Picked up a random poetry book From the crowded shelf. Quick easy hour read: Delight and wonder. Then, Found…
The Perfect Gift for Yourself: Goals not Resolutions
Neel Burton from pyschology.com says, “In the words of Voltaire, ‘God gave us the gift of life; it is up to us to give ourselves the gift of living well.'”
Christmas is over. You might have already taken down your tree and put away your decorations for safe keeping. Your kids have played with the presents so much that they might be bored with them already. You have finally a clear schedule devoid of holiday parties, well except for New Year’s Eve perhaps.
Now what?
The new year is a time for resolutions. Unfortunately, traditional resolution setting notoriously sets you up for failure. Instead, set yourself some attainable personable goals.
“A goal is a desired result that a person wishes to achieve. It is a target that a person wants to reach. It is an end-point of where a person sees himself after a certain period of time. Goals can be short term or long term,”(Nikita).
“Resolutions made at New Years are promises to live a better and healthier life. It seems as a way to make changes in the current way of living and attempt to live a better and fuller life. Many people make resolutions on New Years, but according to research more than 80% people fail at keeping their resolutions. Resolution requires making long term changes and requires putting even more effort to maintaining them,” (Nikita).
Set yourself SMART Goals, not resolutions.
Most of us want to include weight loss in our New Year’s Resolutions. Make it a SMART Goal by making it something you can achieve. Last year, my resolution was to go on the Keto Diet for long-term health improvement. Truthfully, my husband helped me be successful since he primarily did the cooking for me. He was also on it so it was easy (I thought it was easier for him) for us to eat the same meals.
I stayed on Keto from January till the 1st of June. I lost twenty pounds in five months. Additionally, I did exercise at least once a week too. That plus eating specific foods greatly improved my overall health. I felt much better.
Even though I did not write a SMART Goals for this diet, I mentally made myself be able to achieve this goal. I kept track on my Fitbit Alta what I ate and the number of steps I took each day.
This year, my SMART Goal is to work on my time management for my freelance writing business.
In an article on pyschcentral.com, “6 Tips to Improve Your Time Management Skills”, Donna White suggests:
- “Make a list”
- “Set deadlines”
- “Stop multitasking”
- “Delegate responsibilities”
- “Use your down time”
- “Reward Yourself”.
What are you going to set as your goal for this coming year?
Look for these useful resources on Amazon:
Smart Goals: Everything You Need to Know About Setting S.M.A.R.T. Goals (Dream Big, Set Goals, Take Action)
Mini Habits: Smaller Habits, Bigger Results (Volume 1)
My gift to myself this year is to improve my time management for writing tasks. Here is my example SMART Goal for the coming year:
Specific – WHO? WHAT? I will be successful at marketing my writing and receive at least a bi-weekly income from it. I will print prototypes of my completed memoir and market it to others for potential investors. |
Measurable – HOW? I will know I am successful by the profit I make. |
Attainable– REASONABLE? I know this goal is attainable because I have read other bloggers testimonies and my cousin who has been a freelance writer for the last nine years. |
Relevant – EXPECTED RESULT? I will produce a blog to and promote it by email subscriptions. Subscribers will be people who visit my blog and sign up for the subscription. I will also market my writing by sharing it with potential investors/companies looking for writers. |
Timed Oriented – WHEN? I will start making a bi-weekly income from my blogging and content writing by the end of February, 2019. I will find an investor for my memoir by the end of January, 2019. |
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