Preparing for a New Year
I personally love the week between Christmas and New Years Day. In fact, when I worked in the ad agency world, we would shut down for the last two weeks of the year and it was glorious. It was during one of these times, back in 2014, when I started the tradition of carving out at least half a day to reflect on the year that has passed, plus set intentions & goals for the year that is coming. I’ve even created a workshop for the Mink Center for Business & Leadership in Honolulu (hi, Cohort Three sisters!) on this topic.
As the years have gone by, this practice has looked slightly different each year depending on what I felt I needed, but I’ve done this yearly reflection in the exact same journal to make the practice of retracing my years a bit easier. Looking back is so helpful because I can see how much I have grown and changed, especially when I can easily compare year over year.
This year, thanks to personal work in the midst of entrepreneurship and also to our fabulous speakers like Evy Andra, I’ve softened my goal setting approach with a focus on throwing some “being” goals in the mix with my normal “doing” goals.
If you’re curious, here is a glimpse into my process:
Reflection
First, I spend time reflecting. I go back through my Google calendar & my journal to pull out the things that have transpired in 2021. Some of these will be actual things that others can see: winning awards, business revenue, etc. Some of these will be things that only I can know: letting go of fears, doing the work to move around emotional blocks, etc. I write out an actual short list that I can look at that includes both types of experiences.
I also ask myself questions, like:
What brought me joy?
What should I have said ‘no’ to?
What grew well in my life this year?
What did I learn?
What am I glad I said ‘yes’ to?
One new thing that I am planning to add in this year is creating a list of people that really loved on me in 2021. I got this idea from one of my new mentors & my father (my biggest mentor in business), who have both made this a practice in their lives. As my time gets more & more precious, I want to make sure that I know I am showing up for the VIPs in my life.
Clarify
I get clear on what I want in the coming year. I’ve done this a few different ways over the years. Sometimes I’ve listed out my values & then the ways I want to live them out in the new year. Other times I have just picked the top three things on my heart.
This year, I wrote out my priorities in 10 life domains under the categories as created by Michael Hyatt.
Being: Spiritual, Physical, Emotional & Intellectual
Relating: Marriage, Social & Parenting (I add Extended Family into this one too)
Doing: Business, Financial & Hobbies
So, for example, under my business, I wrote out the priority to create additional systems in specific areas that I believe will support myself and my team as we aim to grow.
Dig In
Once I have these priorities set, this is the base that I work from. I dig in. I examine each thought & connect it to a feeling or a why. Why does this really matter to me? What is at stake if I don’t make this happen? What feeling has motivated me to want to focus on this in the coming year? What’s my ‘why’ with this?
Going back to my example of adding systems into my business: I asked myself - why do I really want to set up systems in my business this year? What am I looking to get out of making this a priority? For me, feeling organized is equivalent to feeling like myself and feeling like myself is feeling confident. Also, the only way I see to work myself out of the details & into spending more time on the strategy work, which is where I want to go, is to have solid systems that run without me.
Goals
This is the point that I set my goals.
A few notes about goals. In my mind, some goals should be BIG - as in so big that there is definitely the chance that I won’t accomplish them. Others can be habit-focused, small changes that will add up in big ways.
Also, grace. Grace to change. Grace to go with what transpires in life over the year. Grace for myself when I fall short. Grace has to be a part of goal setting.
Also new to me this year, I’m choosing to focus on my goals in quarterly increments. This will help me define my priorities for three months and make space for not having conflicting priorities. So for example, conflicting goals would be traveling abroad & saving for a down payment on a house. Those two things can happen in the same year, but would be easier to focus on if they are not happening in the same quarter, right?
Plans
Now that I have some goals laid out, I start to lay out the first step or two to working towards achievement. I ask myself - what is going to move the needle forward? I put my thoughts into SMARTER goals:
Specific
Measurable
Actionable
Risky
Timebound
Exciting
Relevant to my values & season of life
(SMARTER is another concept I’ve learned from the Hyatt Company through their Full Focus Planner)
A quick side note - don’t fall trap to over-planning here. It’s easy to get caught up in wanting to have every detail figured out before you start but I have found that this is such a procrastination tactic. Know where you’re going, lay out the first few steps and then - the most important part - GO.
You’ve Got to See It
Finally, I cap my yearly planning off with a vision board.
Most years I just go with the images that make me feel something. For me, this is a time I get creative & not strategic. If I want a new car, I don’t necessarily scan the pages of magazines for new car ads, rather I might go with a beautiful view of Colorado because that’s where I want to roadtrip in a new car and I can actually visualize the wind, the way I feel behind the wheel, etc.
If you’ve never given vision boarding a shot, I would invite you to join us on Thursday, January 13th for our second annual Vision Boarding Workshop. You can snag tickets here.
With that, I will leave you to enjoying the final days of 2021. I hope that this past year held some really beautiful things for you. I hope that you will celebrate yourself for showing up, for all of the hard work you put in.
I hope that 2022 will be even better.