Tag: goalsetting

New Year, Now What?

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

It’s a New Year! One of the first things that you are inundated with at the start of any year is an abundance of ads, videos, podcasts, etc to help you make this the best year yet! Another thing you see in abundance is posts from people (who you may or may not know because let’s face it so many are sponsored ads) sharing their resolutions. In many ways it is as though culture is pushing you to make some sort of groundbreaking change because of the new year. But what about those of us who are having a hard time reflecting? What about those of us who need more than a day to think about the trajectory of our next year, five years, ten years, etc?

Some of us just need a couple of days to breathe. If that is your next best step, then that is okay.

Personally, I have not written any goals for 2026 yet. I have reflected on all of the things that brought me joy in 2025. In fact, during 2025, I kept a “Joy Jar.” Most of the time (sometimes I forgot) when something brought me joy, I wrote it down on a scrap of paper and put it in the jar. It was really cool to spend time reviewing all of my moments of joy! Plus, it illustrated what things bring me the most joy. That’s pretty cool knowledge to have!

So knowing what brings me joy, why am I procrastinating on making goals? Simple. I’m not sure what I want my goals to be yet. I know what brings me joy, and I generally know my God-given purpose in life. I also know that there are about 1.7 million things that I would like to do. However, what I need to time to reflect on before setting goals is which of those things I like to do will actually support a bigger purpose. Spoiler, my love of “brain candy” phone games is 100% not supporting my bigger purpose. Facts.

Knowing I’m a little all over the place, what’s next for me?

  1. Pray on it. No matter your faith (feel free to use any of my books if you need to find faith), take time to pray over what truly matters in your life. Pray for your heart, mind, and soul to be opened.
  2. Think about your RIGHT NOW WHY. What is the thing that currently gets you out of bed even when you’ve only had two hours of sleep? What can you do in the next 90 days to fuel that RIGHT NOW WHY?
  3. Visualize what you want your life to look like a year from now. On December 31, 2026, do you want to look back and go “Damn, I did a lot of cool things and am closer to my dreams!” or do you want to go, “Crap. Another year gone and nothing has changed.”
  4. Revisit the dreams you have let go. Maybe you were writing a book that you’ve yet to finish (ME!), or maybe you have wanted to start a podcast. Are these things you really want in life or were they fleeting in a moment? Learning to distinguish lifelong dreams from flights of fancy is a BIG step!
  5. Think about who will be impacted by your dreams coming true! What do you want them to take away from watching you go for your dreams?
  6. When the time is right (within reason, like don’t want until November), write down your goal. Then break it into benchmarks with dates. Remember, a goal without a deadline is just a pipe dream! Also, it is okay if the date changes as long as you don’t give up!
  7. Lastly, as you are working on your goals, remember it is normal if they are not easy or popular. Most things worth working for take hard work, determination, and may be viewed as strange. Do not let what others think stop you from achieving what you have been put on this earth to achieve. YOU CAN DO IT!

Guess it is time for me to take my own advice! Tomorrow, I’m going to get to work!

What about you? Do you know what your next steps are?

XOXO,

The Great Kaysby

9:09…Mission Accomplished

Like my turtle? To most people it is simply a cute turtle made from a cute craft kit. For me, this turtle symbolizes the last of my “missions” aka fun goals while I was 41. Every year, I set out to complete a number of fun things equivalent to my age for the year. Looking back on when I started with “33 While 33” I laugh to myself. In the 8 years of doing this little self fun project, I’ve learned a lot of things (in fact, I probably talked about some of these last May 7). Ready for some life lessons 8 years in the making???

Lesson 1: If you continually set goals that you are never actually willing to work towards, then you probably don’t actually want to achieve those goals, or you have not yet had the right motivation for setting said goals. In my 30s, I frequently put, “I want to lose 20 pounds as one of my goals.” Did it happen? Nope. It was one of those goals that I kept regurgitating on paper because “I thought I should.” There was never an actual purpose attached. Now that I’m older and wiser (HA HA), I realize that losing weight is a great goal, but you have to be willing to make the life changes to do so. It wasn’t until three years ago that I actually began taking steps towards being healthier (giving up soda, working to cut out artificial sweetners, increasing activity). Is the 20 pounds gone? Nope. Do I feel better? Yup! Part of that is the habit changes, and the other part of it is realizing that such a big lifestyle change is a daily process and not an “end goal”.

Lesson 2: If you set a goal on a whim, it is okay to make changes if the goal no longer fits your life’s purpose or current situation. A great example of this is one of my original goals was to do yoga on a beach. Sounds great, right? While I love yoga, and I love the beach, taking a beach vacation was not a family priority for us this year. Thus, I changed the goal to be something more in line with our priorities. By allowing myself to change the goal, I was able to achieve something fun and not feel let down for not accomplishing a fun goal!

Lesson 3: Fun goals for yourself do not have to take a lot of time. Some of my goals for this past year took 15 minutes or less to accomplish. When I do this sort of goal making, it isn’t about things that are difficult or take a long time. These goals are all about making time to do things that I enjoy. Side note, if you didn’t do 41 fun things in the last year, take some to add in some fun. Seriously, one of my goals was doing yoga in the backyard. Anyone, can take time to do yoga in the backyard! Highly recommend doing it during the full moon!

Lesson 4: Your fun goals don’t have to make sense to anyone but you. Mine covered a variety of areas from going to a Broadway show (touring of course!), creating art projects, publishing books, doing some family travel, and hiking. There were other things, but I can’t think of them right now, and my journal is in the other room. The point of this exercise is to let yourself have fun by doing things you enjoy!! No one else will ever enjoy the exact same things you do!

Lesson 5: Write about the fun things you’ve done and take pictures if you’re a visual person! It’s a lot of fun to look back at a journal or a photo album at all the fun things you accomplished in a year!

I feel like I could go and on about this year and my fun goals, but I’d really like to drink the rest of my decaf coffee and finish my bowl of watermelon. My challenge to you is this. Think about some fun goals for yourself and begin working on them before your next birthday! You’ll love the result!!!

XOXO,

The Great Kaysby