New Year, New You?!
I’ve never been a fan of New Year’s resolutions. Though, I do enjoy using this time of year to reflect on my goals for the year ahead.
To quote Brene Brown, it’s a time to ‘get deliberate’.
So often we spend our time simply jumping from priority to priority that we never find the time to focus on our longer term goals. This is what is meant by ‘getting deliberate’, these things never just ‘happen’ by themselves, you need to deliberately set aside time to achieve them.
Identify Your Goals for the New Year
First things first though… you need to identify your goals. As a fellow changemaker, I’d really recommend starting from a point of impact. What impact do you want to have this year? This should tie in with any mission statement or public benefit statement you have written into your constitution. Then think about operationally how you’re going to get there.
As busy people, you will likely have multiple priorities to balance on a personal level, as well as that of your value-driven activities. When planning ahead it is worth considering all the competing priorities, so the plan you create is based as closely on reality as possible. This improves your chances of success.
Tools to Help You Plan in the New Year
We have some brilliant FREE tools that you can access to help with this. These are located within the ‘People’ heading on our Resources page, and we would recommend…
The Balance Wheel: This activity can be used to achieve a healthy work-life balance. By identifying areas of imbalance, it helps you to create goals and set priorities based on your life vision. I love this activity and use it whenever I am feeling unbalanced. I often have one for me as a whole (work and home) but also one just for work so I can see where my time is currently being spent and make adjustments accordingly.
To achieve the desired balance you have identified, you’ll need to build a series of regular behaviour triggers to assist you on your way. For example, whenever I drive to work I listen to my study coursebooks (that’s if you’re wanting to read/study more). To help build positive habits to achieve your goals, check out our Habit Tracker in the free resource section of our website. As the name implies, this document will help you to keep track of your habits over a period of time. This is useful if you’re struggling to reach targets or would like to cultivate new habits.
Don’t get bogged down with having to have all this in place immediately. I see Jan-March as planning time for my new financial year starting in April. This means the action of planning is triggered by the new year, but I have enough time to do my research, make connections and ensure my team are part of the process.
However you prepare for the year ahead, Junction Point are wishing you a wonderful start. Happy New Year!
