Unpacking the Power of Action Audits: Transforming Goals Into Achievements

My life coach, Brooke Castillo, has a podcast; recently, she had one about action audits.  To do an action audit, you need to know a little about The Thought Model, namely that our actions lead to our results.  For a full explanation of The Thought Model, click here.  In this episode, she spoke of her clients who tell her about their actions to achieve a goal but aren’t getting the desired results.  They’re either not losing weight, making the money they want, or having the relationships that they wish to, things of that sort.  She pointed out that their actions led to their NOT achieving their goal, which is a slight but important difference.  It’s not about the goal; it’s about the actions.  For example, if somebody is following a ketogenic diet to lose weight but the scale stays stuck, it may not mean that their ketogenic diet “isn’t working,” it just means that their current actions are getting them the result of staying at their current weight.  To audit that action, they go through all the steps they’re taking to get the current result.  If they do this (in this hypothetical example), they’ll see that they only stick to their ketogenic diet 4 days of 7.  And that they’re not checking to see if they’re actually in ketosis; they’re just kind of going with how they feel.  And on the days they do stick to their ketogenic diet, they’re not actually calculating the carbohydrates that they eat; they’re just kind of guesstimating them.  When you look at that action audit, you can see (if you’re a believer in the idea that ketogenic diets lead to weight loss) why the person isn’t achieving their goal with their current actions.  Their actions are not consistent with truly following a ketogenic diet.  

I’ve been thinking about burnout a lot recently (thanks to reading this book), so I decided to undertake an action audit regarding my (admittedly implicit) goal of avoiding burnout.  First, I had to figure out if I was burned out.  I decided I was not; I actually feel good about work.  I didn’t get too precious about it; I didn’t make myself fill out a bunch of validated, standardized tests.  I just trusted myself by considering the question and answering with a simple “yes” or “no.”  And nope, I feel pretty good and am not burned out.  Cool.  Since my actions lead to my results, what actions am I (mostly implicitly, some explicitly) taking to get the result of not being burned out?  I’ve generally only been answering emails on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  I’ve also been making a game of how quickly I can get my inbox into at least the single digits (if not zero) on those two days.  I’ve been writing a ton more.  I’ve been pretty rigid about having an 8:30 - 9:00 PM bedtime on days I’m not on call.  I’ve been going to the gym twice weekly and getting > 90% of my activity goal on my Oura ring daily.  I’ve rejected a lot of Outlook meeting invites.  I’ve been spending a lot of time with my husband.  I’ve made a bunch of trips up to Ohio to see my family.  I’ve had many spa days over the past 6 months.  I’ve been eating many more vegetables and working on my gut microbiome; apparently, 95% of our serotonin comes from our gut microbiome?!  I can’t draw a direct line from some of those actions to my not being burned out right now, but I think there are correlations.  

It seems we only recognize burnout when we’re in it.  That makes sense, given our brains’ negativity bias.  But what if we started deliberately noticing when we’re not burned out and figuring out why?  Then maybe we can make the implicit actions preventing us from burning out more explicit.  If you’re not feeling great today, know that I’m thinking about you and sending you all of my best thoughts: you’ve got this, you’ll get through it, I’ve got faith in you.  If you’re lucky enough to feel pretty good, ask yourself why.  I’d love to hear what you come up with. Email me at jessie@burningbrightmd.com and let me know!