It’s almost that time of year when we set new goals and make New Years Resolutions.  Before starting that familiar process, take a few minutes to reflect on last year’s accomplishments and reassess where you are on your path to accomplishing your big dreams.  Here’s how.

First, get out the list you made last year and check off every goal you accomplished.  This is important because it shows you just how capable you are of achieving.

Second, make a list of all the things you accomplished that you didn’t necessarily set out to do.  This is important because it shows you how capable you are of achieving things beyond your imagination.

Third, take a closer look at the things you couldn’t check off.  What are you going to do about those?  Are they still worth pursuing?  Are those items still important to you?  Will accomplishing those goals help you get to your final destination?  If so, there are a few things you need to think about before making any new resolutions for this year.

1. Why were these goals not accomplished?  We often overestimate what we can achieve in one year and grossly underestimate what we can accomplish in five years.  If you have a major goal that went unachieved in 2006, why not reset it for 2007?
2. Do you have a plan?  When you fail to plan, you plan to fail.  I will be discussing the importance of Strategic Planning in a later post, but for now, make a rough sketch of the steps necessary to accomplish this particular goal.
3. Are you giving up too soon?  If your goal for 2006 was to lose 100 pounds and you lost 25, you might be tempted to forget about weight loss for this year using the excuse, “it’s just not in the cards for me.”  Maybe your goal was to double your income in 2006 but you’re still at the same level, making the same amount with no hope for a promotion any time soon.  If you’ve been working toward a goal for some time and not seeing any success, the last thing you want to do is give up.  Why?  Because you’ve put all this work into it already and if you give up now, you’re throwing away all that energy (and possibly expense) that went into your attempts to achieve the goal.  Let me give you an analogy.

Let’s say you live in Chicago and your goal is to drive to Disney World in Florida.  You’ve planned your trip, you have directions, food, gasoline, supplies, bags packed, you’re ready to go and you’re leaving today.  If you started out on this trip say, at 8 AM Friday, you wouldn’t expect to be in Orlando by 9 AM Friday would you?  Of course not!  You know it’s going to take two days of good solid driving to get to Orlando from Chicago.  You know you’re going to have an overnight stay and you have probably even made hotel reservations ahead of time. 

Now let’s say that you’ve had your overnight stay and you start out on your trip the next morning again at 8 AM.  Sometime around Noon, you start to get tired and hungry.  You’re tired of fast food, so you stop into a small family restaurant on one of those lesser-known exits of I75.  It’s home-cooked food and it tastes really great – just the break you needed from all that fast food.  Your meal is complete, you’re full and satisfied and ready to get on your way.  It took a little longer than stopping at McDonald’s, so you’re off your time schedule, but you know it was worth it because of how you feel.

About an hour later, you start to get really sleepy and think, “Wow, my own bed would feel great about now.  I could take a nap, feel refreshed, and continue on my way.”  But wait, you’re 900 miles away from home.  Are you going to turn around, go back home, take your nap, and start all over?  Of course not!  You’ll keep plugging along, probably pull over somewhere for a quick break and some caffeine.

Finally, you make it to the Florida state line and think, “Yes!  It was worth it.  Disney World, here I come.”  Just seeing the sign gives you a renewed sense of energy and enthusiasm and you just know you’re going to make it.  Then, after several more hours of driving, you start to think you missed a turn somewhere.  Maybe your directions weren’t so great after all.  What are you going to do?  Give up and go home?  No!  You decide to stop and ask for directions.  The gas station attendant says you simply missed your turn onto Interstate 4, and all you need to do is turn around and go back a couple of exits. 

You do that, but you cannot find the exit he told you.  You start seeing signs and buildings you know you’ve seen before, so you pull over again and ask for more directions.  Again, you’re told you missed I4, and all you need to do is turn around and go back a couple of exits.

You do that again, and this time, you find it.  In fact, you don’t know how you missed it before because it’s marked plain as day. As promised, once you make it onto I4, there are plenty of directions and signs pointing the way to Disney World – your final destination.  You’re so happy because even though you’re tired and travel weary, you know you’re going to have a lot of fun once you get inside the park.

You see, it never occurs to you to give up on your drive to Disney World.  Why?  Because other people have done it?  Because you know if you just take the right turns, you’ll eventually get there?  Because you know the reward is worth the effort? 

So why, then, do we so easily give up on the goals, dreams, and resolutions that mean a whole lot more to us than a trip to Disney World?

What too many of us do is turn around and go home when we get tired.  Or worse, we get within 15 miles and decide it’s just “not meant to be.”  We fail to ask directions, or just give up when we’re right on the verge of seeing the signs of our final destination.

Your time goal for your trip to Disney World was to leave at 8 AM on Friday and arrive there by 5 PM Saturday.  Instead, you arrived at 8 PM Saturday.  Do you feel ashamed?  No.  You’re thrilled because you’re at Disney World.  You eventually made it, and you’re not even concerned about the fact that it took a little longer than estimated – you’re thrilled just to have arrived.

So what then, is the harm in arriving at a 2006 goal in April of 2007?  Or for that matter July of 2008?  It doesn’t matter when you get there, as long as you’re still thrilled to have arrived.

Which of your 2006 goals are you going to carry over into 2007?

Your Assignment

Take 60 minutes to reflect on all your previous goals and New Years Resolutions.  Which ones are still worth pursuing?  Keep your list handy because in my next post, we will discuss how to “tweak them” to make sure you accomplish them.

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Posted under Inspiration, Leadership, Motivation