It’s time for the end of year audit! Don’t worry. It has nothing to do with taxes or scary people in suits. It’s my own reflective practice of looking at how I spent my time and money and how well I did whatever I set out to do.
Here’s what I’ve noticed this year.
My goals changed.
A lot.
Every three months or so, I checked in on them. In some cases, I circled a goal and labeled it FOR 2020. Sometimes, I erased a bit and made an adjustment. In other cases, I drew a line through it completely, because it wasn’t important any more or it didn’t fit the new trajectory I was on. Our lives change incrementally and sometimes that means that the goals we started with won’t serve us well any longer.
In the season of New Year’s resolutions and all the goal-setting talk, do you find yourself avoiding the goals so you can avoid the inevitable guilt you’ll feel about not accomplishing them? I did.
I didn’t want to be locked into something I thought about in December, but the future Me might have no interest in.
Now I hold my goals loosely.
They’re not carved in stone; they’re written in pencil. Changing or abandoning them is not a failure; it’s an option. I think of them as things I could do, not things I have to do.
Goal setting can be creative and fun. Give yourself permission to try!