Do This Instead to Set Your 2025 Goals @traviasteward

How many times have you heard the same old goal setting advice over and over and over again that was probably created by some white man sitting in a corporate office? Just set SMART goals. Well, those strategies were not built for people who don't look like me and probably don't look like you, and they don't share the same struggles that we endure, and they don't truly understand us. Because if you are not a white man with an automatic hit startup on birth, the typical goal setting strategies don't work for the rest of us. This is Lead with Confidence Now, the podcast dedicated to helping you grow your confidence and live your best life. I'm Travia Steward, and for the past 27 years, I've been on a mission to help you reinvent your relationships and career. My goal with this podcast is to show up for you so that you can rock your own world with the confidence to make that big change in your life you've been wanting to make. What's up, my peeps? Happy Podcast Thursday. I know right off the bat you're probably thinking, ooh, Trey's a little spicy today. You know, I feel— I'm feeling a little provocative. I'm feeling the need to not always say the thing that I feel like I'm supposed to say. I don't want to be that person. So when I sat down to do this episode, I was gonna put out the regular generic cookie-cutter type episode, but truth be told, I have been tweaking and tweaking and tweaking these goal setting things every single year. And because those generic ways work for another part of the population, but they haven't, the way they've been designed, the way I've been taught, they have not worked for me. They have not worked for those of us who are African American, those of us who are female, those of us who are of the LGBTQ+ community, or if we're from any marginalized group, the path is completely different because we just go through different things. I spent a lot of my life overcoming self-doubt because I thought I wasn't good enough because I was gay. I thought I wasn't good enough because I was Black. I thought I wasn't good enough because my hair was short. Whatever it is, it goes on and on and on and on and on about it. Whenever we're talking about setting goals and how to achieve those things, those things look different to someone and for someone like me. And possibly if you are listening to this podcast, you relate to a lot of the things that I say and it probably looks different to you as well because goal setting and the action of doing it is not about just doing this, this systemized approach. Where we don't see examples of people like us doing what we wanna do. So the main point that I really wanna hone in on today is we cannot, we should not set goals, especially for 2025, the same way white men do. So I've been doing some research. I am always trying to learn something. I'm always trying to tweak things, and I stumbled upon This Thing Called Goal Setting Theory by Edwin Locke and Gary Latham. And I tell you what, as a former teacher, I swore by SMART goals. Every professional development day was about, let's create a SMART goal, which was based primarily, what's the goal you wanna achieve? What's the metric that's gonna measure it? It was just about performance. It was also about how can we get it done as fast as we can? But the missing ingredient was the need to learn how to do that thing. And that's what I have been skipping over. And it's important, so important to now integrate, implement the skills that we need to learn in order to achieve these goals. If you're trying to do something that you've never done before, like starting a business, maybe you're switching careers, maybe you are trying to build a personal brand, maybe you're trying to run a marathon, write a book, Well, there's a learning curve, which is why so many people, including myself, used to, or maybe still identify with this thing called imposter syndrome. Now, we were discussing this the other day in one of the mastermind programs I'm in, and for something, you know, the, the way it came up was if you're trying to do something that you've never done, that you don't have the confidence to go at, you don't even have enough courage to go out there and try it. That's where that term imposter syndrome comes from. And it's just that we haven't done that thing yet. So we feel like imposters because people who have done it are already good at it, whatever that thing is. But I wanna release myself, release you from identifying with imposter syndrome and just go, you know what? I just haven't learned that thing yet., but I will learn it because if for something we've never done, especially some of these goals that we're setting, there needs to be some integrated time to learn. And my peeps, I love learning. And so I'm always trying to get better. I'm always trying to improve. And so taking time to actually implement this into your goal setting, the learning part was incredibly empowering for me. And I know it seems small, It may seem like, duh, but you know what? I was skipping over it. I was trying to just hit the goal and just kind of put stuff out. And then I would feel some kind of way when the stuff didn't produce the way I wanted it to produce. Because as a member of the LGBTQ community, as an African American, as a female, as a member of a marginalized group, I've spent most of my life chasing goals, using instructions and directions from people who have never faced my challenges or walked in my shoes. You know, we hear it all the time. You know, Gary Vee, work harder, do more. Hard work alone doesn't help you get there. It doesn't cut it when you're fighting, you know, generational barriers, when you're fighting self-doubt every step of the way because you're worried about being criticized, you're worried about being judged because you don't see examples of people who look like you, people you can relate to, people who have walked the path that you're trying to walk. That you can relate to. When I started my coaching business and I just started coaching, you see, I had no clue how to market myself. None. Because I'm a— I was a theater major. I can teach people how to transform their lives. I can teach people how to reinvent themselves, but writing copy, running ads, having funnels, you can just forget it. And for years I've been struggling with that part of my business and I I have a tendency, you know, I sit and I reflect on it. Sometimes I have these negative feelings of why haven't I succeeded at the level that I want to faster than I have. And truth be told, I didn't succeed faster than I wanted to because I didn't know what I needed to know. I didn't know what I needed to learn. And I always felt like I was behind everyone else. So it's easy to go do these 5 steps, but shit, if you don't know how to do those 5 steps, those 5 steps mean nothing. And then you're just following 5 steps without any sense of mastery. You're just doing something because someone else said to do it and you're not learning anything. So it wasn't until I identified this missing link, this missing piece of the puzzle, and this allowed me to shift my focus, my whole entire attitude and perspective and giving myself time to learn it and actually giving myself time and giving myself the awareness and the ability to just suck at it first, to just suck at copywriting, to just suck at doing all those things that marketing requires. Like me, I was expecting to have it all figured out. Are you expecting to have it all figured out and then beating yourself up because you haven't achieved it yet? Because what I know is how to help people reinvent themselves. I know how to help people align their thinking with their actions. I know how to help them improve their mindset. I know how to help them become the person that their goals require them to be. So before you get out there and you're like, I wanna write a book, we wanna learn how to actually write and structure our ideas. Before maybe starting a new business, maybe starting a new project, we wanna learn the basis of what that thing requires. Especially with a business, learn business financing and marketing. Before switching careers, you may wanna figure out what are your transferable skills that you are great at, and then learn what is required in the ropes of your new industry that you may be transitioning into. Before building a personal brand, you have to, you know, learn content strategy, learn the structure, learn how to write copy. Before, you know, if you wanna run a marathon, a half marathon, a 5K, Maybe get a trainer who has been there, done that, who can teach you the fundamentals that will help you succeed because traditional ways don't work. The traditional ways that has worked for other people who don't walk in our shoes don't work because when you are a member of a marginalized community, failure feels different. I know it feels different for me. For me, it feels heavier. Feels like such a greater level of disappointment because of the gravity, because of the weight of trying to prove something to myself, to my family, my partner, my friends, to the world. And when that thing fails, it feels like sometimes I'm carrying 1,000 pounds. Not that I've ever actually carried 1,000 pounds, but you know what I mean. So When we're thinking about it, if we, myself included, don't build the muscle of failure and then let us off the hook and go, how can I treat this as just information? How can I learn from that and not repeat those same things that, that I did the last time? Which is part of the work that I want you to do is looking at the things you did in 2024, learning from them, and how can we not make those same mistakes in 2025? What I want you to take away most importantly from this episode is using the goal setting theory, which revolves around getting clarity, having a vision. What is it that you want to accomplish? In order to do this, figuring out how do you wanna feel? Because in everything in life, we do things because we wanna feel a certain kind of way, or we want to avoid feeling it.? Because I know for me, I am more motivated by the pain of not having achieved that thing that I said I wanted. At the end of life, when I look back on my life, if I haven't done the things that I really wanted to do, I will have a level of regret. I know this. I already know it because I future pace all the time. So you want to figure out how do you want to feel? And then go to one year from today, one year from when you're doing this, and ask yourself, how do you want to feel in December? Do you want to feel invigorated? Do you want to feel successful? Do you want to feel like you've achieved everything? Do you want to feel fulfilled? Do you want to feel like you're on top of the world? Well, in order to have clarity, what is that thing that you want to do that if you will have done it by the end of 2025 will help you feel the way you want to feel. And so when we're talking about getting clarity, it's getting clarity on goals that are actually measurable and they're tangible. So instead of just saying, I want to lose weight, maybe say you want to lose a certain amount of pounds. You want to lose 25 pounds. You want to lose 15 pounds. Instead of saying, oh, I just want to run faster. Will choose. Like, if you run 3 miles in an hour— I'm just making this up, right? If you run 3 miles in an hour, maybe you're going to lower that to, I'm going to run 3 miles, I'm going to cut 5 minutes off my time, I'm going to cut 10 minutes off my time, whatever that thing is. I'm not a runner, so I'm just really making that up. But I'm just trying to make a point that make it tangible, something that you can measure. So at the end, when you get to it a year from now, you're like, yep, I did that, or no, I didn't do it. And what are the things that I can tweak for next this year if I still have that goal. And then the next part of this goal setting theory is you want to have that vision of what you want, but you also want to challenge yourself. Because if it's a goal, a goal should push you. But I believe they must also be attainable. Like, don't, you know, if you are 55 and you're like, I, I really want to go to the Olympics as and be the fastest woman in the world, You might not be able to do that. Just saying. I don't know. But you wanna make sure it's something that you can do. Make sure it's something that's attainable. Because if the goal feels impossible, it just becomes demotivating. And think about something when you're setting your goal, when you're setting your vision, when you're setting the challenge of it, you wanna think of what is something that you already feel confident in and stretch from there. Like, I already feel confident in having and helping people get transformations. I know I can do that all day long in the park with my eyes closed, with my hands behind my back. I know I can do that. So coaching was a next best transition for, for me from being a theater director. And so I'm using that skill that I built for 24 years to transition into coaching. Which has allowed me to be a badass coach. So starting with that and stretching from there, and then you also want to find with a level of relatability role models who have actually walked a similar path that you're trying to walk. Because when you see someone who looks like you, who talks like you, who is just like you, that you can relate to, and that person has done the thing that you wanna do, it reinforces your belief that you can do it too. It's definitely done that for me. Like, I see someone like Oprah Winfrey who has achieved such a level of success, and I can, I can look at Oprah and go, okay, she's a Black woman who has achieved a high level of success, but I don't want to be a talk show host. I don't want to be a producer and have my own station, you know, my own network. I want to find people who are like in my industry, people who are walking this path, people that I feel like are 4 steps ahead of me. Those are the people that I relate to. Those are the people that I look at and say, ooh, okay, if they can do it now, I know that I can do it. After being relatable, after really finding something that challenges you, You want to be emotionally connected to this goal by having that vision, but also writing it down. Writing it down just makes it so much more meaningful because when you're writing it down, like in the sense of writing a letter to your future self, and when you're writing a letter to your future self, you write the letter as if things have already happened. You write it, I have, let's say your goal is to make $250,000. I am so grateful and happy that I have made $250,000 by building this new business where I have hired 2 people for my team and whatever that thing is. But you write it like you have already done it. But one of the missing things that sometimes I feel like goes unnoticed is Write a second letter, one from your future self to your present self, because I believe nobody knows you better than you know yourself. And because you know yourself so well, you know the hiccups you're going to come across, you know when you're going to feel self-doubt, you know if you fail how you're going to act. So write that letter from your future self to your present self so that when you do fall down you are reminded that this thing is waiting for you. And it's waiting for you because your future self told you that you could have it. And then the next part of this goal setting theory, you have to be committed. Once you have decided that you wanna do this thing, you have to have a high level of commitment, but also give yourself grace. Don't beat yourself up. So having the high level of commitment and being emotionally invested it creates a stronger motivation, a stronger why, because you want to do something that allows your goals to align with your values and your aspirations, the things that you want to accomplish and not what you think someone else wants you to do. So the next thing is you want to get regular feedback, regular support. Find people who will give you honest and constructive feedback, but not ones who are just gonna be cheerleaders, but also people who can point out your blind spots, people who can lift you up when you really need that extra little boost. And one thing that I, that I have realized, you have to be really intentional and really know the people that you are asking feedback from. Because whether we realize it or not, when you share a dream, when you share something that you're excited about with a friend, with someone who maybe doesn't understand this goal that you have and doesn't understand why you're doing it, when you share that thing with another person who doesn't understand and can't relate, when they don't ask you questions about it, when they don't Or even if they seem excited for you in the moment and then they just move on, that's deflating. I know it's deflating for me, for, you know, like one of my, one of my really good friends. And of course, you know, because I don't, I don't claim to be perfect with this work. I do the work every single day and I'm always improving. And so one of my friends, one of my really, really good friends, we were, we were at lunch and She had asked me about my business months and months and months ago. I said, you know what? It's, it's going a little slow right now. So when we were having lunch recently, I asked her, I said, you know, how come you don't ask me about my business anymore? And she said, because you told me it was going slow. And so what I was making it mean was all this other negative shit. Like how come she's not asking me? She's asking another friend, blah, blah, blah, blah. She doesn't think I can do it. She doesn't think my business is legitimate. So again, I don't claim to be perfect on the other side of this mic. I have blind spots. I have my own coaches who call me on my shit when my mind chatter and I can't see the label or read it on the outside of the box. And so you have to have— surround yourself with the people who are going to lift you up, but also keep you accountable and also give you the constructive feedback and not just cheerleaders. And then the last part of that, you want to have deadlines because without a deadline, without putting something on a calendar, it just turns into someday. It just drifts. I'll get to that thing someday because deadlines create urgency and it keeps you focused. Now, don't stress you out with it. Don't stress yourself out trying to go, oh, I'm going to run that marathon. You know, today we're in December and I'm running that marathon by February. February 28th, I'm running that marathon. Well, you know, that's going to stress you out, and I'm not sure if you are not a runner to begin with, it's probably not going to happen. Think about what timeline can be timely for you, also challenge you, and also stretch you a little bit. But then it also has to commit you to doing that thing. Like, you know, something that's going to commit you to doing it more than like one day a month, something that is like, I need to put together a plan so that I have weekly things that I have to do, maybe daily things that I have to do, that's going to amount to a whole list of things that I am going to review at the end of the week, that I'm going to review at the end of the month, that we have a system of— these are the systems that I'm putting in place, I'm implementing, and I'm getting feedback on it, and I'm reflecting and looking at what worked and what didn't work. So that's it, my peeps. That's what I have for you today. And what I want you to really take away from this episode is setting goals isn't just about following the recipe of someone you can't relate to. It really is about just taking that as a starting point, taking that as a foundation, and then figure out how it can work for you. Figure out how you can tweak it. Figure out maybe you need to add something. Maybe you need to subtract something. But one of the most important things that I found that works for me is finding a person who is 2 steps, 4 steps, 6 steps, but that's ahead of where you want to go. Someone you can relate to, someone who looks like you, someone who may have walked in your path, who is doing the thing that you want to do. Find that person, look at what's working for them. And finding that person, you will see an example of someone who looks like you, who is like walking through the same struggles and challenges, similar things, right? And when you see that person, it will give you confidence. It will give you hope and optimism that you too, that I can accomplish those things as well. All right, my peeps. So whether you are doing something big in 2025, whether you're starting a business, whether you're running a marathon, whether you are chasing a big dream that, you know, completely feels out of reach, Start with that foundation and tweak as you go, but really take the time to stop and enjoy the ride. Stop and challenge yourself so that you can always be growing. Because again, I'm a believer that if you're not growing, you're dying. We want to make sure that we're challenging ourselves with these goals in a way that's helping us grow and especially helping us grow into a growth mindset. For this podcast, take what you've learned from all the episodes, and I hope you're putting it into action. Now, if you would like some help, if you don't want to do this work alone, if you have some goals that you want to accomplish, I would love to help you reach your next goal. I would love to help, help you reinvent yourself. I would love to help you get control of that mind chatter. I would love to help you get clarity on what's creating the results you have in your life today. And so if you found this episode helpful, I would love it if you shared it with another person who also could benefit from it. And then if you— if you're feeling so extra kind, I would love it if you would go wherever you're listening to this podcast episode and leave a review. I would love it if you would leave it on Apple Podcasts if you're an Apple user. If not, maybe Spotify, but give me a 5-star review if you feel so inclined. It would totally make my day. So make sure also that you're subscribed so that you don't miss an episode. All right, my peeps, I got one more episode coming out before January 1st, and then I will— this will be the end of this season, and look for the next season and what we're going to focus on. All right, my peeps, we'll talk next week.