By Megan M. Moore, Attorney Career and Business Coach
When it comes to your well-being, the truth is that you need to figure out what works for you. What your colleague or family member does may not resonate at all with you and vice versa. This is where accountability can assist you in making additions, changes, or improvements to your well-being.
The word “accountability” may conjure images of apologizing for mistakes or feeling angry with yourself or your circumstances for “failing” to improve your well-being. We all have had moments where we feel like either we aren’t capable of making a change or our circumstances prevent us from making a change. One way to work through these beliefs is to approach the change with neutral accountability. This means taking an objective or factual look at what you want and how you’re going about getting.
First, I want to offer my definition of accountability:
Accountability is taking ownership of your choices and results.
Let’s break this definition down.
- Taking ownership means looking neutrally at the situation. This is different than judging yourself or blaming your circumstances for perceived failures. In fact, this definition of accountability includes taking ownership when you achieve the outcome you want, without making mistakes.
- Next, focus on the choices you made. By focusing on choice, you can shift away from looking only at your circumstances and explore what choices those circumstances lead to.
- Finally, identify your results. Identifying results helps you see what you achieve or how you feel, whether you achieve the result you want or not. Public service announcement: you get results even when you don’t take action toward your desired outcome.
More simply stated: applying this approach to accountability will help you learn what works and doesn’t work for you. Try this five-question approach to stay neutral and access your learning:
- What did I commit to?
- What did I do (or not do)?
- What are my results?
- What is my learning?
- What could I do the same/differently?
Then, you go again. Keep in mind when you’re making any change, you may need to make several attempts to find what works for you.
Let’s explore a hypothetical situation related to well-being. You overhear a colleague who you view as successful talking about the benefits of meditation. You ask how it helps them and how they go about meditating.
The friend explains, “I started out slow. I only meditated for ten minutes every weekday morning. After around a month, I added to that and meditated fifteen minutes every single day. Now it’s second nature to me.”
You hear this description and think, “Ten minutes. I can do that!” So you commit yourself to meditating every weekday in the mornings before you begin your workday. You set an alarm to wake up a little earlier. Monday comes and you hit snooze a few times on the alarm. Since you have a work meeting first thing, you skip meditating for Monday and decide to start tomorrow. The same things happens on Tuesday, and then you decide you’ll skip this week and maybe start fresh next week.
Looking at this situation, you could easily blame yourself or your circumstances. For example, “I didn’t do anything about meditating. I’m too lazy to get up in the morning and I’m too busy at work to meditate. I don’t think meditating is right for me so I’m not sure if I’ll even try again.”
Let’s apply the five question approach:
- What did I commit to? 10 minutes of meditation on weekdays before work.
- What did I do? I set my alarm Monday and Tuesday, and I snoozed it. Once I got out of bed, I decided I did not have time to meditate for 10 minutes so I skipped it both mornings. After Tuesday, I decided not to meditate.
- What are my results? I did not meditate on any weekday last week, so I’m not sure what the benefits of meditating might be for me.
- What did I learn? I learned it is hard for me to wake up, even when I use an alarm. I also noticed that when I didn’t meditate on Monday or Tuesday, I felt like I’d already not met my commitment, so I stopped.
- What could I do the same/differently? Choose a different time of day. Commit to once a week to start off with. Maybe commit to a shorter time.
Now, you can go again. Perhaps your new commitment looks like this: This week, I will meditate at least once for ten minutes at any point during the work week.
Building on the above hypothetical, let’s imagine you keep your commitment and, actually, you meditate twice for ten minutes, once during the week and once over the weekend. Let’s apply the questions:
- What did I commit to? Meditating at least once during the work week for ten minutes
- What did I do? I put a post-it note on my mirror and on my monitor reminding me about this commitment. I meditated Wednesday afternoon at my desk when I had a break in my day. I also meditated on Saturday morning before starting my day.
- What are my results? I meditated twice, and it seemed like it was helpful because I felt prepared to tackle what was next at work and what I wanted to do over the weekend.
- What did I learn? I can meditate for ten minutes. It was helpful to have the post-it notes to remind me, which prompted me to try it on Saturday. I liked the way I felt at work after I meditated.
- What could I do the same/ differently? I could keep using the post-it note. And, I coulud commit to it twice a week but keep it at 10 minutes. I could pick a specific time of day, but I’m not sure that will work for me.
Go again: This week I will meditate at least twice for ten minutes, and at least one of those times will be during the workday. I will write new post-it notes to remind me of this commitment.
By applying this neutral approach to your well-being, you get to explore what works and doesn’t work for you. You also can get comfortable with trying different actions and activities, knowing you may need to try out different approaches or activities. Eventually, you will find the right fit for your well-being.
Megan M. Moore is the Co-Chair of the SDCBA’s Wellness Subcommittee. She is a certified professional coach and licensed attorney. As President & CEO of Megan Moore, Inc., she supports career-driven attorneys to pivot away from stress and toward personal and professional fulfillment. You can visit her website or email her at Megan@MeganMooreInc.com to learn more about coaching.