The trouble with New Year’s Resolutions is that they end up being a list of “shoulds,” “chastisements,” or “corrections” instead of a list of things you are DRAWN TO. If you’re like me, you make the same resolutions every year because you don’t feel motivated to act on them, even though you think you SHOULD. Your New Year’s Resolution-making session turns out to be a giant finger-shaking at yourself for what you did NOT do because you were NOT DRAWN to do it! After your initial enthusiasm at the beginning of January, it is easy to excuse yourself from sticking to your resolutions, with the idea that you’ll “try again next year.”
Dreams Are Different
It’s an entirely different matter when it comes to your dreams for your life. When you make a list of dreams you are naming the things that you WANT for your life. You won’t be tempted to excuse yourself from going after the things you want for your life! (If you are tempted, it means you don’t want them badly enough, and you need to find out more about yourself and what you DO want.) When you are aware of what you WANT for your life, you’ll be delighted at what you achieve. At the end of the year you can celebrate your achievements instead of scolding yourself for the things you haven’t achieved. Then you can make an updated “Dream List” for the year to come!Here’s How To Get Started
1. Look at the BIG PICTURE of your life.
Today’s chores may loom large, but put them out of your mind when you look at the big picture. Describe the way you want your life to be and list the things you want for your life. The things you want for your life can be physical, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual – include them all.
2. Decide if your everyday routines CONTRIBUTE to or DETRACT from the way you want your life to be.
Is your life cluttered with reading and responding to a daily deluge of emails and social media posts? With cleaning up after everybody else’s mess, keeping records and paying bills, serving on committees and meeting social obligations? Keep the ones that contribute, eliminate the ones that detract.
3. Use Your Power of SELECTIVITY.
If you had to move away and had only one small suitcase to take a few things, what would they be? You’d be forced to be highly selective because you would want your most treasured things. For me, it would be my fiddle and my favorite books. Having limited space helps you identify what is most important to you.
It’s the same way with your TIME. We all have 24 hours a day and we spend over half these hours sleeping and acquiring food, clothing and shelter. If you aren’t selective, you can easily end up spending most of your day on your needs to “survive,” and end up with no time for your needs to “thrive.”
Even when it comes to your survival needs, you have many choices for HOW you will meet these needs, and you can actively select some choices over others. For your WORK, you can grow your own food, you can flip hamburgers, you can be the strategist for a high-tech corporation, you can produce works of art, or you can find a specialty niche and run your own business. You can choose and use your work to help make your life the way you want it to be.
Likewise, every choice you make will have some bearing on the kind of life you live, and you can make this work to your advantage by being selective:
LIVING QUARTERS: Is your abode cluttered with piles of books, magazines and papers? Are your closets cluttered with too many clothes? Using your power of selectivity, keep what enhances your life and throw out everything that doesn’t contribute to how you want your life to be!
FAMILY: Is your life so cluttered with the “To Do Lists” of other family members that you never get around to your own? It helps to remember that you CHOSE to raise a family as part of how you wanted your life to be, but this doesn’t mean you are a “slave” to your family or that you must turn your back on other things you want for your life.
RECREATION: Is your day cluttered with so many chores that you never have time to read, listen to music, go hiking, or just relax and enjoy “being”? Using your power of selectivity,choose and use your recreation to help make your life the way you want it to be.
SOCIALIZING: Is your life cluttered with all sorts of people that crowd out your dearest friends? Do you clutter up your week with a slew of social events you feel obligated to attend? Using your power of selectivity, choose and use your social events to help make your life the way you want it to be!
With a little bit of thought and selectivity you can come up with your Dream Work, your Dream Living Quarters, your Dream Family, your Dream Recreation, and you Dream Socializing and you can make each of these categories contribute to your dreams for your life.
Then – instead of spending New Year’s feeling guilty and making “corrective” Resolutions – you will be spending the entire year FEELING ALIVE and making your dreams come true!
I’d love to hear how these steps work for you — feel free to email me at Terry@YourRecipeForLivingCoach.com, or post a comment on my Break Free Blog atwww.YourRecipeForLivingCoach.com. Please know that you are welcome to share this BREAK FREE TIP by forwarding this message to a friend or colleague.
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