Happy New Year! This is the time of year everyone is talking about New Year’s resolutions. It’s likely you’ve even been asked what your New Year’s resolutions are.
And, we’ll admit, we haven’t been big fans of New Year’s resolutions in years past. You make a resolution(s) and you start working towards that but it often fizzles out before you get through the winter or first few months of the year! And then you are discouraged and disappointed. You find yourself asking, why didn’t I reach my goals? What happened?
This year, as we started thinking about making resolutions, we wanted to take it a step further. We wanted to look at what our resolutions have been in past years and figure out why we haven’t always reached them. To our surprise, we found a pattern and we want to share it with you. By recognizing this pattern of what worked and didn’t work, we were able to set in place three rules through which to filter all of our resolutions through. They are:
- Don’t set too many resolution. Prioritize.
You don’t need 10+ resolutions or goals. Your goals should be prioritized and they should focus on the biggest, most important things you want to accomplish this year. This allows you give the attention needed to these goals without running yourself ragged.
- Set attainable goals. But, goals that stretch you.
Don’t set yourself up for failure. No one likes to fail. However, you can’t grow if you aren’t being stretched and pushed. Set goals (not dreams) that are outside of your reach but not so far, that it will take a miracle for you to reach them. This ensures you are see progress and you are encouraged on your path to reaching your goals.
- Be accountable. Put checkpoints in place.
Accountability only works when you intentionally monitor progress. Some people are able to do this on their own. Others need an accountability partner or someone who will push them when they fall behind. Figure out which camp you fall into and put in place the needed accountability checks. with regularly, scheduled meetings or self assessment.
I don’t know about you but we are actually excited about our New Year’s Resolutions this year. We followed these three rules and we are looking forward to tracking our success and seeing our progress over the course of the year!