I have to be honest with myself and you – I never hold true to any new years resolution. I believe this probably holds true for many of you reading this. I think that in the past couple of years have forgotten to even set one. With this low level of commitment and a new year upon us, I have a new idea. I’m going to set some 2016 goals, but with a caveat.
There are two things I have learned from my career around objectives (well there are more but these ones are the most prevalent).
- That all goals/objectives should be SMART.
- I’ve done my best to do that as much as possible so that I can track my success over the year. And tracking is a must to feel a sense of accomplishment and motivate you to keep going.
- That even the best goals and objectives have to be adaptable.
- Things can change very quickly in a year, and in order to be successful, you need to be resilient and adapt. So if these 2016 goals are abandoned or need to change due to circumstances, I’m also not going to beat myself up over it.
So as I sit here, mildly hungover from our festivities last night, I write my 2016 goals to share with you.
I was inspired to do this via a friend’s share on Facebook. It was a video and the man was speaking of doing one thing each month that is worth talking about. This doesn’t have to be something that costs money – just something interesting and worth sharing. I already have my first two months planned.
During the month of January, I’m going to abstain from alcohol. For some, this may seem simple, to others it may seem silly. I absolutely love wine (not in an alcoholic way, but in a “enjoy the different tastes” way). I look forward to weekends and indulging in a nice bottle. But with our upcoming trip to Mexico (my February notable experience), I want to be feeling great while soaking up the sun on the beach. I’m also interested to see if staying away from wine can actual increase my performance in my running and strength training and also improve my results. I haven’t planned much further than that, but I will take it one month at at time.
I’m definately not an Instagram sensation with thousands of followers. And I’m not going to make money promoting products or having advertising on my blog. I have a full time job that I love, a family to take care of, and I’m about to complete my diploma to in Interior Design. I don’t have time to strategically follow, like, share, or comment on things just as a way to gain more likes or followers myself. At the end of the day, for me, it doesn’t mean anything anyways.
I want to use these forums as a means for inspiration and a medium to inspire others. I want to share our life with our families and friends across Canada and the world and I want to see the fun that those same people are having. Being so far away from so many people I love has given me much appreciation for these social connectivity tools – sometimes I feel like we are only minutes away rather than thousands of kilometres.
So no offence to some of those redundant fashion bloggers or companies trying to sell me things. Really, no hard feelings. What your doing is great, but if I’m not following you – its just that what your showing me is probably not for me. I’m going to reserve my feed for loved ones and inspiration.
I will admit it, we rely a lot on technology to keep kids busy and allow us to relax or get things done. Televisions, iPads, iPhones, etc. have become a staple in our home. But these tools that we convinced ourselves would be used to educate and inspire, have become essentially idiot boxes – being used for Netflix and YouTube rather than educational games and exercises. Now, I’m setting realistic goals here – so saying that these devices will never be used to entertain is only setting myself up for disappointment. But I would like to start with the following rules.
– All technology stops at the kitchen entrance. I will place a basket where all phones, devices, etc will go into during dinnertime – adults included.
– Limit any television programming (on the TV or iPad) to one hour per day. The exception, where all the kids/family sit down together to watch something as a family/sisters. No more isolating ourselves by hiding in separate rooms on devices for extended periods of time.
Something I’m not super proud of, is how much debt we have accumulated over the past 6 years. We started out by having only a mortgage as debt…but then came two more kids, RESPs, new cars, activities, a wedding, a pool, a kitchen renovation. These things, all added up and now we have become a little uncomfortable with the current situation. So we have mapped it out and have a plan, but my goal this year is to reduce our spending and be able to put roughly $800 extra per month on debt. This doesn’t include any extra bonuses we will get. I think if we can do this in 2016, we will feel a lot better and be able to breathe a little easier in 2017.
I love my current job. The passion of the people I work with and the energy I feel from the work I do really drives me. However, I do have another passion that I ‘m pursuing on the side – Interior Design. My goal for 2016 will be to start to get my name out there, get some more experience on small jobs, and also start finding reliable trades people and contractors to work with. Then I will see where it takes me.
So that’s it. This is what I hope to accomplish, starting today, in 2016. Already, I’m starting to feel a bit better and ready to take on the day. Now with that being said, its time to get off this computer and get in some quality time with the family. Looking forward to sharing more with you this year and having you join me on this new site .
Leave a Reply