Conquering your Goals: Celebrating Milestones

Hi everyone! I hope you are doing well. This week in our Conquering Your Goals series we are talking about celebrating milestones. Most of our goals in life can take time, sometimes it can feel like we have nothing to celebrate until we fully complete our goal. This can encourage us to rush towards our finish line and be disheartened when inevitable setbacks or delays come our way. One way to get out of the all-or-nothing mindset and appreciate progress over perfection is to celebrate milestones. 

A milestone is a significant point or achievement along the journey toward completing a larger goal. Milestones break down a goal into smaller, more manageable tasks or achievements, providing opportunities to measure progress, celebrate success, and maintain motivation.

Examples of milestones in goal setting include:

• Completing a key task: For example, writing the first chapter of a book.
• Reaching a percentage of the goal: Such as losing 10% of a total weight loss or gain goal.
• Completing part of the goal: Reaching a 1-mile run every week on your journey towards doing 5-mile runs every week. 
• Doing something for X days: Meditating for 7 days 
• Reaching a new streak: Logging steps for 30 days in a row. 

Breaking bigger goals into milestones

Example: Reduce time spent on screens to 1 hour everyday outside of work.

Possible milestones

• Time tracked every day for 15 days
• Reduced screen time by 30 minutes per day from the baseline.
• Read a book instead of being on the phone before bed for 7 days

Ways to Celebrate

In most cases, you can celebrate the way you celebrate most of your accomplishments. For some people this means getting a sweet treat, for others, it calls for a facial or a pedicure, etc. However, you need to be mindful of not celebrating in a way that feeds the habit you are trying to break. For example, don’t celebrate weight loss by binging for a day. Similarly, don’t celebrate reduced screen time by watching a Netflix series or meeting a money-saving milestone by going shopping. 

Here are some ideas:

• Treat yourself to new clothes to reach a weight loss or gain goal
• Go for a movie to celebrate reaching 10,000 steps every day for 7 days. 
• Invest in your new hobby to reduce your screen time by 1 hour (getting a new paintbrush)
• Develop a personal ritual that you perform every time you reach a milestone. 

📣Tasks for you

For the goals you’ve set, think about three key milestones you’re excited to reach. For each milestone, describe:

1. The Milestone: What is the specific achievement or progress point you’re aiming for?
2. How You’ll Celebrate: What meaningful or enjoyable activity will you do to celebrate reaching this milestone?

This post is part of the Conquering Your Goals Series. Check out all the posts here.