The New Year is upon us. And even though time as it relates to the numbers on a calendar is a manmade thing and problems don’t just go away, troubles will still arise, and the grass won’t magically be greener just because one number changes and we buy a new calendar, I do love a new year! It is a season filled with renewed hope and refreshment as the days roll over to a seemingly blank slate.
I love a brand spanking new datebook or planner. I love the feeling of accomplishment that comes with knowing that we have completed half a year of schoolwork. I love looking ahead at what we have yet to learn in the coming year. I love that the days stop getting shorter and start {slowly} getting longer. I just flat out love that “day 1” feeling, where so much seems achievable!!
Hoards of people take this opportunity to make lofty resolutions to do better in the coming year. We all want to be better, do better, try harder. But I have always loathed these New Year’s “resolutions”. To me, it seems like an excuse to put off making a change until January 1, when in reality, we can start right now, today, ANY day! Resolutions tend to inspire us for 5 or 6 weeks at BEST before the NEW wears off of the New Year and they become a distant memory. Who really remembers their resolutions from umpteen years ago anyhow? I would venture to say that a microscopic amount of the billions of resolution that have been made have actually become life-long habits. Don’t set yourself up for failure like that!
So. Even though I don’t care for resolutions, I do LOVE setting GOALS.
Now, you might be saying: “What’s the difference?”
Well, a resolution is more of a broad statement…
I want to:
- lose weight
- eat healthier
- work out more
- go on more dates with my spouse
- be more intentional with my kids
- give up ____ (insert vice here)
But if you never really work out and your resolution is to work out “more”….work out one time and BAM, resolution achieved.
A GOAL comes with more instructions, or a road map, so to speak.
We’ve all heard of SMART goals….right?
SMART goals are
- Specific
- Measurable
- Actionable
- Realistic
- Time sensitive
To break that down, lets use the example of losing weight.
- Specific: I want to lose weight
- Measurable: I want to lose 10 pounds
- Actionable: HOW will I lose this 10 pounds? I will work out 3 nights a week, walk around the block after dinner every night, drink 80 ounces of water each day, and follow The Whole30
diet.
- Realistic: I really would like to lose 30 pounds, but 10 pounds is an achievable and realistic place to start.
- Time sensitive: I will lose the 10 pounds by June.
Year In Review
For us, each year in late december my husband and I sit down with last year’s goals in hand and go over how we did. Typically, it is not super stellar, but we can usually cross at least a few things off the list! We review our past goals and see which ones we accomplished, which ones we still need to work on, and which ones we can just toss altogether.
Make the Most of Your Time
Next, we map out his vacation days. Since he has one of those “real job” things, he only has so much time off, and we try to stretch those PTO hours as much as we possibly can. We like to take an annual trip with my parents, he takes off for every birthday in our family of 5, we like to keep a few days hoarded away “just in case” (which he can roll over to the next year if unused), and the remaining days we can sprinkle throughout the year as needed.
Break It Down
Next we discuss goals broken down by category. Some ideas on what these categories might include are:
- Faith
- Financial
- Family
- Homeschool
- Professional
- Health
- Homestead
- Organization
I’d like to add that we do this on the computer rather than on paper. It’s just easier to organize it that way without having to erase.
Individual Goals
Last we talk about individual goals, for ourselves and for the kids.
Some examples of our individual goals include how many books we each want to reading the coming year, how many times a week we want to work out, how many blog posts I want to get out each month…one seemingly simple goal I have for myself this year is to try my hand at making homemade vanilla…something small and easy, but it always feels so good to cross something off a list and this is something I’ve been putting off for years!
We talk about what programs we think the kids should be involved in and if anything needs to be dropped if things are spread too thin. They want to do basketball, soccer, ballet, gymnastics, tae kwon do, piano lessons, violin lessons, Wild Explorers Club, co-op classes…I’m sure I’m missing some things…but my point is it adds up quick. I am not one of those taxicab moms who spends all week shuttling the kids to activities, and with 3 kids, time is a precious commodity! We try to do as much as we can in our own home, and we are super blessed to have little recreation center here in our tiny town that offers many of the things I just listed. We end up only traveling for maybe 2 things each week and I am thrilled at how we have been able to keep the in-car time so low thus far!
When It Doesn’t Go As Planned
2016 has admittedly been a “ran-over-by-a-truck” year and I could not be happier to see the last of it come and go. I feel like this year has aged me 10 years, physically. And emotionally, well, I’ve probably cried more this year than the rest of my life combined.
Our 2016 goals were pretty great and we were excited to accomplish so many things when we wrote them. Our categories were Financial, Family, Homeschool, Side Business, Faith, and of course our individual goals. We paid off some debt that we wanted gone, we took some great family trips. We started teaching the kids to ride bikes. We served at several mission opportunities with the kids. I started blogging. But the majority of our goals were left untouched and unachieved due to wave upon wave of unforeseen circumstances.
There were so so many valleys that we dealt with this year, but I won’t go into all of that at this time. The biggest and most obvious has to do with Papa, which you can read about here. That consumed the first half of the year. Then in mid August, all 3 of the kids and I were involved in a wreck at the hands of a drunk driver, and it has consumed the remainder of the year. Life just hasn’t been the same since that day. I went through some extremely heavy emotions for about a month after it happened. The “what-ifs” circling through my head and the feeling of being completely victimized. I have had 3 doctors appointments a week on top of physical therapy. Six appointments a week between the 3 kids. I have had to pre-make dinner for the family and squeeze in the bare minimum of homeschooling 3 days a week for the past 5 months before running out to yet another appointment. Oh, and did I mention that our doctor is an hour away? Constant pain. Babysitters. Legit PTSD. Insurance claims. Rental car fiascos. Having to explain it all to the kids. The whole thing replaying over and over again in my head. Anxiety. My goals were suddenly extremely unimportant and were replaced with “just make it through the day”. I have felt like the candle has not only been burning from both ends, but that is has been scorched, struck by lightning, stomped out, and, well, ran over by a truck…a drunk one.
So the past year has not played out quite the way we planned, but we have given ourselves grace when it comes to our goals list. The lack of check marks on it is frustrating, sure, but we are about to be handed yet another year to try again. If you don’t cross them all off, that’s okay. It is OKAY to give yourself grace when things get completely off track! Don’t overthink it and just do the best you can.
Release the Micro Managers!! (has anyone seen the Lego Movie??? We are slightly obsessed)
It’s a balancing act. I like having a plan and having things laid out for me, but I do not thrive under micromanagement. For 2016 I wanted to read 12 books. Thats 1 a month. Totally doable, right? Well I broke it down to reading 10 pages each night to achieve my goal. By the end of some days I would feel exhausted and not be thrilled with the thought of reading. Even when I could barely hold my eyes open I felt that I HAD to squeeze in my 10 pages or I would count it as a FAIL. A few nights I would dread it so much that I would just skip it. Then I would feel like I had to read the accumulated amount of pages from the missed days and it just became a HASSLE! Reading is supposed to be ENJOYABLE! But with it hanging over my head like that it became more of a chore, a box to check, an action item I did begrudgingly, if at all. Somewhere between February and March I just completely gave up on it. So that didn’t work for me. That doesn’t mean that it wouldn’t work for you. It is just a good example of how getting TOO specific can get tedious.
Not everything has to be subcategorized down to the atom. In 2015 I decided that I wanted to stop drinking coffee. I didn’t make a plan of attack or list out the ways I was going to avoid the beverage. I just…..(wait for it)….stopped drinking it. At first I made myself hot tea to curb the craving for a warm drink, but after maybe 3 weeks I didn’t miss it one bit. I went an entire year without it just to prove to myself that I could do it. Now I drink it occasionally, but not always. It isn’t forbidden, but it isn’t an addiction anymore.
Make It Known
Making your goals known can be a huge help. Make sure your spouse knows what you are working towards and tell them ways that they can help keep you accountable. Blog about it. Post it on social media – I always enjoy keeping up with a good success story – post your progress! Write out your goals and put them in a place where you will see them frequently. Accountability partners are great too. Ask your friends if they have similar goals that you could work towards together! If you want to lose weight, see if you can find (or start your own) Biggest Loser challenge with prizes that will motivate you even more. Several years ago a circle that I casually ran in was doing a wellness challenge with some pretty substantial prizes. I decided that I wanted to win…to prove to myself that I could, to win the prizes, and honestly…I kind of just wanted to beat everyone else. Oh, and yeah, be healthier too….
I worked my tail off for 3 months. And guess what?? I got 4th place out of something like 600 people. I should probably do that again…..
Do It!
Skip the resolutions. Go grab yourself a piece of paper or sit down at the computer and list out the categories you want to focus on this year. Think about it, talk it over with your spouse or your friends. Get those ideas, dreams, and goals scribbled down and slap it up on the fridge where it is in your face every day. And just START! Do what you can each day and little by little those check marks will start to appear!
Recommended reading to help get you started:
- Own Your Life: Living with Deep Intention, Bold Faith, and Generous Love
by Sally Clarkson
- Design Your Day: Be More Productive, Set Better Goals, and Live Life On Purpose
by Claire Diaz-Ortiz
- Managers of their homes by Steven & Teri Maxwell
Have a real, good year!!
~Robbi