Happy, happy, happy New Year to you all! I soooo love this time of year! I always have a renewed sense of commitment and determination and so far this year I have to say that I am feeling on fire! Some people don’t believe in New Year’s Resolutions and I have to say I don’t really either. What I do believe in though, is setting goals!! I am very, very passionate about this and before I talk more about my process, I want to tell you why.
Once upon a time, I used to be very, very, very overweight. When I was very overweight, I wasn’t very happy deep down inside and although I did want to do something about that, subconsciously I had some issues going on that caused me to self sabotage every time I attempted to. For a period of time, my life was what I would consider a complete mess with no direction. I just kept on keeping on, doing everything I needed to do and not much else. My life was a constant merry go round of doing everything that I could for others and nothing for myself. I spent so much time doing the urgent stuff, that I didn’t have time to do the important stuff. Why? There were many reasons, but one of the biggest ones was because it meant I didn’t have time to focus on myself and everything I didn’t like about myself and my life. Long story short – we could be here for a very long time otherwise – one day I realised that if I didn’t do something about my weight, then if I was lucky enough to still be here, I would end up being alone on the couch with no life. My daughter was growing up and would be going off overseas for an undetermined length of time and I was a single mum. In that moment I decided that that wasn’t the life that I wanted. I didn’t want to be alone. I wanted to have someone to share my life with and I was in no shape to be sharing my life with anyone in the state I was in. I was a walking heart attack waiting to happen AND I didn’t love myself, so how could I possibly love anyone else?
So what does this have to do with New Year’s resolutions or goals? Well up until this point, of course every New Year I know that I “told” myself that this would be the year that I would start to release my weight, but it was only in my head. No one else knew that that was my goal. The New Year after I had decided that I needed to change my story was no different. I started the year making a silent promise to myself that this would be the year. It did feel different this time though. I went back to weight watchers and tried to follow their plan. I joined a local curves and tried to exercise there the recommended 3 sessions per week. I got to the end of that year and I had managed to lose 10kgs – which was great – however with over 100kg to lose, I knew that I needed to try to do better the next year otherwise it was going to take me 10 years or more to lose the weight and I wasn’t getting any younger! So the next New Year’s Day I took some time out by myself and reflected on the year gone past. What I had done. What I had achieved. What I did well and what I could improve on. Then I wrote down a list of goals for the next year. I had never actually written a list before and I thought that maybe physically writing a list might help in some way. I figured it couldn’t hurt! I wrote a list of 10 things, with releasing weight at the top of the list and then I made sure that they were all SMART goals. For those of you that don’t know what SMART goals are, it stands for Specific, Measureable, Achieveable, Realistic and Time Bound.
That year I didn’t get everything achieved on my list, but I DID get a LOT more achieved than I would have if I didn’t go through that process. The biggest achievement of that year, was that I released 50kg. My goal for the year was 60kg, but I was definitely ok with 50!
Each and every year now I have the same process on New Year’s Day, although I go a bit further these days. Now as well as making them SMART goals, on New Year’s Day I pick 2-3 of the ones that are most important to me that I want to work on for the first quarter of the year, and then I write a list of actions that I need to take to achieve them. At the end of each quarter I sit down and evaluate where I am at, pick my 2-3 to work on for the next quarter, write down my action steps and off I go again. I also write down WHY I want to achieve those goals. You need to have a really powerful WHY. Your WHY – and also your why nots – are the key to everything. I’m not perfect. Things don’t always happen when I plan for it to happen, but I ALWAYS get there in the end. One of the biggest lessons I have learned, is that the ONLY time we fail, is if we give up, and I NEVER give up if I really really want something. Sometimes it just takes me a lot longer to achieve it than I planned. I always learn along the way though, and I truly know that everything happens when it is meant to!
One of my biggest goals for this year is to publish my book. I finally finished it in November after starting it 3 years ago! See what I mean? I didn’t plan for it to take me 3 years – I planned for it to take me 1 month initially – but I never gave up on it and I DID finally finish it! It WILL be published in the very near future. I am currently in the process of sourcing a professional editor and I also took massive action on New Year’s Day and actually submitted it to 3 publishers. Whether it is picked up by one of them or whether I go down the self publishing road makes no difference to me really. I set myself the goal to write it and now I have set myself the goal of publishing it and publish it I WILL.
I don’t know if you have a New Year’s Resolution or goal setting process, but if you don’t, I would highly recommend it! I wish for you a wildly successful and exciting 2018. My years since I released my weight have all been wonderful and this year will be no exception. I do however, absolutely know that it will be one of my best to date! I am so excited for all that it will bring and I truly wish the same for you!!
Here’s to an amazing 2018!!
Shari
Xoxo
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