How to Set Goals AND Stick to Them

The Key Is to Think Small

You know that feeling when you set a big, ambitious goal—lose 30 pounds, run a marathon, completely overhaul your diet—and then three weeks later you're face-down in a pint of ice cream wondering where it all went wrong?

Yeah. Me too.

Here's what I've learned time and time again through my own transformation, and what I've seen with my wellness coaching clients: Big goals aren't the problem. It's that we skip the most important part—the tiny, achievable steps that actually get us moving.

Goalettes: Action Snacks for Your Wellness Journey

Think of a goalette like a hip sack when you don't want to carry your whole backpack. Or a snack instead of a full meal. Goalettes are bite-sized objectives—mini experiments designed to get you started on a path toward meaningful change.

The most impactful characteristic of a goalette? It's attainable.

Not "I think I can do this if everything goes perfectly." But "I can do this even on my worst Tuesday."

What does a goalette look like?

• Add something green to your plate at one meal per day

• Take a 10-minute walk after dinner

• Drink one glass of water before your morning coffee

• Go to bed 15 minutes earlier than usual

• Write down three things you're grateful for before bed

• Take three deep breaths before checking email

Notice what these have in common? They're specific. They're small. And most importantly, they don't require you to become a different person overnight.

Consistency Is the Secret Sauce

Here's where most people go wrong. They get excited, pick five goalettes, and try to do them all at once. Within a week, they've abandoned all of them.

When you try to change too many things at once, you deplete your willpower and decision-making capacity. Each new habit requires mental energy, and when you spread yourself too thin, everything becomes harder—and eventually, nothing sticks.

Don't do that.

Master one before you stack another.

Research by health psychologist Dr. Phillippa Lally and her team at University College London found that it takes an average of 66 days for a new behavior to become automatic (study published in the European Journal of Social Psychology). Some habits took as little as 18 days, while others took up to 254 days.

Your goalette needs to become effortless—something you do without thinking—before you're ready to add the next one.

Here's what that looks like: You start with your goalette—a 10-minute walk after dinner. For the first week, you have to remind yourself. By week three, you're automatically reaching for your shoes after you clear the dishes. By week six, it feels weird NOT to walk. That's when you're ready to add the next goalette.

Not when it's on your calendar. Not when you've done it for a few days. When it feels automatic. When it would take MORE effort to skip it than to do it.

Over time, these tiny actions compound. That 10-minute walk becomes 20 minutes. The green thing on your plate becomes a salad. The meditation app gets opened, then used daily.

But it all starts with one small, achievable action that you commit to making automatic.

Challenge Accepted!

Now it's your turn. Pick one goalette. Just one.

Choose something so small it feels almost silly. Something you could do even on your most chaotic day.

Do it today. Do it tomorrow. Do it until it becomes part of who you are.

Then—and only then—add another.

That's how real change happens. Not in dramatic transformations, but in tiny, consistent actions that stack into a life you actually want to live.

Ready to identify your first goalette and create a personalized wellness plan? I'm Laura, a Mayo Clinic-trained wellness coach helping people build sustainable habits that actually stick. You can connect with me here.