This is a great time of year for reflection. It’s a great time for looking forward and looking back. That’s what I do in December. I look back at what worked over the course of the year, and I look forward to what I want to accomplish.
I challenge you to design your very best life.
Have the courage to design and write out your very best life, and then think about what you need to do in order to make that a reality.
We don’t suffer from a lack of opportunity…we don’t suffer from a lack of talent…we don’t suffer from a lack of ability. We suffer from a lack of imagination.
Engage your imagination into your future, and from that process you can start to put things into action that will allow you to live the life of your dreams. It is real and it’s possible. And if you have the imagination and the courage, it can be yours.
What goals are you setting to crush it in 2019?
I have slightly mixed feelings about New Year’s resolutions. There’s really no objective significance to New Year’s Day…it’s just a day. Trace it back far enough and you’ll find that the reason January 1 was chosen as the start of the year is just that a couple of politicians took office that day. You could make your New Year’s resolutions on any day of the year and it wouldn’t be any different.
But we can capitalize on the new beginning hype to improve our lives and help others improve theirs too. That can start with setting some goals – but it’s important to do it the right way.
Here’s the first rule of New Year’s resolutions: Don’t make all of your goals things that you want to get. Instead, try setting your goals based on personal growth and contribution to others. Define positive goals that will make an impact on you as a person and help you effect meaningful change in the world.
What distinguishes goal setters from goal getters?
Part of the problem with New Year’s resolutions is that people tend to have some major goal that they want to reach, and they’ll make that their resolution. That’s fine – but if you don’t have a way to get there, the odds of you reaching it are slim to none. You can keep your eye on major goals while taking the small steps that will get you there.
There’s a quote I love by Henry David Thoreau: “If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.” This brings us to the second rule of New Year’s resolutions: Take a top-down approach to your goal-setting, and break down smaller goals that will help propel you to those larger ones.
Whether you nailed it or failed it in 2018, you can take 2019 by storm!
Now for my final rule for making New Year’s resolutions: Use the mistakes and learning experiences from 2018 to guide your goals for 2019. No one likes to do it, but you need to focus on your mistakes and appreciate them for the growing opportunities they are. Only then can you get value out of them, and use them to improve future experiences.
So…what are YOUR New Year’s resolutions?
