I'm not sure if it's exactly the same (I sometimes struggle with the nuance between a system and a goal) -- but I like to think of systems as "rules".
If I want to get healthy, I don't set a goal to "go to the gym three times a week" (classic 'feel bad when you fail' goal) or track how often I go to the gym on a calendar and then monitor the count (I felt like that with Beeminder).
But rather, I come up with a rule along the lines "If it is Monday, Wednesday, or Friday and I drive past the gym on the way home, I will park and walk in to the desk". For whatever reason, I don't feel bad if I break the rule every once in a while. If it's Tuesday and I missed Monday gym time because of $REASON -- I don't sweat it because the rule says don't do anything on Tuesday. But the rule itself is pretty easy to follow -- I pick a gym on my commute route and if I don't feel like working out, I can just walk to the desk and then leave, all I'm out is 5 extra minutes.
You need to periodically review your rules to make sure they are still making it easy to succeed.
Other "rules" I've done:
* If I bring lunch to work M-Th, then I can go out for lunch on Friday guilt-free
* I can watch as much TV/sports as I want, as long as I do it while on the treadmill
* If I floss at night, I can stay up an extra hour reading a book
These rules are super-sticky until something changes that makes it harder to follow (e.g. if I don't have a book queued up on Kindle, it's harder to read; a new work-project schedules lunch meetings at restaurants)
If I want to get healthy, I don't set a goal to "go to the gym three times a week" (classic 'feel bad when you fail' goal) or track how often I go to the gym on a calendar and then monitor the count (I felt like that with Beeminder).
But rather, I come up with a rule along the lines "If it is Monday, Wednesday, or Friday and I drive past the gym on the way home, I will park and walk in to the desk". For whatever reason, I don't feel bad if I break the rule every once in a while. If it's Tuesday and I missed Monday gym time because of $REASON -- I don't sweat it because the rule says don't do anything on Tuesday. But the rule itself is pretty easy to follow -- I pick a gym on my commute route and if I don't feel like working out, I can just walk to the desk and then leave, all I'm out is 5 extra minutes.
You need to periodically review your rules to make sure they are still making it easy to succeed.
Other "rules" I've done:
* If I bring lunch to work M-Th, then I can go out for lunch on Friday guilt-free
* I can watch as much TV/sports as I want, as long as I do it while on the treadmill
* If I floss at night, I can stay up an extra hour reading a book
These rules are super-sticky until something changes that makes it harder to follow (e.g. if I don't have a book queued up on Kindle, it's harder to read; a new work-project schedules lunch meetings at restaurants)