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Goal Setting and
Wellbeing

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A look at goal setting in
the context of
lifebalance and
wellbeing

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Maslow
Psychologist Abraham Maslow (1943, 1954) stated that human
motivation is based on people seeking fulfillment and change through
personal growth. Maslow described self-actualized people as those who
were fulfilled and doing all they were capable of.
The growth of self-actualization (Maslow, 1962) refers to the need for
personal growth that is present throughout a person’s life.
For Maslow, a person is always “becoming” and never remains static in
these terms. In self-actualization a person comes to find a meaning to life
that is important to them.

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5 Ways to Wellbeing
Summary of evidence by NEF (2008 - 400 scientists’ work reviewed)-
suggests these are major factors

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Connect
With the people around you. With family, friends, colleagues and
neighbours. At home, work, school or in your local community. Think of
these as the cornerstones of your life and invest time in developing them.
Building these connections will support and enrich you every day.

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Be active
Go for a walk or run. Step outside. Cycle. Play a game. Garden. Dance.
Exercising makes you feel good. Most importantly, discover a physical
activity you enjoy and that suits your level of mobility and fitness.

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Take notice
Be curious. Catch sight of the beautiful. Remark on the unusual. Notice the
changing seasons. Savour the moment, whether you are walking to work,
eating lunch or talking to friends. Be aware of the world around you and
what you are feeling. Reflecting on your experiences will help you appreciate
what matters to you.

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Keep learning
Try something new. Rediscover an old interest. Sign up for that course. Take
on a different responsibility at work. Fix a bike. Learn to play an instrument or
how to cook your favourite food. Set a challenge you will enjoy achieving.
Learning new things will make you more confident as well as being fun.

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Give
Do something nice for a friend, or a stranger. Thank someone. Smile.
Volunteer your time. Join a community group. Look out, as well as in.
Seeing yourself, and your happiness, linked to the wider community can
be incredibly rewarding and creates connections with the people around
you.

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A whole range of factors determine an individual’s level of
personal well-being but evidence indicates that the things we do
and the way we think can have the greatest impact.

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Finding our goals

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• Each segment gets labelled with an area of
importance, in which you want to set goals
• Areas of life that are important to you for
example: artistic expression, positive attitude,
career, education, family, friends, financial freedom,
physical challenge or public service.
• Remember to include fun things, interests and
hobbies for example as they are areas of learning.

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Wheel of life
An example

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Wheel of life
A quick example

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Wheel of life
The unshaded areas are where we can set goals

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Can be used to plot likely impact of changes - here a change of job
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Also unanticipated benefits - here mapped for someone learning IT
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Alignment

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Can highlight issues - here a single mother of a young child has
concerns about going back to work
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Here are the goals, these themselves get broken down into actions

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• What’s the Brain Chemistry of setting goals?
• According to the research of psychologists, neurologists, and
other scientists, setting and visualising a goal invests ourselves
into the target as if we’d already accomplished it.
Neurologically, then, our brains treat the failure to achieve our
goal the same way as it treats the loss of a valued possession.
And up until the moment the goal is achieved, we have failed
to achieve it, setting up a tension that the brain seeks to
resolve.
In some cases by abandoning the goal.

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• Love, Loss, Dopamine, and Our Dreams
The brain's functions are carried out by a stew of chemicals called
neurotransmitters, Dopamine is one of them.
Dopamine acts as a motivator, creating a sensation of pleasure
when the brain is stimulated by achievement.
So dopamine plays a key role in keeping us focused on our goals
and motivating us to attain them, rewarding our attention and
achievement by elevating our mood. We feel good when we work
towards our goals.
Conversely, loss or the frustration of our desires starves us of
dopamine, causing anxiety and discomfort.

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• The Neurology of Ownership
When we own something, we invest a part of ourselves into it – it
becomes an extension of ourselves.
This phenomenon is called the “endowment effect”, occurs when
we take ownership of an object (or idea, or person); in becoming
“ours” it becomes integrated with our sense of identity, making
us reluctant to part with it (losing it triggers that dopamine shut-
off discussed = pain).
Interestingly, researchers have found that it doesn’t require
actual ownership or even possession to come into play. In fact,
it’s enough to have a reasonable expectation of future possession
for us to start thinking of something as a part of us – as jilted
lovers and 5-year olds denied a toy at the store have all 26

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• The Upshot for Goal-Setters
The bigger the potential for positive growth a goal has, the more
anxiety and stress your brain is going to create around it’s non-
achievement – i.e. you will feel the pain of failure and loss until
you achieve the main goal, unless you break it down into steps.
But the fact that the brain rewards our attentiveness on by
releasing dopamine means that our brain is working with us to
direct us to achievement. Paying attention to your goals feels
good, encouraging you to spend more time doing it.
But ultimately our brain wants us to achieve our goals, so that
it’s sense of who we are can be fulfilled.

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What have we learnt about Goals?
• Visualise main goals keep revisiting them -
“endowment effect” will reinforce even the
smallest behaviours towards them
• Break them down into small steps to get
Dopamine reward e.g.
• What can I do this week?
• What can I do in the next 24 hours?
• What can I do NOW?

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G.R.O.W. Model
Devised by Sir John Whitmore, the GROW model is deservedly
one of the best known and widely used goal setting tools.
Goals - Reality - Options - Will
It is useful for both personal and professional goals and from
what we’ve learnt about “endowment effect” and Dopamine
we can understand the psychology of how it works.
By asking questions around the model, you can clarify what you
want to do, and how you can get there.

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Goals
•What do you want to achieve?
•Where do you want to be in 5 years time?
•What is your ideal scenario for the future?
•What do you want to be different in 6 months time?
•What do you want to be different by the end of today?

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Reality
1What is your current situation? (Vs. goals you have described)
2What are your strengths and development needs?
3What have you done to shift the situation?
4What do you feel about where you are now?

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Options
1What choice do you have (ways of moving towards your goal/s)
2Which ones are in your control?
3Which ones are in your influence?
4What other options exist?
5Who do you need to influence?
6What resources do you need?
7What might you do if you had optimum resources?
8What will happen if you stay as you are?

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Will
1How committed are you to making this work? (Scale of 1-10) and
why?
2What will keep you on track and motivated?
3What will stop you achieving it?
4How can you overcome that?
5So, how committed are you now? (Scale 1-10)

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Here's a 2 minute speed-coaching session using GROW.
Coach : What area would you like to discuss?
Client: I'd like to do some more exercise (Topic)
Coach: And what would you like out of the coaching session? (Question to establish the goal.)
Client: I'd like to commit to take some regular exercise.
Coach: Where are you now when it comes to exercise? (Reality question)
Client: I'm not running as regularly as I'd like. I'm not doing some kind of exercise every day.
Coach: So if you'd like to commit to take regular exercise (the goal of the session) what are your options?
Client: I've got a heart-rate monitor I could learn how to use. I could get the bike serviced. I could try a bit of
running. I could find an event in the future that I could aim for.
Coach: Out of all of these options which are you committed to taking forward? (Narrowing down the options).
Client: I'd like to find an event to aim for. There's a 60 mile cycle ride coming up in 3 months time I'd like to aim for
that. I'd also like to work out how to use my heart-rate monitor, as that would get me out as well.
Coach: so what will you do between now and the next time we talk? (Wrap-up)
Client: I'll call John to find out when the cycle event is and I'll get the application form filled in. I'll also spend half an
hour tonight working out my heart-rate monitor.

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Locus of Control
Locus of control is a theory in personality psychology
referring to the extent to which individuals believe that they
can control events that affect them, theconcept was developed
by Julian B. Rotter in 1954.
A person's "locus" (Latin for "place" or "location") is
conceptualised as either internal (the person believes they can
control their life) or external (meaning they believe that their
decisions and life are controlled by environmental factors
which they cannot influence).

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Locus of Control
• Internal linked to good emotional health
• Can change in response to events - “Tsunami”
• Can change positively through thinking style, “evidence” of
own performance
• Cannot control everything but can control our responses and
actions
• Viktor Frankl: “Everything can be taken from a
man but ... the last of the human freedoms - to
choose one's attitude in any given set of
circumstances, to choose one's own way.”

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Viktor Frankl
• A prominent Viennese psychiatrist before the war,
Viktor Frankl was uniquely able to observe the
way that both he and others in Auschwitz coped
(or didn't) with the experience.
• He noticed that it was the men who comforted
others and who gave away their last piece of
bread who survived the longest.

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• The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, first
published in 1989, is a self-help book written by
Stephen R. Covey. It has sold more than 25 million copies in 38
languages since first publication, which was marked by the
release of a 15th anniversary edition in 2004.
• Covey presents an approach to being effective in attaining
goals by aligning oneself to what he calls "true north"
principles of a character ethic that he presents as universal
and timeless.[1]
• In August 2011, Time listed Seven Habits as one of "The 25
Most Influential Business Management Books".[2]

40. Independence
• Habit 1: Be Proactive
• Take initiative in life by realizing that your decisions (and how
they align with life's principles) are the primary determining
factor for effectiveness in your life. Take responsibility for your
choices and the consequences that follow.
• Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind
• Self-discover and clarify your deeply important character
values and life goals. Envision the ideal characteristics for each
of your various roles and relationships in life. Create a mission
statement.
• Habit 3: Put First Things First
• Prioritize, plan, and execute your week's tasks based on
importance rather than urgency. Evaluate.

41. Interdependence
• Habit 4: Think Win-Win
• Genuinely strive for mutually beneficial solutions or
agreements in your relationships. Value and respect people.
• Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood
• Use empathic listening to be genuinely influenced by a person,
which compels them to reciprocate the listening and take an
open mind to being influenced by you.
• Habit 6: Synergize
• Combine the strengths of people through positive teamwork,
so as to achieve goals no one person could have done.

42. Self-rejuvenation
• Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw
• Balance and renew your resources, energy, and health to
create a sustainable, long-term, effective lifestyle.

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What is work?
• work/w rk/Noun:ə Activity involving mental or
physical effort done in order to achieve a purpose or
result.
•
• Verb: Be engaged in physical or mental activity in
order to achieve a purpose or result, esp. in one's job; do
work.
• Synonyms: noun. job - labor - business - labour -
occupation - employmentverb. operate - labor -
function - labour - run - go - make

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Is Work Good for You?
There is a strong evidence base showing that work is generally good
for physical and mental health and well-being. Worklessness is
associated with poorer physical and mental health and well-being.
Work can be therapeutic and can reverse the adverse health effects of
unemployment. That is true for healthy people of working age, for
many disabled people, for most people with common health problems
and for social security beneficiaries.
Overall, the beneficial effects of work outweigh the risks of work, and
are greater than the harmful effects of long-term unemployment or
prolonged sickness absence. Work is generally good for health and
well- being. Gordon Waddell, CBE DSc MD FRCS
Centre for Psychosocial and Disability Research, Cardiff University, UK
A Kim Burton, PhD DO EurErg
Centre for Health and Social Care Research, University of Huddersfield ,UK