Tips for Goals

Hi my darlings! Thank you for stopping by my blog post! I hope you are doing well, and that you are happy and healthy!

Today I want to share few ideas about goals. My article will be very simple, not based on deep science. But if you want to learn more about goals from real scientist, I recommend you to watch this episode of Andrew Huberman podcast: The science of setting and achieving goals.

You can also watch my simple video: Tips for goals.

There are four main brain areas which help you to achieve your goals.

Amygdala. This part of the brain is responsible for fear and anxiety. Sometimes we need to be a little bit scared in order to be motivated, so it is important to use your own fears for achieving your goals.

Basal Ganglia. The function of this part of the brain is the switch between two options 'Go' and 'No go'. If your goal is too complex and not realistic, you won't be successful because your brain wouldn't even want to put efforts, it won't let you start the action.

Lateral Frontal Cortex. This is CEO of your brain, it helps to make long-term plans, to analyze what is good not only now, but later as well. This is the part of the brain that helps to do useful hard work versus easy, but not beneficial work.

Orbitofrontal cortex. This part of the brain has connections to your emotions. Without it you wouldn't have any feeling.

So if we look at these four parts, we can see that goals can depend on the following parameters:

- Fear

- Yes to action

- Analysis

- Emotions

In my blog I mostly share my experience, and for me fear is always a key driver. For example, I have some health related goals because I am afraid of aging and I believe that if I take care of my health, it can help me to stay younger for longer :-) Or I am afraid to have not enough savings, so I try to save money and I prefer conservative S&P500 investments.

And I want to talk about visualization and fear. In most of self-development books I read, they recommend to visualize success. But for me it is much more helpful to visualize my failure. Even in small tasks. When in the morning I think how disappointed I will be with myself if I am not productive, I became more organized and complete more tasks. I have a fear of not supporting myself, not using my potential. And when I visualize how upset I will be, I work harder.

At the same time my emotions help me a lot. I love how it looks like when a lady can do splits, so I decided to learn how to do splits. I am still working on this goal, I think it will take two or three months. And image of me doing splits keeps me motivated. But I still have a little bit of fear involved, when I think that if I skip my stretching exercises I can lose the progress that I have already made.

I try not to set up goals that I too difficult. I work out everyday, but some of my workouts are just 15 minutes long. It is very hard for me to work out for an hour, but if I break my exercises in two pieces, let's say cardio for 20 minutes and stretches for 25, my brain accepts this challenge. And my basal ganglia doesn't switch to 'no go' option, it gives me a green light :-)

I do think about my future, how I can look like 10, 20, 30 years later, how much money I might have. And these thoughts generated mostly by my lateral frontal cortex, give me energy to keep working on myself.

Now you can see how I use my brain in order to work on my goals and I hope my example can help you.

If you don't know where to start and you don't have any goals, I recommend you to start with health and financial goals, because they are very straightforward. Health goal can be a healthy diet, good sleep, exercising. And financial goal can be saving money and paying off debts. It is important to take care of yourself. It is your social obligation. By taking care of yourself you help not only yourself, but everyone around you!

Be Strong And Love Yourself!

From Dasha With Love!

Love Wins!