In this episode, Krista Kolodziejzyk talks about her personal journey with setting goals and learning how to build systems around goals to make them come to life.
Links:
- You’re invited to The Ultimate Personal & Professional Goal-Setting Workshop for Health Pros [FREE EVENT] – this is a pre-recorded session that you will have access to for one week starting on Friday, February 23rd, 2024 (you must register to get access to the workshop)
- If you are listening to this episode after February 23rd, you can access the recording by becoming a DSC member
Episode Transcript:
Welcome to the Dietitian Success Podcast. Here at Dietitian Success Centre, we’re all about making it easier for you to build your confidence and expertise. So, whether you’re a dietitian or a dietetic student, we’ve got something for you. I’m Krista, your host and the founder of DSC. Now, are you ready to ditch the imposter syndrome and join our incredible, vibrant community?
If so, let’s jump in.
Hey there and welcome to another episode of the dietitian success podcast. So this episode is actually sort of going to be a precursor and on invitation to a free session that I’m running on Friday, this coming Friday, which is. February 23rd. It’s actually not going to be a live session. It’s prerecorded. Session. That is all about setting goals. And walking you through a system that I’ve developed for setting and then actually achieving goals. Cause that’s the biggest piece is. This is not going to be one of those sessions where we. You know, come up with and we write down a few goals and then they stay in a notebook. And. They are, and they never see the light of day. That’s what I don’t want.
I want these to be things that we actually make come to life. We actually may come to fruition in our own lives. And so I have a system that I’ve developed for how to actually, you know, make these things happen in your life. And so I want to teach that. So you are actually going to have access to that content for a week. So you can watch it at any point throughout the week, because I know that often live events are hard to attend to because we all have busy schedules.
We have things going on. And so I want to make sure people can watch the session on their own time. So you’ll have a week to watch it. If you are a DSC member, this session will be uploaded to DSE after that. So you’ll have access to it forever. So if you’re listening to. This podcast episode after February 23rd, 2024 and the week that’s following that. Then you can join us in DSE and you can watch the session.
You’ll have access to that. So this is sort of a precursor to that session. And if you want to join us for that session, the link full with the invite is in the description of this podcast episode. So make sure and sign up for it so that you get an email with the link for the video, when it comes out on Friday. But I wanted to record this podcast episode to talk a little bit about how things really changed for me when I learned how to make things happen. And I was trying to think of what the podcast, what this, the title of the podcast, this podcast episode would be.
And it was funny because I was like, oh, you know, come set your goals with me in 2024. And I was like, that is so boring. That is the most boring title. And I was like, why don’t I just write a title that speaks to what I’m trying to communicate? Which is, this is exactly what I’m trying to communicate is how do you actually make changes in your life? Because I think we’ve all been there where we, and I know that this rings very true for me.
It used to ring very true for me. It doesn’t anymore, but this idea that I had this feeling of like, I want to do this. I want to do this. I can see myself doing this, but I can’t actually figure out how to make this happen in my life. Like something is, there’s some sort of resistance. There’s some sort of barrier that’s preventing me from making this thing happen. And consequently, it’s leaving me feeling like I’m not really reaching my full potential.
So some examples, things like. You know, and I’m going to talk about this story in a second, but like, Before I started my business. For instance, I always had this feeling of like, oh, and I would see these people on Instagram. I would listening to these stories on podcasts of people. Talking about their businesses talking about their lives as entrepreneurs.
And I would think to myself, oh my gosh, like I want that. That is, so that would be so incredible. But at the end of the day, like I just didn’t know how to make that come to life. And I. And I would, you know, I would start the year often in January and I’d be like, okay, this is going to be the year. And then I just, I would write down these goals in a notebook. And then they would just sit there because I didn’t really know how to make them happen.
And it left me feeling. A little bit and I mean, a little bit disappointed at myself, honestly, because I was like, Hey, I know I really want to do this. This is like on my heart. This is on my mind. But it just kept being like, oh, okay. If I could only figure out how to make this happen for myself.
And a lot of it came down to just like not having the courage. You know, living my life from a place of fear of what other people’s, what other people thought of me. Et cetera. So anyways, I’m going to talk a little bit about that story of the, you know, before the journey, the, after, when it comes to goal setting and then the system that I’ve created around goals. And then in the live session, sorry, prerecorded session that I’m going to be releasing this Friday. I’m going to, we’re going to walk through that system and I’m going to teach you how to set your own goals, systems, and habits within that. Framework.
And so you’ll walk away from the session, actually having some. Goals mapped out for yourself in 2024. All right, so let’s get into it. And one thing I do want to say too, before we get into this content, is that I know. I so pre baby. So for those who’ve been listening for a while, they know that I have a four month old now. And he so pre-baby, I was pretty consistent about these podcast episodes.
They would generally come out every week. And then pre-baby, I was able to record a whole bunch of episodes and schedule them out for a few months. So up until a few weeks ago, there had been consistent episodes still coming out every week. And now we’re at the point where I don’t have any more bagged episodes.
And so I’m just live recording. And one of the things that I’ve discovered is that finding the space. And I don’t want to say finding the time, because I truly believe that if you. You know, you have to make time for the important things, but it’s more so finding the right. Us space in the day to be able to. Press record is really challenging. Um, Like, it just has to be a time where I have childcare because it just, you know, you can’t just rely on like a nap to be able to, because my, my son is like still very inconsistent with napping.
And so. I can’t rely on an app to be able to actually press record and, and get a recording done. And so, you know, just, it just takes more pre-planning, which is totally fine, but I’m giving myself some space right now to just sort of. Let recordings happen when they’re going to re when they’re going to happen.
And then at some point, want to get more consistent with this podcast again, but anyways, that’s just an aside, but I just wanted to. Just wanted to tell you where things are at for me. So let’s get back to the content here.
Okay. So I want to talk a little bit about my own journey and I almost don’t even like to use the term goal setting. It’s sort of like goal-setting sounds, I don’t know it, you know, because it is so much more than that. It’s more about how do we actually make changes in our lives. But let’s just refer it for the sake of this. Discussion what’s referred to it as, as goal setting.
So. And I want to talk about this journey and sort of how this evolved in my life, because I’m wondering if there’s probably, there’s probably some themes here that you might be able to relate to. So basically there was sort of this period of time when I finished school I had gotten my first job.
I changed jobs. I was living my life. My boyfriend at the time, now my husband we’d moved in together. Things were good. Things were good. I was generally happy. But. And I had alluded to this before, I always had this, like, and for me it was, it was business. Like I had always had this feeling, this thought of like, oh, I just. I was seeing these people have their own businesses and you know, living these lives as entrepreneurs.
And I kept thinking to myself, oh my gosh, like that would just be so cool. Like, I want that to be me. And I felt like I had this like untapped potential. I always had this feeling. You know, I was so excited by it, but it was just, it was so scary. And I think, you know what, looking back, I feel like I was largely living my life and just making decisions based on other people’s perceptions of me.
Right. Like, I don’t want to start a business because what if people saw, right. Like what if, what if people that I know. Saw me talking about my business on social media and what if they judged me and what if I was embarrassed? Right. Um, and so I had all these thoughts and at the end of the day, like it just wasn’t.
I was having a hard time taking action. Because I didn’t have a clear plan. I didn’t know how to do it. I. I was too scared at the end of the day. And so, you know, maybe for you, this is related to business, but maybe it’s also, maybe it’s something else in your, in your life. And I think it was other things in my life too.
Like I I’d always been an active person, but I was like, oh, I just really want to like. Start getting more consistent with running. I had always been a runner, but like have never been a great runner. I’d always found it really challenging. I’d never gotten into like a really good, consistent flow of running regularly. Maybe for you it’s, it’s something like that.
Maybe it’s something activity, focus. Maybe you want to learn Spanish. Maybe you want to save up to buy a home. But today you just haven’t figured out how to make that happen. And so that’s where I was at. And each year you tell yourself, okay, this is going to be the year, but then it doesn’t end up being the year. And so that was sort of the before and, and then basically what happened for me and how this changed for me was it actually started with a really long commute. So I was driving to work every day to, and from work every day and some days I would spend almost three hours in the car, depending on traffic. And I had, I was having so much frustration around how much time I felt like I had wasted during this travel. And so I was like, well, you know, at that point I hadn’t really gotten into podcasts at all. But I was like, Hey, why don’t I try listening to a podcast episode?
I hear these are cool. Maybe I can learn something. Maybe I could make this time a little bit more productive. And. So I started dabbling in the world of, of podcasts. And through this journey, I developed this category or, sorry, I, I discovered this category of podcasts related to personal development. So I E you know, how do we develop ourselves as people to make our lives better, basically at the end of the day.
And it was funny because I was almost like scared to start listening to these podcasts because. I kind of had this like perception of them being like self-help and I was like, oh, I don’t need that. Nothing’s really wrong. But in reality that’s so not the case, you know? Personal development is about is, is applicable to everyone who just wants to. Make life better, be happier.
Reach their potential. And so I started to dabble in some of these podcasts and you know, some that came up because these are big podcasters. Jenna Kutcher was one. I don’t listen to her as much anymore. I don’t find her content as relevant to me, but at the very beginning stages, it was, you know, Jenna Kutcher.
And then I kind of discovered Amy Porterfield as well. Who’s more business focused. I’m trying to think. Marie Forleo was another one. So I was, I was discovering and uncovering these podcasts and it was really starting to open my eyes to what was out there. I was listening, you know, they have these guests on these podcasts and we’re doing these insane, cool, crazy things. And living these incredible lives, doing these incredible things.
And I started to think to myself, well, like what’s the difference between me and that person. And I think, you know, the only difference was that that person had the courage to take action and start making changes. And, you know, they had figured out a way to do that. And so the one thing that was consistent in all of these stories of people doing amazing things, What was that, you know, they had made the decision that they wanted to make a change.
They had structured goals around that change and they’d figured out a way to make it happen. And so that was that journey for me. You know, and I, I forced me to ask myself the question of like, have I ever actually set a smart goal for myself and achieved it? And that was like a very uncomfortable question for me to ask because I was like, well, no, like, I feel like I’m. You know, a motivated, driven person, but I’ll often write down these goals and then they’ll just sit there.
And because I haven’t taken it a step further to actually figure out like, what’s the system, what’s the habit around that goal. And so, you know, they would just, it, they would just sit there and I was like enough of this. I don’t, I want to do it differently this time. I want to set goals and I want to actually see them come to fruition. And so I figured out this system for myself of doing this. And I’ll talk about that in a second. But because of that system, I, and I’m not saying this stuff to like brag or flex or whatever, but I’m saying it because I think my life took on a pretty transformative change and I really can attribute. A lot of that or all of that, honestly, to this system around goals, this system around how do we make a change in our lives and how do we actually. You know, make it happen, make it, make it come to life.
And so because of this system, I started a consulting business as a dietitian. I grew it to a point where I was able to leave my full-time job. I was able to take that momentum and that confidence and launched DSC, which has grown to what it is now, which is really awesome to see. From a personal perspective.
I completed my first iron man triathlon, which if you’re not familiar with iron man, it’s basically a really long triathlon. So 3.8 kilometer swim I’m in Canada. That’s what I’m talking about in kilometers, but 3.8 kilometers, I think that’s 2.4 miles. I believe. 180 kilometer bike, which is 112 miles.
And then a 42.2 kilometer run, which is 26 miles. So, and that’s all continuous. So it’s swim bike run. Took me 15 hours and nine minutes. And so completed my first iron man triathlon. So like went through the whole, the training and, you know, did that, and like went from somebody who had, I think I’d run a couple half marathons, but I was like very inconsistent to half marathon is 21 kilometers. It was so inconsistent with running and like working out in general. And went from that to somebody who had actually completed an Ironman, which was pretty cool. The other thing too, that is kind of fun that I had been wanting to do for a while.
I kept telling myself after university, I want to read more. And I had you. I just kept telling myself, telling myself, telling myself that. And I, I didn’t, I wasn’t reading more. And then I, after developing this system you know, I was able to make reading habit in my life. I read 40 books in 20, 20, 65 in 20 21 53 in 2022 and then 38 in 2023.
So it dipped down a little bit. But still like, I’m really happy with the fact that now I could say, oh, reading is just something that I do every day. So anyways, I’m saying all that, just to talk about how this system works. And, and I think it all comes down to this idea, that setting and actually achieving your goals, I think changes your confidence.
And I think that confidence changes your mindset and a change in mindset changes your life. And so it’s about starting small. And then we start to see. This we start to see this like snowball effect of setting and achieving these goals in your life, in your life. And so anyways, so this all comes back to this system that I’ve developed, and this is really what I’m going to be teaching in the free session. Starting on Friday. Is, and I, I think of it as like a three part system.
So part one is defining the achievable goal and I think that’s. So important is the piece around achievable goal, because like I just said, I think when we, so when we set goals that are just too lofty We, and we don’t achieve them. We sort of have to, we have to almost set the bar lower for ourselves at the beginning so that we get that feeling of, oh, this feels really good to achieve something. And it snowballs into something bigger. And so I think you need to set a small achievable goal at the beginning, and then things can grow and grow a girl from there, but we define the achievable goal and that’s often where people stop.
Right. They define the achievable goals. So they would say maybe, Hey, I want to read, I’m going to read five books in 2024. But then they don’t take it a step further. And the step further is creating the system and habits around that goal. So how do we actually make this come to life in our day to day? And so that’s step two, creating the system and habits around it. And then step three.
So it’s taking it a step further is tracking it consistently. So how are we going to keep this goal top of mind? How are we going to measure? Is this happening every day or is this not. And so I’ll walk you through exact during the session. I’ll walk you through exactly how I do this. 1, 2, 3 system. But again, it’s defining the achievable goal, creating the system and habits around it and then tracking it consistently.
And this is not a novel approach. Other people do, you know, other authors, podcasters, et cetera out there have. I think, you know, talked about a similar system. But I’m going to talk about how I’ve applied it to myself and, and exactly what that looks like for me. And then we’ll also during the session, we’ll also go through. A bunch of examples of goals and how those can be broken down into habits and systems.
And it’s gonna be a lot of fun. So. That is it for this episode. I hope to see you at the session. And again, if you’re listening to this podcast, after the free sessions available, then I want you to join us in the DSC membership. This will be under the, personal and professional development category.
So it will be accessible to all members, regardless of the membership tier that you are in. And yeah, I hope that you enjoyed listening to a little bit more about my journey. I’m excited to talk more about this. I’m excited to teach this starting on Friday, so I hope you have an awesome week and I will see you next Thursday.
