Goals Your Nervous System Will Actually Keep
If your goals keep stressing you out instead of moving you forward, they’re probably too big for your nervous system right now.
Here’s how to make goals smaller, safer, and actually repeatable — without lowering your standards.
Ever set a gorgeous, colour-coded goal… and then immediately avoid it?
That’s not always a discipline problem. Often it’s a safety problem.
Your nervous system has one main question:
“Can we do this and stay safe?”
If the goal feels too big, too vague, too public, too fast — your body will quietly hit the brakes. It will distract you, tire you out, make you “forget,” or send you down a spiral of “I’ll do it properly later.” That’s not sabotage. That’s protection.
So instead of asking, “How do I force myself to do this?” we can ask a better question:
“How do I make this goal feel safe enough that I’ll actually do it?”
Let’s do that.
Outcome goals vs process goals (plain English)
Outcome goal = the result
“Grow my audience.”
“Launch the thing.”
“Lose 5kg.”
“Meditate every day.”Process goal = the repeatable action that makes the result more likely
“Post twice a week.”
“Talk about my offer weekly.”
“Move for 15 minutes, 4x/wk.”
“Sit for 3 minutes after coffee.”
Outcome goals aren’t bad — they tell you where you’re going.
But outcome-only goals can activate perfectionism because you see the gap every day.
Process goals, on the other hand, give your nervous system something concrete to do today. They lower the stakes.
3 traits of nervous-system-safe goals
1. They’re sized for a low-energy day
If your goal only works on your most productive day, it’s not sustainable.
Try this line:
“What’s the version of this I can do on a tired Tuesday?”
Not “1 hour of yoga” → “5 minutes + one posture.”
Not “write a whole blog” → “open doc and write 150 words.”
Not “create my whole offer” → “outline 3 bullets.”
When your body sees, “Oh, we can actually do that,” it stops fighting you.
2. They’re attached to something you already do
Your nervous system loves predictable anchors.
Pair the goal with an existing cue:
after coffee → 3 minutes of breath
after lunch → 10-minute walk
open laptop → 5 minutes on creative project
Sunday night → map content / movement / meals
You’re not “finding time” — you’re tucking it in.
3. They’re allowed to count
This is the one people skip.
If you do the small version and immediately tell yourself, “Yeah… but it wasn’t enough,” your brain doesn’t get the reward. No reward → no motivation → no repetition.
Let it count at the level you did it today.
What to do when you miss a day
This is where last week’s post on self-compassion plugs in.
Name it: “I missed yesterday.”
Normalise it: “Humans miss days.”
Return small: “I can do the 3-minute version now.”
That’s it. No making up. No punishment. You’re training your system: we can step back in without getting in trouble.
Why this matters heading into the new year
December/January goals often fail not because they’re “wrong,” but because they’re too dysregulating for the season. “New me, every day, full routine, total overhaul” sounds sexy — and your body says “absolutely not.”
If you make them nervous-system-safe now, you’ll have actual momentum when everyone else is crashing out of their 30-day challenges.
Your goals don’t have to get smaller — your next step does.
Make it doable, anchor it to real life, let it count. Safe goals get repeated. Repeated goals build trust. And trust is what actually changes things.
If you’d like daily, ready-to-go anchors to pair with this, join the free Mindful Moments Challenge — short, nervous-system-friendly practices you can drop in around your day to keep you showing up.
