Recently I’ve noticed friends and family struggling with thoughts of the future, worried about making plans and uncertain as to what they should be. It’s hard to plan New Year’s Resolutions and even trickier to keep them. Good intentions of going to the gym, laying off fast food and learning that new language can fall by the wayside quick. By the mid January you’ve long forgotten where your gym even is, the takeaway rule you broke with pizza on 5th January (well done for lasting 5 days!) and you swear blind to your friends that you never wanted to learn Mandarin Chinese.
So if a normal year is tough already, 2021 is a belter. It’s easy to curl up inside, sink into the sofa and pull those covers over your head. The biological response of Flight or Fight rules for the easy escape, and hibernation sets in. All of which we lead to increasing frustration with the situation, your lack of control and your continued path of destruction that you have that love-hate relationship with it.
What you really need is a method to plan those resolutions. If you don’t like calling them that, pick another word. Goals. Plans. Motivations. Whatever it is, it’s more important than ever to have them, breathe them and live them.
The Corona Shock
Because of Corona, you may not be looking to plan New Year’s Resolutions. In terms of the actual virus, the devastation that Coronavirus has left in illness and deaths is unheard of since records began. But the wider impact has been equally daunting. A new way of life, liberties removed, more time indoors, less social life. No travelling. A smaller group of people to interact with. Seeing family less, or not at all. Worrying for others. Worrying for ourself. Self pity. Rise in mental health issues. A greater awareness of our own mortality. Depression. Lack of meaning. Plans cancelled. Paranoia. Resentment. The list goes on.
Corona was also a great time to slow down, reflect, and learn. To experience new things. To embrace the stillness. But, and it’s a big but, chances are that the shock to the system took all of 2020 to get over. The haphazard nature of rules and regulations changing by the week further impressed the chaos. First, lockdown then no lockdown then back to a half way house. Sometimes you were in isolation or quarantine and most other times not. As the governments of the world scramble to make a new rule book – mostly through trial and error it seemed – people were thrown in and out of levels, tiers, zones or whatever other name the powers that be seemed fit to try to bring order to chaos.
Populations split into two group. The ones that ate too much, drank too much, binged on two much TV and did little else. And the other group? Well, we hated them. The ones that were busy learning new skills, making habits, getting side hustles and flourishing. It’s not always as fun, but it is far more rewarding.
So 2020 is done. We’ve been through more Ben and Jerry’s tubs than I care to think about. We’ve stuffed yourself with turkey, turkey pie and turkey sandwiches as the leftovers decreased. The countless bottles of wine and spirits are still piled up waiting to go to the dump.
It’s time to say no to this state of being and put in place new goals.
3 Methods To Rule Them All
When we set new goals, people do this in many different ways. We goal set very differently and our passions are unique.
What I hope to do in the next three methods is give you at least one that calls to you. One that makes you think about what you want. One that helps you to plan New Year’s Resolutions. Finally, I want to give you some simple tools to help with working through and habitualising these goals over the coming year.
I do think there are a few things that you can do to crystallise your plans, almost a preparation of sorts. Firstly, declutter the home. Have a bit of a Winter clean. Get rid of all unwanted presents, things you don’t use, rubbish from the Christmas season, wrapping paper, decorations you never use, old letters and bills, and so forth. Make sure your outer space is ready for action.
Secondly get out more. It’s easier to stay inside in these times and in this weather. Even a short walk can both clear the mind and start the creative process.
Finally, try some yoga or meditation. As well as decluttering our outer space, it’s good to cleanse our inner space. Just five minutes of meditation a day, we make it live more in the moment. It will help you to stop regretting the past and worrying about the future. It will give you a better stillness to work on what you need now to become who you want to be.
Plan New Year's Resolutions 1: The Business Approach
1) Think about what you real want
2) Reprioritise short term and long term goals
3) Split your goals down further into Macro and Micro goals (big and small)
4) Record your goals in a journal (or similar)
5) Find Accountability Partners
This method appeals to very strategic thinkers, and works well for business. The goal here is to re-assess what you want. For companies especially, a year can be a long term and because of 2020 specifically, our needs and wants may have changed drastically. So it’s about looking at the short and the long term. Where do you want to be by the end of 2021 and also where do you want to be in 5 or 10 years? Plan New Year’s Resolutions this year that will help you begin the journey to where you want to be.
Any goal that you had in 2020 that now doesn’t speak to your heart. Throw it out. It no longer serves you. Split your goals down into macro and micro. Macro may be more rewarding but will take longer. Micro, and potentially monthly goals, will keep you hitting those single notes that will keep the melody on track.
Remember to record your goals and follow them up. Writing them down will keep you accountable. Lastly, partners can help too. People that will give you good ideas or simply check in. Announcing to the world in some way, often via social media for individuals, keeps you wanting to not let yourself down.
Plan New Year's Resolutions 2 : The Vision Approach
1) What have I accomplished in 2020?
2) What makes me feel Alive?
3) Why does it feel right?
4) What do I not want or no longer serves a purpose?
5) What can I Accomplish with and without Covid?
This is more the method that calls to me to plan New Year’s Resolutions, and to creative types (although I still have a healthy dose of Method 1 in me too)
I like the idea to plan New Year’s Resolutions this way as it focuses on the positive and keeps our emotions high. You’ll notice there’s no “what did I fail at in 2020” question. That’s not the purpose here.
Ask and write down your thoughts on those 5 questions. Firstly jot down all the things you accomplished in 2020, however menial or small they might feel. You’ll probably find you’ve done more than you thought. Feel free to write down ones that feel silly as well – e.g. finally managed to binge watch all series of Game of Thrones.
Then think about the things that make you feel Alive. The things you loved from this year, but also more widely the things that really get the blood rushing. We want more of this in 2021, obviously!
Then ask yourself the question Why? They say that the most important thing in any endeavour is to find you why. This is the thing that you need when the going gets tough, when all help is lost, when your face is up against the window of KFC longing for that yummy, spicy, breadcrumbed chicken. It is the voice in your head that says “I am going to stick to it because…”
Fourthly, we want to spring clean and chuck out anything that doesn’t serve our purpose. Maybe you always wanted to travel the world, but 2020 has made you realise time is short and family is more important. That’s okay. That’s life. We grow and we change, and often the reason that we aren’t an astronaut like we wanted to be as a kid, isn’t because we didn’t follow the dream. It’s because as we got older the dream did not serve us. So it’s important with the massive diversion we took in 2020 to get back on track – the right track for us at the moment.
Finally think about what you can accomplish this year. I would split it into the dream world if life returns completely to normal, and then a set of goals of what we can accomplish in the world that we currently live in. Having a dual set of goals may be confusing but I believe it’s the only way we can feel rewarded this year. If we make all of our goals limited, and we won’t believe the dream of the life that we really want. If we make all of them visionary, the world may not be able to grant us the space and freedom to complete them.
So the key here is in the mix. Then write down a final set of resolutions for the year ahead.
Plan New Year's Resolutions 3: The Pragmatic Approach
1) What do I want to keep from Covid?
2) What do I want to reclaim?
3) What could I do better at this year?
The final method has some elements of the vision method, but looks at things more pragmatically with three questions to ask yourself. It’s a simple way to plan New Year’s Resolutions.
Firstly what have you enjoyed during 2020. What did you potentially newly discover or keep up during the previous year. We like these – put these in the plan for 2021. Secondly think about what you haven’t been able to do, and what you want to reclaim in your life. Think about ways that you could do this in the present situation. Maybe you want to run the London marathon but you don’t know if it will be cancelled – potentially running your own marathon distance would be a goal you can achieve. But it’s also important to dream so if there are things you really want to do, then put them down. Dream of a time when you can, and prepare for that time.
Finally, look at the things that you can do better at this year. Maybe you started doing some things in 2020 but you just fell short of them. By using the output of these three questions, you’ll be able to draw together a list of goals for the year ahead.
Tools To Keep You On Track
1) Diary or Microsoft Word
2) Notebook or Note Apps
3) Planner or Outlook/Asana etc
4) Friends/Accountability Partners or Social Media
5) Books
6) Apps
There are a variety of tools that we have at our disposal to plan New Year’s Resolutions and then to follow through, but I believe these are the baseline. Personally, I prefer to keep things quite traditional with pen and paper. I find writing out things helps keep me on track. Ohers prefer to keep everything digital and at within phone’s reach. Since we always carry around phones (and sometimes tablets and laptops for some people), I understand this can be more convenient that lugging diaries around the place.
A trifector of diary, notebook and planner will set you on the right track. They may look similar – and they do have their overlaps – but they serve different purposes. A planner will allow you to look ahead, a notebook will be good for the moment, and a diary will document what has happened.
I’m currently using the Clever Fox Planner on the recommendations of a friend. It’s great. It allows you to plan our yearly, monthly and weekly goals as well as developing habits, affirmations and gratitude. All in one book. This helps set you up for success and keep you on track. Where a notebook helps I find is in terms of creative ideas in the present, or just in terms of taking notes. What’s going well or needs improving? New goals to think about? And so forth. I do use Samsung Notes on my phone as well. For some of my goals, like trying to keep my meat intake under 100 days, I would write each day I had meat and what I had. It was a fun way of seeing what I was eating, but it kept me in check.
For those of you who prefer digital resources, as well as numerous note apps, there are some great programs like the Calendar and Task functions of Outlook, and a whole host of other programs like Asana, Trello, and Microsoft Teams that will allow you to plan both individually and with a team if needed.
Finally I don’t think you can beat a good old diary, or maybe Microsoft Word, or even a social media post daily to show what you have accomplished. By looking back at the end of the month and the year, you’ll be able to see the progression. You’ll also feel more positive as we tend to forget the things that we have done.
These will keep you on the straight and narrow, but friends, books and apps are the cherry on top. Accountability Partners and Friends will make sure you get things done or, at the very least, make you feel bad about the fact that you aren’t doing them. When you vocalising your goals to the world, they become real. This propels actions and increases guilt when not performed.
I find that a monthly post on Facebook with my goals keeps me in check because I then want to be able to update people the next month, or at least be prepared if anyone asks how things are going!
Books are an underrated resourced to set you on your way, to give you new ideas, and to validate your approach. Currently I’ve been reading The Miracle Morning which is all about habits each morning to set yourself up for long term success. If you’re looking to do something inparticular, look on Google for help. As well as books, there are so many resources to help you. Want to pick up the guitar? There are countless sites with basic chords, the chords to songs you want, Youtube videos of techniques and so forth. Apps as well will help. Want to learn to do handstands? There’s an app for that. Want to track your calories? My Fitness Pal. Want to track your exercise? Stava. Or Fitbit. Or Garmin. There’s a whole load of resources to both help and record. Use them as you’ll build up a habit, and then it will become second nature.
Let's Make It Happen
I truly hope that this will give you some ideas on how to set goals over the coming year, and follow through on them. If you’d like to see my goals for this year, check them out here.
This isn’t an exhaustive list – far from it – so if you have any further suggestions, or comments, I’d love to see the below.
I hope you succeed in all your endeavours!