Dear Daughter,
I was going to start this post saying something like, "Elsa, having an active plan is the most important thing in life", but I realized that I sounded like a project manager nerd. I mean, I’m very proud of being a control freak who project-manages everything in life, but that would take it to the next level! Kidding aside, I think having an active plan and taking action is the most important thing if we want to accomplish our goals. So why am I calling it an active plan? Because so many of us have plans, but nothing comes of it (I know you do, Elsa…). If you don’t take your plan and break it into smaller tangible action items and sub-goals and get going, it is just a plan on paper. So how do so many of us fail at this? I think it is because we don’t take the time to create an active plan that we stick to. We think that saying “I’m going to start going to the gym so that I can lose 10 pounds” is an active plan, when we should be saying “I’m going to go to the gym every day, doing x exercise, eating 1200 calories and weighing myself once a week”.
There are so many things we can apply this active plan approach to that we don’t realize. Examples:
Leadership (I’ve covered this in this post)
Creating a positive mindset
Creating healthy relationships
Being the best parent you can be
Building your career
You and I have talked about this many times, Elsa. What is it that stops us from getting started and ultimately reaching our goals? I know that in our case, it’s fear. We fear what would happen if we reach our goal, or even worse: if we fail. I know it is also the fear of judgment from others, which is often linked to perfectionism. I’m so sorry that I have somehow given you this mindset that I myself struggle with. Let’s support each other to stop this mindset. We just need to commit and take action! This is where the active plan and discipline starts. We need to start with small steps and sub-goals and just do it step by step. As we take each step, we will start to slowly break down that fear and start seeing progress in our plans.
This is how you create an active plan
Define your goal - what is it that you want to accomplish?
Determine all the sub-goals that are needed to reach your main goal
List your sub-goals per priority
Identify and list all the action steps you need to take to fulfill each sub-goal
Set a due date for each item
Track and update progress ongoing
So let’s go! Let’s put pen to paper and commit to do it. Make it a habit of reviewing your active plan every day and noting the progress. It’s important that you review the plan every day because “out of sight, out of mind”. As soon as you don’t live by that plan, it becomes an inactive plan.
