been giving your power away. It is amazing, it is powerful and it is eye-opening. If you need a little boost and this sounds like what you need right now go to womentakingthelead.com/coaching. You’ll get more information on the assessment and can purchase it there if you so choose.

Achieving a goal requires more than taking action

While sharing the progress I’ve made on my goals I’m also going to share with you some of the realizations I’ve had as I am thinking about my goals and taking action on them. This is very personal and I’m a little queasy sharing this but from all the feedback I’ve been getting from you I know my being open about my experience is helping you to face your fears and make progress on your goals.

I’m going to start off with my relationship goal because that’s where the most stuff has been coming up.

Goal #2 Be in a relationship.

Goal: be in a committed, monogamous, romantic partnership with a man.

Here are some of the good things that are going on in regard to the metrics and milestones I set.

In terms of taking on embodying being more open to partnership and having fun, I have practiced being more aware and less hyper-focused when I'm out and about. I don’t want give off signals like I'm already in a relationship or I'm too busy or disinterested in chatting with strangers. That is going well. I’ve made eye contact with more men, I’ve gotten appreciate glances an smiles back so I’m definitely getting feedback from those around me that I’m doing something different.

I have continued to tell more people about my goal and my preference to be introduced to men who are into personal development. No set ups yet but as I write this I’m realizing I’m not being explicit in asking the person I’m talking with to introduce me to the single men they know who are into personal development.

A male friend of mine challenged me on this need to have someone who is into personal development. He thought I was limiting myself and that part of being in relationship was to have someone who balanced you out. I’m still pondering this. Please weigh in. Send me a note or comment on any of the posts about this episode on social medial.

I have also researched online dating apps and asked around as to which one would be the best for me. I committed to being signed up on an app by the end of the month and that is done. I’ve only been on for a few days at the time of this recording and I can say so far it has been fun and interesting.

In terms of milestones and metrics I am on track with this goal. But let’s face it working toward a goal is never limited to whether or not you take the action. There is a whole mental, emotional and spiritual component to achieving our goals. If there weren’t we would have already achieved them by now.

Without putting any effort into uncovering them our limiting beliefs that have held us back in certain areas will rear their ugly heads when we begin to take action, or even consider taking action, and you will be overcome with the experience of it. This is what has been happening to me and although it’s not pleasant it’s an opportunity to change the belief. I was astounded not only by the belief itself, because it was an illogical belief, but as I worked through one belief another would be revealed. It’s fascinating!

Beliefs I’ve uncovered related to being in a relationship

The first belief that got in my face was I am not worthy, lovable enough, or deserve to be in a relationship. Who would want me?

This is not logical but it creeps into my psyche in moments of doubt. The ego is not logical and it repeats and harps on limiting beliefs to taunt you and get you to hold back and play small. So I faced this one head on and also talked through it with a friend.

I was in a good place and feeling myself moving forward and then the next limiting belief hit me a couple of days later: I resist receiving love and so will sabotage anything good that comes along. My conflict with receiving love is not limited to the area of romantic relationship. It also plays itself out in the areas of accepting help, accepting compliments or payment for my services, which also has impacted my ability to earn income in my business.

I would much rather be the giver because it is safer, more acceptable and to be honest I’m in control of what and how much I give. Sometimes without warning someone pays a compliment, gives a gift or asks to hire me. The accepting of this love does not happen as naturally or easily as you think it would. It takes some effort for me to manage myself in these moments and be gracious.

Even hearing “Thank you” can be annoying to me at times. Isn’t that interesting?

Today as I was gathering my thoughts for this episode I was randomly on my phone cleaning up the podcast app to remove any podcasts I have not listened to in some time.

I came across the Affirmations Podcast which I have not listened to in months. I went in to see if the host was still releasing episodes, because if she wasn’t I was just going to delete the podcast off my phone. I saw that yes she was still releasing episodes and the latest episode was titled Receiving Love. How funny is that? I feel supported in dealing with this limiting belief because clearly the Universe is on it and is sending me the messengers I need.

The most recent limiting belief I encountered around relationship was I will have to give up full control over my life. Where I live, holidays, meals, entertainment will all be a negotiation. Rather than looking at this as an adventure I was looking at it as a loss of freedom. The actual belief can probably be translated to “negotiation is burdensome.” I definitely need to change my mindset around this one.

The other interesting thing is that although these limiting beliefs have come up primarily in regard to relationship I can see how they have, and if left unchecked would continue to, hold me back with my other goals.

This may sound a little odd but I’m actually looking forward to the next layer of limiting beliefs that I can face because when I do face them and move through them I feel space, something opens and creates more possibilities in my life. More on that in a bit.

It's as easy or as hard as changing your mind

I’m going to talk about two my goals together because they are starting to overlap.

Goal #1 Build more strength and endurance.

Goal #4 Do a Women Taking the Lead branded full-day event in the summer or fall

Goal for strength and endurance: Do 300 Spartan-regulation burpees in good form in one session by June 30. Separately, do an unassisted pull-up.

Originally I guessed my baseline was 50 burpees and on January 12 I discovered it was actually 100. The surprises keep coming because I can report to you that I have already achieved my goal of doing 300 Spartan-regulation burpees in good form in one workout session.

It seems a little shocking to me that I achieved this goal so fast but in retrospect it’s not surprising anymore. I want to offer this to you because this is what happened.

I changed my mind. Yes, I changed my mind.

I had a belief of who I was and what I was capable of and I changed it.

I believed it would take me until May to do 300 burpees and it took me until February. It definitely helped to just get started but even when I hit 120 and 150 burpees in one session I still didn’t see 300 burpees so close on the horizon.

At one point when I was doing my burpee workout I decided I was someone who could easily do 300 burpees and within 2 weeks I did.

I have changed my goal to doing 1000 Spartan-regulation burpees in good form in one session. I believe I can easily achieve this by December 31, 2018 but I’m actually going to attempt to achieve this goal sooner. I know I can do this because I’ve decided I’m someone who can easily do 1000 burpees in one session. I’ve already got my plan in an Excel spreadsheet.

This is the key to achieving your goals and it’s at the heart of my coaching system.

You have to decide you are the person who can achieve your goal. You are the type of person who does it easily. If you struggle with this I know a great coach who can help you. Because I’m the type of person who can coach someone around this.

Don't be surprised if your goals begin to merge

During one of my burpee sessions I got the inspiration to turn the achievement of 300 burpees into an event. The idea became a vision to find a place to accomplish this goal, invite others to burpees with me (although they don't have to shoot for 300 burpees) but it could be a fundraiser for a local charity and maybe do a Facebook live.

The last time I talked about this on the podcast I was playing with this idea but this idea is now becoming a reality. I am teaming up with Spartan Races, Inc., and many other local businesses to do a fundraiser in the Greater Portland area in the Fall. The details are still being hashed out so stay tuned on that.

I also have the goal to do one unassisted pull-up by the end of the year. I have not ordered the pull-up bands yet so I will put that on my list to get done before the goals update at the end of March. Also, I declared that if I can't do a pull-up by September I'm going to hire a personal trainer to help me with this goal.

Goal #3 Increase profitability in my business.

Goal: have a net income (earnings minus expenses) of $80,000 minimum.

I have created a spreadsheet that outlines how many books, assessments, strategy sessions, group programs, private coaching packages, etc. that I need to sell in order to hit my goal. I have definitely focused on the marketing and the promotion of those things.

I have also had more people reach out to me out of the blue wanting to talk about private coaching and doing workshops within the workplace, so there is a lot of potential for increased profits there.

January’s Profit and Loss report showed a net profit of $4,115.49. That ended up much better than it was looking mid-month so that’s great. However, if I’m going to have a net profit of $80,000 I’m going to need to start recording an average net profit of about $6700 a month. So I’m a little behind but like I mentioned there is a more potential in the coming months.

Be flexible with the timeline of your goals

Goal #5 Outsourcing. I originally stated that Outsourcing was going to be contingent upon my profitability goal so I didn’t expect to see much action here. However, all the prep work and meetings that have gone into this potential new work in the coming months had me leaning on my VA for more support in the past few weeks and so this goal has already seen some movement.

The key to achieving this goal will be a matter of whether I can sustain it. I don’t want to outsource and then take work back. I want to outsource and continue to have so much paid work coming into my business that there is no thought of ever taking work that I’ve delegated back.

Ultimately, this has only made sense because some of the extra work I’ve asked of my VA was work related to the promotion of my products and services. The hope being the extra work I’ve paid her for will come to have paid for itself many times over and then I can give her more projects which she has been eager to get.

I also have to recognize that in the short-term my profitability goal will take a hit but this does not mean it’s a bad thing. It’s an investment now for more profit down the line.

I want to mention again the Energy Leadership Assessment because this tool is brilliant at revealing the limiting beliefs and the perspective you have of yourself, other people and the world that limits your ability to experience and have the life you want. If you’ve been wondering where you get started this is it.

This assessment is a low-cost, low-risk, high value experience that will clear the path and get you moving toward your ultimate goals. Go to womentakingthelead.com/coaching to find out more and to get started.

Please feel free to reach out to me regarding anything you heard in this podcast or if you are looking for some support with limiting beliefs and the achievement of your goals for 2018. You can reach me at jodi@womentakingthelead.com.

As always I hope this was helpful to you and here’s to your success!

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Resources

Private Facebook Community: Chat, share and collaborate with other women listening to the podcast!

Accomplished: How to Go from Dreaming to Doing: A simple, step by step system that gives you the foundation and structure to take your goals and make them happen.