Happy New Year! I hope you all had restful holidays with your loved ones and are ready to take on a new year! 2014 was an amazing year, but no matter how amazing, it's always nice to set new goals and continue growing each year! What are your goals for this year? I've got a few myself, most are more small changes I can make in my daily life, but some are bigger projects I'd love to complete.
If any of you also have some big goals this year, I hope this post can help you in achieving them!
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| Image via Instagram @Sara_De and featured by @DarlingMagazine |
1. Write them down: This sounds silly, but writing things down really does get them out and make them tangible. No longer are they dreams and ideas floating around in our mind, now they're in front of you. I like to write plans down in a journal and even continue writing and see where it takes me. Type out your goal or find a cute print that symbolizes it and get it printed - hang it somewhere where you will see it everyday.
2. Surround yourself with likeminded people: Nothing is more detrimental to a goal than having people constantly belittling it. Many of us will continue and succeed, in spite of such talk, and if you can do so bravo! But nothing is more cultivating than having people who are thinking about the same problems you are or working towards the same goals. These aren't cheerleaders, per say (although it's always nice to have them in your corner too) - these are people who you can talk with and bounce ideas of off, learn from, collaborate with. You are almost never alone in your goals - find likeminded people and link up however you can! Social media can be great for finding these people, as can good old fashioned networking.
3. Break it up and set mini rough deadlines: Goals can seem scary. Especially when they're big, they can seem near impossible. One of my favorite quotes in high school was the classic by Lao Tzu "a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step" - back then the idea of becoming a doctor seemed so far away and would take so long and would basically be impossible. But I would think of that quote and just focus on the next step and now, well, you guys know how time flies! Breaking up your goal into smaller steps serves a couple of purposes - for one, it will allow you to plan your attack, and figure out what actually has to get done to reach your goal. Secondly, it will make the goal seem much less daunting - just focus on the next step, and then the next one, and then nothing will stop you.
4. Be kind to yourself: I call all deadlines rough deadlines. Now some are rougher than others of course, but for the most part, if you don't accomplish something by the time you wanted, it's ok! The world won't end, you will have another chance tomorrow, or the next month. I mention this because we all have setbacks, or things that come up and require us to temporarily change our priorities, it's life after all. But we can't beat ourselves up over these things, be kind to yourself, and set a new deadline! No need to give up.
5. Be ok with change - The final thing you have to remember when trying to achieve your goals is that sometimes goals change. Never be so stiff in your goals that you lose your ability to see new opportunity. I for one like to finish things, I'm obsessed with the checking off of checkboxes, so this was a lesson that was hard for me. But we really can't plan for everything, and because of that our goals don't always fit us. Our goals grow or change as we do, and we should be ok with that!
I'd love to hear what tips help you achieve your goals! We all have different things that work for us!
