Wait! Stop! Before you begin strategizing your New Year’s
resolution for 2012, just hold on a minute. Take time to appreciate all that
you can about 2011, even the hard things as there are lessons in every
challenge. Don’t be too hard on yourself; it’s okay to write all the little
victories too. Here are a few from my list:
- · Did more yoga this year than ever before.
- · Mended a fence with a coworker. It really wasn’t that hard to do!
- · Remembered to use my fabric grocery bags more than ever before.
Now, take a long, appreciative look at your list. Consider
putting it on the fridge and be proud of it!
There is a part of you still thinking, yeah, well I still want to accomplish (insert really cool goal here). Before
you go busting into full New Year’s Resolution Mode, I invite you think of a
new approach to reaching your goals: thinking about what you need to stop doing in order to reach a goal.
For example, as a working Mom of three kids, I want to spend
just a little time walking or having dinner with a friend. I get email and
Facebook time but no real face time. In order to get out once in a while, I
must end thinking that I do not have time to spare for fun with friends, that
my family can’t get along without me while I walk with a friend. When I stop
thinking this way, I will make friends time happen.
Dr. Henry Cloud, author of Necessary Endings, masterfully
shares how endings are necessary and strategic if we are to move onto something
better. He notes that when endings are avoided or not done well, we lose out on
opportunities to reach our goals. Even worse, we often get so accustomed to
being miserable that we don’t even notice our predicament. Though I’m not
affiliated with him, I fully believe his work can help each of us with our
personal, business and athletic goals.
So before January 1 shows up on your calendar, I encourage
you to make a choice to end something in order to move forward. “A fool tries to adjust the truth so he does
not have to adjust it.”
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