on Resolutions
I generally have goals that I'm working toward throughout the year. My current set of goals includes:
Eat something Paleo-compliant for dinner
Acknowledge Thomas
Ask for what I need
Be positive to the kids
Meditate three times per week
Always do my best
Be impeccable with my word
Save money
Hit my step count (10k) every day
Some of these are from therapy homework. Some of them represent the Four Agreements (although now there are five). The others are random self-improvement goals. Yet as a list, my goals have issues.
Are some of them unnecessary? Probably. Let's be honest... I don't generally half-ass anything. That makes the "always do my best" goal kind of extraneous. Also, if I'm being impeccable with my word, I'm clearly going to be much more positive with the kids. Are there too many of them? Likely. It's hard to remember and focus on a list this long, IMHO. Only a few of them at a time could possibly receive any amount of focus. Are they specific enough? Nope. You can't measure whether you've achieved a goal if it isn't specific.
In the spirit of making New Year's Resolutions, my goals are in need of an update/revamp. No time like the present. Especially since I like to get a jump on resolutions during the month of December. I'm impatient like that.
As I develop the new list, I need to keep a few things in mind. The new list of goals should be shorter. They should not be redundant. They should represent the things that are the most important to me: my relationship, my professionalism, and my fitness.
Here's a first attempt:
Engage in conversation with Thomas a minimum of once per day.
Be impeccable with my word across all environments.
Have a 30-inch waist by July 1st.
Only having three items will enable me to keep them in working memory. I can ask myself whether something I'm about to do will help me, or prevent me from reaching one of my goals. Even the prospect of a narrower focus feels really good to me. Gonna run with it.