Ah, that odd in-between time of the week between Christmas and New Year’s. How ya feeling, friend?
I love New Year’s. Yes, I’m the kind of person who feels like a new year is a fresh, clean slate. Yes, I consider what I want my year to look like, with goals and words. It feels like a blank page in a new notebook, and I love that feeling.
But often I make the mistake of looking back, not seeing myself where I want to be. And then I call it all a failure, leaving it up to next year to solve all my problems. Anyone else? Anyone? And how messed up is it that we do that to ourselves?
It’s time to give ourselves a FAIR assessment.
This year I am utilizing the Cultivate What Matters PowerSheets to keep track of my goal setting for this year. I love Lara Casey’s approach that making small moves that lead to big changes, and choosing grace over perfection.
She kicks off the planner by inviting you to assess yourself and your year. I honestly felt a little daunted by this task. I could barely remember my “word of the year” for 2018, although I could definitely tell you all the ways I feel like I fell short.
But the more I wrote, the more I realized I’ve had some pretty significant wins this year.
First of all, I went back and figured out what my goal of this past year was. My focus word was “access,” with a goal of connecting with others more, and accessing my best self. What immediately springs to mind for me is how terrible I am at phone communication with my friends, how I need to spend more time with people, and make more date nights happen.
However, when I think about it, there have been a lot of great strides this year. My husband and I have worked through a lot of communication issues, and we deal with conflict so much better. Plus we are working on date nights and talking about things other than our kids while we’re on them.
My kids and I spend the most time together, and I am so amazed at how well they communicate with me and others. I have really aimed to affirm them and also to help them talk through their emotions rather than acting out. I can do more to be a playful mom, but I am working on it!
I’m ending out the year having spoken with four of my good friends that I don’t get to see all the time, and I have a bit of phone phobia, so that is a huge leap.
Finally, I’m connecting better with myself. I’ve gone through some counseling sessions, and really feel that I know myself a lot better than I have prior to this year. For the first time maybe ever, I can clearly state how I’m feeling, and identify triggers, truths and lies. What a difference.
There ARE victories.
You may be able to point out all your wins with ease, and that’s awesome. I wasn’t so intentional last year, and I can tend to be a downer anyway, so it’s much easier for me to spot the bad.
Before you launch into your 2019 goals, I encourage you to give a fair and honest assessment of your past year. Sure, think about what you need to work on, but give yourself credit for the good things too. There ARE victories to be found. You ARE moving forward.
And you might be surprised to find that once you start noting victories, more and more will spill out onto the page.
What are your victories from this year? I want to hear! Leave a comment below, or drop a comment on my most recent Instagram post.
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