Now that you’ve been making consistent progress with your short-term SMART goals, it’s time to think about how those short-term goals are helping you to work toward your long-term goal. While focusing on short-term progress is great for motivation and making actionable changes, it’s important to periodically zoom back out and remember your big picture.
How are the habits that you’re working on now moving you toward your ultimate goal? Is it enough to continue with your current behavior changes or is there more work to be done? If so, do you feel comfortable enough with the consistency you’ve been able to maintain with your current goals to be able to realistically add more to your plate?
All of these questions are important to consider as you progress toward your long-term goals. Optimizing your health and glucose values is all about the journey, and even once you’ve reached your goal, regularly checking in with yourself with still be necessary to make sure that you maintain that progress.
Some things that can help you stay on task during this journey include:
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Have an accountability partner
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Allow flexibility and avoiding an “all or nothing” mentality
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Understand that consistency is key. One “bad” meal, day, or even week isn’t going to make a difference in the long run, but the shame and guilt that people often put on themselves when something like that happens can significantly derail us. Using these ‘mistakes’ as learning experiences and being able to move on from them will often help you to be more successful in the long run
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Break down larger goals into smaller, more manageable goals
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Be prepared for challenges and plateaus and being open to making changes to push through these setbacks. Almost everyone will experience ups and downs on the journey toward self-improvement. Being open to making changes and continuing to learn and improve is often the key to moving past these challenges.
Continued Monitoring and Accountability
Blood sugar control (and health in general) is a lifetime journey rather than a single destination. At no point will you be “done” working at this goal. As things change in your life, you will also need to stay on top of monitoring your glucose values to know when you may need to make some adjustments to fine-tune your progress. Things like aging, schedule shifts, changes in family life, and other obstacles will inevitably come your way over time. Knowing the general information discussed in this program and being prepared to make adjustments as things change will set you up for a lifetime of success.
Keep your primary care team, NutriSense nutritionist, accountability partner, and whomever else is important to you on this journey in the loop on your progress so you can take a team approach to stay on track.
Next: Additional Resources