Home Health & Hospice Week

Don’t let everyday tasks overwhelm you.

With a little planning, you can erase any discouragement in meeting your personal and professional goals, and pave the way to positive mental health.

If you do not set realistic goals and a plan for meeting them, everyday tasks can become overwhelming. Setting and meeting realistic goals will allow you to feel more organized, provide you with a sense of accomplishment, and guide you on how you can move forward, personally, and professionally.

 Get started: If you have several goals, list them in order of importance. This will help you from feeling overwhelmed. It also helps you keep your attention on your most important goals.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services advises that you can use the following steps to set any personal or professional goal:

• Think Positive: Write your goals in a positive way. For instance, write, "Learn to do well," not, "Do not make mistakes."
• Be Realistic: Make your goals precise. Include dates, times, and amounts so that you can see how well you are doing.
• Be Prepared: List the obstacles you need to overcome in order to accomplish your goal.
• Identify Resources: Write down the names of people and groups you need to work with to reach your goal.
• Outline What You Need to Know: List the skills, knowledge, and experience required to reach your goal.
• Design a Map: Create an action plan: Develop a plan for learning the skills you need to reach your goal.
• Know the reason: Write down the benefits of achieving your goal.

 Setting goals is important, but make sure your goals are realistic. For instance, if your goal is to get more sleep, don’t try to go to bed an hour earlier right away. Instead, set smaller goals of going to bed 10 or 15 minutes earlier each night.

 Best strategy:  Take small steps and keep taking them every day. Celebrate your small goals along the way to keep you on the road to achieving your larger goals. For instance, if you want to create a new filing system, you may first want to start by cleaning out the old one before starting the new one. This way you will be starting with a strong foundation.