A New Week Resolution:

New Year resolutions are a great way to get excited about setting goals for the year. It allows us time to reflect on the previous year and project for the new one. But how do we keep the momentum going all year long?

The answer may be in breaking those goals down, and revisiting them often. Goals keep us focused and give us something to be excited about. But as Kevin Fischer says, life happens and those good intentions get pushed out by all the other things that are screaming for our attention.

When we get derailed it’s easy to feel defeated and give up. But that is Exactly when it’s time to revisit those goals! That’s the time to take stock and see what needs to be adjusted, tweaked, or improved. In comes your “New Week Resolutions!”

I have been keeping a journal since I was 12 years old, a practice I find very therapeutic. Last week I had an “off” week. I didn’t exercise as often as I had planned, and made some rather horrendous food choices. In years past, one week might have turned into months, fueled with discouragement and an “all or nothing” attitude.

Instead, as I was journaling about my week, I decided to take stock; to reflect on my previous week and project for the new one. And that’s when I had an epiphany! This is what I need to do, weekly, to stay on track for my yearly goal. no judgement, no guilt, no put downs.

A simple evaluation of my week not only yielded some great insight about what challenges led to my poor choices, but also provided great input in how to address those challenges and prevent a repeat next week. Week by week, this can only yield to an improved approach, which will ultimately lead to goal!

The goals you are working on will determine the type of evaluations you conduct, and the things you choose to review. In my case I chose the following since my goals are health/wellness related:

Physical activity, sleeping patterns, meals, water intake, spirituality, and schedule.

for each category I looked at “what went well?”, “What didn’t go well?”, and what I can do to improve, tweak, or address it so that next week I can have another outcome in that area.

Just a few lines for each category not only provided me with a much clearer picture of my week, but also provided me with a game plan. An unexpected bonus of doing this exercise is that it revealed that I had a lot more things go right than I originally thought.