Tag: goals

Setting Intentions

If you’ve been following me on social media and through my blog and newsletter, you know I’ve recently started doing yoga.  I go to a class once a week and do some exercises on my own throughout the week.  At the beginning of each class, Beth, our instructor, tells us to “set your intention for this time.”  My intention is rarely the same week to week.  This week, I may want to stretch out.  The next week I might be focusing on building strength.  Two weeks ago, mindfulness may have been my goal.  Those are really three very different foci, and it’s pretty impossible to set an intention for more than one at a time.  Sure, I can do the flow with mindfulness as my goal and still build strength and stretch out, but I can only concentrate on one intention at a time.

Yoga poses
Doing yoga has helped me learn how to set intentions for each day.

The same happens in business.  My intention for my business is to serve my customers the best I can.  Another day, my intention might be more growth-oriented.  These don’t happen in isolation from each other or any other focus I might have for my business on any given day.

I am using the lesson from yoga to impact my business.  Each day, I’m going to start out by stating an intention for that business day.  Today’s intention was transitional.  Transitional days see me moving from the last major task to the next one.  I finished clearing out the remnants of the lip balm order I sent last week and prepared to restock some soap.  This transitional day was also a day of preparation:  When my new printer crosses the threshold tomorrow, I will be ready with stacks of labels to print off.

By stating an intention for my days, I am doing more than setting a goal.  I am declaring what I will achieve that day.  Doing this today has energized my day.  I have felt super-charged to make things happen, but only if they work towards my intention.  Wrapping soaps that need to be wrapped is not part of today’s intention, so they will only get done after everything else is complete.  They are, however, a huge part of tomorrow’s intention.

Do you set intentions or goals for each day?  I encourage you to set an intention for each day, and let me know how that changes how you’re able to do life or work in the comments below.

Starting with the Finish in View

No secret…  I walk a few times a week.  I’ve walked in pretty-chilly temps and I’ve walked in weather where I begin pouring sweat as soon as I step out of the house – like walking through the sauna that is North Carolina in the summer.  I don’t walk because I like freezing my butt off or sweating out two pounds of liquid in under an hour.  In fact, if I could get the same benefits from not-walking, I would in a heartbeat, but the truth is, I can’t, and walking really does have a whole lot of benefits – psychological, holistically physical, emotional, and even spiritual.

When I start my walks, within the first quarter mile, I mentally plan my route and start thinking of the very end – that last quarter mile when I can start slowing it down, check my pulse, log in the time and calorie burn, and get more comfortable.  I think about which route I’ll follow.  It’s always the same four streets, but depending on how I walk them, it can be 2.5 miles or 2.8 miles.  It may seem silly to think about finishing my walk before I have barely begun, but envisioning the end helps motivate me through every step and prevents me from taking short-cuts – skipping that little bit of .2 mile or not going down that short street.

Similarly, thinking about the end of a business venture from the outset helps a business owner work towards that goal, that completion, that teleos.  As we celebrate 15 years of soapy business, I reflect back on those early days, and I did not have an end-game in sight.  It wasn’t until several – SEVERAL! – years down the road that I began to think about things like having a brick-and-mortar store and passing my business down to my children.  That particular route requires certain steps and a certain amount of time, just like when I opt for “route A” of my walking choices.  Going the B&M route means striving to build up the revenue to sustain such a venture, taking into account overhead, staffing needs, retail traffic ebbs and flows, and so forth.  Passing the business down to my daughters requires teaching them every aspect of the business, not just the technical aspects, but also the passion and the why.

Last year in the midst of the rebrand, the brick-and-mortar suddenly became less important to me, and the girls have no desire to run a soapmaking business, though they love making soap.  They love the creativity and the design aspects, and the chemistry of it fascinates them, but that’s as far as their enthusiasm goes.  So, it’s become time to work with another end-game in mind.

To be honest, I haven’t entirely worked that out, yet.  Part of the rebrand involved an increased focus on wholesale and private label, though retail is still a very strong part of my business.  At this point, though, I’d more love to have a separate work shop than a full-blown B&M.  I’d enjoy the space separate from the house to make, wrap, and store my products.  The completion of my business now would be having a strong business to sell off in – ideally – one huge chunk to someone who’d love and nurture it as I do.  Again, this route requires a certain path, a certain set of steps, a particular journey to traverse.

Without the finish in sight, I could just meander along, making this product or that product, selling whenever, pushing for sales when I felt like it and ignoring my business when I didn’t.  Similarly, when I walk for my health, having a defined time frame and route ensures I do at least as much as I need to, and it also restricts me from following whims that could take me on long treks – not that that would necessarily be a bad thing, but when the family is expecting me to be gone a certain amount of time, being gone for 2-3 times that would cause them to worry.

Goals are essential, but goals without a defined end are just nebulous scratchings on a dry-erase board, the result of moments or hours of brainstorming.  As you set your goals, whether fitness, business, or lifestyle, determine to look at the end.  It’s likely not the end, but it is an end, often that of a chapter before the next beginning.