The Beauty Battalion - Featuring Beauty In All Shapes & Sizes January 2017 | Page 50

t's a New Year, a new better you right?

We love the fresh start a new year can

bring and the endless opportunities and optimism I always feel surrounding this time of year. We seem to start our year off with an intense motivation to create our best selves. We sign up for gym memberships, skip the sugar, stock up on nicotine patches, and declare to ourselves that this time will be different. Sadly, by February, most of us won't have ever opened our foreign language audio books or stuck with our 5am Pilates classes. So what went wrong? What makes reaching our goals so hard? Today, I've compiled a few key practices that successful, goal-oriented people use to reach their goals, stay on track, and create their best selves in record time. Bring on 2017!

Create A Vision Board

No matter what your resolution is, creating a vision board is a great, creative practice to help visualize exactly what you are working towards. For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, a vision board is a collection of images that remind you of your end goal. They can be messy, detailed, perfectly symmetrical, or anything in between. The only rule in using a vision board is that you need to display it somewhere that you will see it every day. Hiding it in a binder or the back of your closet isn't going to cut it. When you see it every day, your subconscious (and conscious mind) are reminded of everything you are working towards. The visual reminder helps keep you motivated, on track, and successful.

Meditate/ Visualize

There have been countless studies done on the benefits of mediation. Besides it being an incredible stress-reliever, immune booster, and anxiety-reducer, meditation has been known to help people reach their goals as well. By quieting the mind and focusing on your breathing for 10-15 minutes a day, you'll find that you're better at problem-solving, more creative, and sleep easier. Depending on what feels right to you, spend some time visualizing your resolution before/ after/ or during your meditation session. Imagine what it will feel like to have accomplished your goal and visualize yourself already achieving it. Take 10-15 minutes every day to discover new motivation you never knew you had.

Goal Setting Techniques That Work

By Lisa Miller-Mecham

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50 the beauty battalion | January 2017