Success! Make This Your Best Year Yet!

Success is achieving the outcomes you desire, whatever those outcomes are for you.

Where would you like to be at the end of this year in the key areas of your life?

• Career/ Business/ Purpose
• Relationships
• Finances
• Personally / Professionally – your growth and development goals
• Emotionally
• Physically
• Spiritually
• Rejuvenating aspirations – adding fun, leisure, creativity, and wonder to your life

A new year is the perfect opportunity to initiate some life-giving changes! And if you are reading this at some other point in the year, don’t worry! It’s never too late to revamp your life. By all means, don’t put it off. Do it now!

Each Year

The hope is that during the course of a year you make valuable discoveries, embrace better habits, and walk more fully in who God created you to be. If you do, you are more likely to enjoy success in the coming year! If you don’t, you will find yourself right where you are, still!

There are simple steps that will significantly increase your chances of realizing the success you yearn for. And not just success in the visible areas of your life, but in all facets of your life, so that deep down you have a sense of peace while getting the results you were seeking.

With that in mind, the key to making the coming year your best year yet is to be intentional. It won’t just happen – I guarantee it! Because it involves deliberate effort, I encourage you to…

1. Seek God

Not the kind of seeking where you invite God to rubber stamp your plans and make your dreams and goals a reality. No, a clean-slate-kind-of-seeking where you allow Him the chance to dictate the direction of your year. Lay it all down! Surrender!

Allow God the chance to get you on board with His plans and what He has in mind for you to accomplish in the coming year. I admit, letting go is hard! However, it’s much easier than spinning your wheels trying to make something happen that God never intended to be.

While you may be eager to get going, I encourage you to slow down and wait for God to make His wishes for the year abundantly clear. Rushing the process is counterproductive.

2. Reflect

How you bring one year to a close is just as important as how you begin a new year. With that in mind invest the time in reflecting on the previous year?

• • • What about the year lingers? Your frustrations? Your accomplishments? How tired and worn out you feel? How overjoyed you are that many fun experiences you enjoyed?
    • What went well? What worked?
    • What didn’t go well? What didn’t work?
    • What needs to change?
    • What did you learn?
    • What new habits did you start?

As I was putting together my annual photo book for my family this past December, I was completely blown away at how many incredible memory making moments we had all shared. My heart was full. And even more full in light of the fact that I also successfully achieved my work goals too. That’s a winning combination!

What stands out for you when you glance back at the previous year?

3. Dream

Inertia keeps us on the same general track doing what we’ve always done. It keeps us safely huddled in our comfort zone!

I dare you to dream!

Pause, breathe, and consider what do you really want? Is there something specific you’d like to learn? What would you like to accomplish? Are there experiences you’d like to have? People you would like to see?

Come on! The world is your oyster! What’s God placed on your heart? It could be anything!

Whatever dreams have come to mind write them down? Keep them in front of you or you are sure to revert back to the same ole, same ole!

4. Narrow Your Focus

In your seeking God, reflecting, and dreaming a myriad of possibilities have surely come to the surface. Now it’s time to prayerfully determine your top three targets or goals – the ones God is saying yes to. These are your lofty ambitious aspirations for the year. For example, your goals might be to…

• • • Grow your business to “X” number of clients or “X” dollars
    • Improve work/life balance so that you can begin a new hobby or spend more time with your family
    • Complete a book

5. Strategize

Setting the goal is the easy part. Determining the daily actions that will enable your goals to become a reality is trickier. For example, if one of your goals is to write a book, your daily action might be to write for 30 minutes to one hour five days a week.

If your goal is to improve your work like balance, your daily action might be to maintain office hours of 9am-6pm each day. Or you might refrain from bringing work home. Or a date night once a week. Be sure to pick actions that would enable you to enjoy the balance you desire.

As a part of the strategy, be sure to find a way to track the actions you intend take so that you can easily determine if you are actually taking the steps necessary to achieve your goal.

Finally, ruthlessly eliminate the busywork that isn’t actually accomplishing your goals. I know I’ve made the mistake of continuing to do certain tasks that did absolutely nothing to contribute to my goals because I’d always done those tasks, they were easy, or in some cases, I just enjoyed doing them. Sadly, those tasks stole time from the tasks that would have served my goals better.

6. Assemble Your Team

In order to accomplish your goals, who do you need on your team? Do you need to…

• • • Find people to inspire, prod, or hold you accountable?
    • Have someone mentor you in a specific area?
    • Network and meet people in your industry?
    • Find someone to partner with who might compliment your personality or skill set?
    • Work with people who would offer a different perspective?
    • Collaborate with others?
    • Work with a coach? A therapist? A trainer?

7. Stretch

Unless you stretch yourself, you are unlikely to make much progress! The truth is that what you desire is outside of your comfort zone. And what God has for you to accomplish is outside of your comfort zone too!

Where have you gotten comfortable? Where do you need to stretch yourself?

8. Organize

Organizing is a never-ending process, but sadly it often gets ignored for matters we believe to be more urgent. I challenge you to make a concerted effort to get organized for three great reasons:

1. Disorganization wastes time
2. It stifles your creativity
3. And it bogs you down and makes you less effective!

In order for you to successfully reach your goals, what do you need to organize?

9. Evaluate

Achieving your goals hinges on two things: 1) how effective your daily actions are and 2) how consistently you execute those daily actions. And to be able to answer those two questions, you need to regularly evaluate your progress. Without a pre-determined plan for evaluating, it won’t happen!

Do you need to evaluate your progress at the end of every…

• Week?
• Month?
• Quarter?

Whatever you decide, block off several hours on your calendar now to ensure you make time for it. While it may seem like a big sacrifice of your time, it’s been one of the biggest game changers for me! Evaluating enables me to…

• See my progress or lack of progress
• Evaluate my daily actions and my level of consistency
• Brainstorm and experiment with new daily actions
• Determine what needs a little extra attention

To make the coming year your best year yet, you are going to have to make some changes!

How will you set yourself up for success?