by Danielle Faust of longnaturalhair.info
As a wellness and lifestyle coach I work with motivated women daily to set and achieve goals for their life. Setting an ultimate goal along with long and short term goals plus daily “to-do” items will get you from where you are now, to where you want to be. As it relates to your hair, setting goals will get you from your current length and health status to your dream hair in measurable chunks.
To set hair goals to get you to your desired hair you must:
Decide on what your final goal is
Create a plan to get there
Set mini goals from your plan
Take daily action
Decide on Your Goal
This is basically asking yourself “What do I want and by when do I want it?” Whether it’s hair down to your butt, or even ends, or a fully transitioned head of natural hair, you have to write down what the end goal looks like and when it will be. My current goal is healthy, shiny hip length hair when straightened by December 31, 2013. What is yours?
Create Your Plan
This is your regimen on a long term scale. What will you do to reach the goal? Monthly trims? Weekly deep conditioning? What will make your dream become reality? Think about this and be sure to write it down. When your goal and plan is committed to paper, you are more apt to succeed.
Set Mini Goals
This is when we look at our plan and see where we can record smaller successes. My goal may be hip length hair, but if I’m starting at neck length then there are many milestones such as arm pit length, bra strap length, and waist length for me to hit before I reach my ultimate goal. How can you break down your ultimate goal into smaller milestones?
Take Daily Action
This is the key to your success. All the planning, goal setting, and recording won’t matter if you don’t take action! Daily action is required for you to reach any goal, hair-related or otherwise. Whether it be moisturizing your ends, wearing your scarf to bed, or remembering to take your multivitamin, be sure to make it a daily activity.
Set yourself up for hair health success! If you create your plan and do what you need to do each day, there’s no way you won’t reach your hair goals! Get started today and you’ll be celebrating your goal’s fulfillment sooner than you think!
Terrific post! I just had a talk with myself about my procrastination. So, in my attempts to do better at both, and being realistic, here is my following hair goal:
• Develop and set a routine for pre-poo, conditioner, wash and style.
• enhance growth by daily scalp massages.
• photolog my monthly progress (probably like the 10th of each month)
• Research a multivitamin that will suit my vegetarian standards
• Enjoy the life I live now with the hair that I have, now!.
This post is sooo helpful! Not just in setting my hair up for success but the formula Danielle maps out can be useful in general for all areas of life where I may want to set up myself for success…..thank you again! I'm definitely am going to begin using this lay out to figure out some things and actually put things in perspective!
I am 6 months into my transition. I really don't have a goal. This article really made me think about what goal I'm trying to reach. I know that I want to transition for a long time so that I can have length when I BC. I just don't know how long it will take to achieve the length I want.
My recent goal was met when I reached bra strap length a goal I want because my hair never grew that long in high-school. My goal is midback by August 2013. Hope I make it.
My long term goal is to have waist length hair by December 2014. My short term goals are to find a balance between maintaining my routine and trying new styles and products. I'm at a point now where I have found all of the products I need and the styles that work best for me, but I don't want to fall into a rut and get bored. I think I'll try a new style or product once every two months or so.
Long term – achieve shoulder length and have a very solid regime by the time I BC September 2013. I'll be 20 months transitioning then.
Short term – keep learning my hair's needs and keep her most healthy!!! Transitioning is a learning curve… loving it!
Great goal setting advice. You may want to check
out http://www.GoalsOnTrack.com/, a very nicely built web app designed
for tracking goals, habits, and todo lists, and supports time tracking too.
It's clear, focused, easy to navigate, and most of all, really works!
Well I def need to work on some things. I overall goals is on going. I've read that hair should grow between 1/2 and 1/4 inches every month. That this is a sign of healthy growing hair. With that I'll get my desired length in the time expected. I've experimented and have found that a usually wash and go for me works. I didn't realize how much my hair loved water. I mean my hair was growing 1/2 inches every single month. Some areas not as fast due to hands in hair disease. But that I'm working on. My hair should be close to 12 inches this coming January and that'll be my 2 year natural hair anniversary. I do have somethings to add to making sure my goal is accomplished. Like paying more attention to the ends of my hair, such as trimming.
Short Term, to embrace this current length and stop being lazy
Thank you curvycurly! You're correct about interchanging products within the regimine. I'm a relativey new natural so as you can imagine this makes me happy. I'm really excited to have found a regime that works well for me and my hair so quickly. After reading the author's site, I might set a goal for learning our to french braid/braid in general….I'm terrible with that and it helps if you know how to do it with natural hair.
Establishing a routine is the most difficult part, especially when you're tempted to try new products but it sounds like you pretty much have it down 😉 The routine may stay the same however the products may vary.
Short term: get a trim and stay on top of them every 8-10 weeks, I've been slackin'.
Long term: maintain healthy hair with a cut that compliments my face, head, and texture; my hair is fine so having length is not important to me as the longer it gets the thinner it looks.
My goal is similar to yours Des. Right now my main focus is to establish a consistent routine. I currently DC every week, do a homemade protein treatment once a month, ACV rinse once a month to clarify my scalp since I stopped using shampoo. I'm also strictly shea moisture products, but I have been alternating between that and Eden Bodyworks since I received those products for free at a hair event. That's it! Sticking to that routine is my goal and I've seen some great results 🙂
My goal is to get a routine and be consistent with it. I would love to start feeling like I have achieved some length. I cowash weekly and try to DC every other week. I need to be more consistent with my protein treatments to strengthen my hair also. Good advice and it helps to set realistic goals.
Thanks, this will help me a lot because I have trouble with patience and hair growith. I'm off to work on my plan 🙂
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Right now my goal is mid-back length by June 2014. My hair is about shoulder length in the back and barely just past my ears on the sides. I am concentrating on maintaining a solid routine. I cowash and deep condition weekly and I do a bentonite treatment once a month. I am still looking for a solid DC to use, but for right now it's Shea Moisture Restorative Conditioner. I have tried to get on the bandwagon with other products, but I find that my hair doesn't like them and gets really hard even if I use something that says it's organic. So I know that consistency is the key and if I want to reach mid-back length I have to stay on track. Good article!
If you'd like a tool for setting your goals, you can use this web application:
Gtdagenda.com
You can use it to manage your goals, projects and tasks, set next actions and contexts, use checklists, and a calendar.
Syncs with Evernote and Google Calendar, and also comes with mobile version, and Android and iPhone apps.
Good advice!