Yeah, it’s that time of the year. Time to purge out all the junk you’ve accumulated, make resolutions and plan a fresh start, right?
That’s a load of crap.
Who has time to do all that?
And what’s the point?
I’m not big on “resolutions”. Resolutions are nothing but a test of willpower and guess what? I manage to defeat myself every time. So it’s like I win, but I don’t. And that’s just dumb. It should be win-win.
In the past I’ve been a fan of setting goals and there’s nothing wrong with marking a target and going for it. You can read all about that process here. But this year I’m not about resolutions or goals.
This year I’m about results.
Goals and resolutions are great, but sometimes they get put on hold, changed or abandoned because new and exciting things show up that we hadn’t planned on. I don’t know about you, but my days are unpredictable. A single text message can throw off my schedule for weeks at a time – often in an unbelievably good way. Control is an illusion. Fortunately we have all learned skills to adapt to this, otherwise our heads would explode the first time we were interrupted.
Like just now when my daughter bursts in with a random question. Now where was I? Oh yeah…
What I don’t want to happen in 2011 is to be so focused on a goal that I miss out on the cool stuff going on around me. I want to have goals that I work towards, but I’m not going to beat myself up if I don’t quite reach them or they turn out slightly different than I intended.
So in trying to marry the two concepts of setting goals and allowing flexibility to seize opportunities as they show up, I realized that what I’m really after is results. Rather than just tracking my progress on a few goals, I want to record my results for each day and week. What I’m going to be aware of is all the little accomplishments that happen on a daily basis that aren’t attached to a goal, but matter just the same. I want to log milestones as they happen and if a new idea shows up, I want to capture it even if it wasn’t on my goal sheet for the year. If I achieved it, then by golly give me the credit for it!
So at the end of 2011, I want to look back and see what I accomplished in all areas – not just what I “planned” to do. I’ve been doing this over the last couple of weeks as an experiment and it’s already had quite an energizing effect. I’m not doing anything fancy other than logging my achievements into a daily calendar as they happen. I use Google calendar in week view (so I can see the previous days for inspiration and motivation), but you can use any type of calendar or journaling tool.
So here goes… I’m ready to see what 2011 can throw at me and I’m ready to see what can I do with it…
My challenge to you for 2011 is to focus on your results, take credit for everything you achieve and keep a record of it. Who’s with me?
