New Year Resolutions?- How we met our 2017 goals!
Everyone has their family traditions. We are a young family so we are still building ours. One that has already made the cut are having New Year goals every year. Nope, we don’t call them New Years resolutions. We call them goals at our house and we take them pretty seriously.
Around the middle of December we take one last look at the current years goals and start talking about next years.
Usually we have a two family goals, Denver and I have three or four personal goals, and a goal for each of the boys. For instance, this year one of our family goals was to pay off our family car by the end of April of 2017. We try to pick obtainable but aggressive goals to push us. At the beginning of 2017 we owed $7,000 on our car. By the middle of April we paid the car off. (Stay tuned for a future post to tell you how we accomplished this goal.) The boys had age appropriate goals such potty training for our two year old and our four year old wanted to learn to read and read through his whole Bible with us.
My absolute favorite goal from 2017 was Denver’s. One of his was to write me a letter every Thursday for the entire year. I now have a box full of letters from my husband to me that have chronicled our life over the past year. The good, the bad, and ugly have all been written in these letters so one day we can go through, read them together and laugh about all the happenings of 2017. If you want to grow closer to your spouse this year, I highly recommend something like this. Denver enjoys writing so this was a great labor of love from him to me and is something I will cherish forever.
Out of my four personal goals, I was able to meet all but one. Of course it is the weight goal and it is something I want to hit really hard this coming year. We were blessed and were able to meet all of our other goals (a total of 9 out of 10 as a family).
So how were we able to meet all of our 2017 goals except the weightloss goal?
First of all, we are nothing special. We are a couple of 30 year olds who have two kids and work to survive everyday just like all other parents. We aren’t perfect, in fact we are extremely far from it. I really want to eat Lindor truffles everyday and have a glass of wine to keep my sanity. Denver just wants to lock himself in another room and be able to read for days on end and watch football. Neither one of those usually happens. It has taken us years to get into a routine to make the goal process work. It was around two years ago when we finally figured out what worked for us.
Here are the keys that have helped us reach our yearly goals!
Figure out how many goals you want to make this year.
It may be that you have one big goal you want to reach this year. We like to have categories for our personal goals. We usually have one self health goal, one or two career goals, and one goal of giving. As a family we like to have one financial goal and one time goal (ex. Take x number of days off to spend with family or take a vacation to Disney World.) Figure out what you really want to work on this year. Ask yourself “One year from now, what would I like to see different in my life?” That one question will put you on your way to making at least one goal.
Once you decide on the goals, be specific and write them down.
Why not just keep them in your head? You are more likely to fulfill a goal when you write it down rather than keeping it in your head. In fact, I would suggest posting your goals somewhere you will see them each day. If you are like me, you may forget what you wanted your goal to be. Writing them down has been key for us. It helps us throughout the year refer back to the goals and see what goals we have accomplished. If I didn’t write my goals down I would forget how many pounds I said I wanted to lose. I think it was just 15. (I wish it was only 15.)
We usually sit down and evaluate our goals at least every six months. Sometimes we have to adjust the time frame a little. For example, we had one goal to be accomplished in July but we realized it just wasn’t going to happen when we reviewed at the six month mark. We pushed the deadline out to November and stuck to it. It is good to have an aggressive timeline. However, realize it is ok to be flexible with yourself and not to beat yourself up if you don’t meet it by your exact deadline. Just make sure you are making progress towards the goal. I did not meet my weight loss goal this year but I did try out a gym where I found myself laying flat on their *thankfully* brand new floor huffing and puffing like I was about to die. True story, unfortunately. Just. Make. Progress.
Make a plan on how you are going to meet your goals.
You can’t just say, I’m going to get a promotion and bam! it happens! I wish it worked that way but it doesn’t. You need a plan on how you are going to reach your goals. Make the plan and work it! It may be frustrating and exhausting but having a plan means you are two steps closer to meeting your goal!
Keep revisiting your goals through out the year.
We sit-down together and look at the goals we set at least every six months to benchmark. We casually talk about them when we are riding in the car or at dinner. Yea, we may be a little weird and very goal oriented. The overall gist, just take a look every so often to remind yourself what you are working toward and remind yourself of your plan!
Follow these tips and you will be on your way to meeting your goals in the new year!
What are your goals for this year?