How Your Home Can Help You Reach Your Goals

Your home impacts your ability to achieve your goals, far more than you may realize. In fact, creating lasting and sustainable change can be challenging, if not impossible, without aligning your home with your goals.
 
This is because our homes influence our behaviors and affect our physical, mental, and emotional well-being. Aside from our relationships, our environments may have the greatest influence on how we think, feel, and act.
 
Let's say your goal is to build a habit of eating healthy foods, but your pantry is stocked with junk food, your blender for morning smoothies is buried in the back of a cluttered cabinet, and your home office is in the kitchen making it easy to snack all day; maintaining that new habit will be difficult.
 
Or perhaps your goal is to cultivate a loving romantic relationship, but you still have an ex’s belongings in your closet, and your home doesn’t reflect the best version of yourself. It’s unlikely that you’ll be in the right mindset or emotional space to meet someone new.
 
If you wish to embrace a new habit or achieve a goal, it makes sense to create a home that supports that habit and aligns with your goal. Your home should work for you, not against you. Otherwise, it’s like paddling upstream. On the other hand, a supportive environment that aligns with your goals points you downstream; your home will help make process of building habits and sticking to your goals easier and more enjoyable.
 
Step 1: Clarify Your Goal 
Write down your goal or habit. Sometimes, we think we know what we want, but writing it down can help us gain clarity.
 
Step 2: Know Your Why 
Why do you want to achieve this goal or build this habit? What will you gain? How will you feel? What’s the cost of not achieving it? A strong “why” will motivate you to stay committed.
 
Step 3: Define Your Next Steps 
Identify the next steps to achieve your goal or build your habit. Make these steps clear and easy. If you feel any hesitation, break the steps down further until they’re so simple that you’re excited to take them.
 
Step 4: Commit 
Consider what will support your commitment to following through. This could be a promise to yourself, scheduling time on your calendar, or finding an accountability partner.
 
Step 5: Create an environment that supports your next step.

• Inspire the Action: Create a visual cue to remind you to take action. For example, if your goal is to journal every morning, place your journal and pen on your bedside table.
• Support the Action: Make it easy to take action with minimal effort. If you want to cook more meals at home, ensure your kitchen is organized and functional. Clear clutter, organize, and arrange your space to make following through easy.
• Elevate the Experience: Make the process enjoyable. You’re more likely to take action again if you enjoy it the first time. Place a visual “reward” in the place where you take action.  For instance, if you want to develop a reading habit, create a cozy nook with a focal point, like a beautiful piece of art. Enhance the space with textures, scents, sounds, and colors that make you happy.

 
Your home is ready to serve you as a powerful tool for transformation.