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Two Thirds of the Year Left – How are Your New Year’s Resolution’s Going?

May 5, 2010 by 2 Comments

Have you noticed which of your New Year’s Resolution’s have been dumped, and which ones are being achieved?

I’ve noticed that my NYR regarding my fitness level has been achieved and I now enjoy maintaining it.

I also confess that my New Year’s Resolution to keep my office tidy is a dismal failure!

Within a week of tidying my office it becomes identical to what it looked like before I tidied it.  Since the beginning of the year I’ve tidied my office only once.

So I ask myself these questions: -

  • Was my NYR realistic?

I thought it was.  Tidying isn’t difficult, but it’s boring.

  • Did I plan it properly?

What’s to plan?  Start at one end and go through to the other end!

  • Did I get a friend or coach to help me stay accountable and in action?

No I didn’t.

  • What was the cause of my broken NYR?

It’s boring, I prefer to get on with my work.

  • Can I identify an underlying belief or beliefs that keep me stuck with an untidy office?

I find tidying my office a boring task.   I need to focus on my work, not on keeping the office tidy.

I’m actually an untidy person in many areas of my life – check out my shed!

Bingo!   My beliefs are running the show.

I should know better.  Our lives are largely a reflection of our beliefs.        Our beliefs are automatic – they occur without our having to remember or think about them.  That’s great if the beliefs are positive and useful, but not great if they are negative and useless!

OK, I need to work on my beliefs about me being a tidy person and capable of keeping things tidy, and actually doing it and maintaining it, just like I did with my fitness.

What about you?

Would you care to reflect on your broken NYR’s and see if you can identify something deeper and more powerful to work on to help you achieve your NYR?

Follow my process or even create your own way of reflecting.

Just pick a broken NYR, ask the same questions and see if you can discover the underlying belief that you can improve upon – and watch the difference!

I’m going to share what I do from now on about changing my beliefs about being tidy.

Let’s track and see what works. I’ll post progress photos of my office, then shed and garage.

I invite you to join me and let’s do this together.

Let’s each choose a broken NYR and help each other to achieve it?

Have your say below. I look forward to hearing from you.

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How to Win the Game of New Year’s Resolutions!

January 9, 2010 by 1 Comment

Why do we make NYR’s?   If they are that important why do we wait until the New Year?

Are we simply conditioned by our culture to make and, yes, even break NYRs?  Too often they slip, don’t they?

However, you’ve made your NYR, so… Oh… you made a number of NYRs this year!

You’ve probably dropped out on a couple of them already – and it’s only day 7!

OK, enough with the challenge – let’s win the game of NYR.

Successful players focus only on the most important realistic resolution that can be planned supported and achieved.

They line up all the ‘cards’ to ensure they have a royal flush!

Their success motivates them to repeat the process.

Success building on success.

So, firstly choose your most important realistic resolution – write it down.

Now list the cards – the various ways you are going to ensure you achieve your winning hand.

Remember, successful players ensure they have all the right cards – a fully integrated plan with a range of support mechanisms (‘cards’), not just one, such as: -

  • hiring a coach to help you plan and work on it
  • writing about it every morning, midday and evening in your journal
  • creating a vision board as a desk top background
  • enlisting the help of a trusted friend to keep you accountable
  • celebrating small victories (time spent on track) – in a way that won’t lead you off your path
  • reminding yourself every hour why the resolution is so important to you
  • having a recovery plan that starts the moment you drop off track, as you might sometimes
  • planning a powerful reinforcing reward on your success

If your NYR is overcoming an addiction you must enlist specialised help, otherwise you aren’t serious.

If your NYR is about changing an undesirable (non-addiction based) habit, ensure you have a worthy habit to replace it with, otherwise you’ll be pushing something soft and smelly uphill with a piece of string.

Regardless of what your NYR is, you must have a fully integrated realistic plan and enlist the right helper/s who will coach support and remind you and keep you accountable.

If you are not prepared to do that, then your NYR probably isn’t that important.   You’d be better off making another choice – one that you really desire and will properly prepare to ensure winning.

Start again right now, make a comment and keep us informed of your progress and share how you achieved your royal flush.

To your success.

David Deane-Spread

Filed Under: Attitude Tagged With: , , , ,

Here’s a simple New Years Resolution Ready Reckoner.

December 31, 2009 by 2 Comments

Before we even think about what your goals are and what you want to achieve in 2010 this could be a breakthrough for you to remember “where you’re at and where you want to go”. It’s not a formula that you have to “get right” or write down a heap of stuff to work out.

Here’s how it looks for me for 2010: 1/3/4/20/50/90/500

Here’s how it works – each number is symbolic and represents something powerful for you. Its purpose is to be your memory jogger of what’s important to you as you go through the year.

One issue for many people with goals and resolutions is actually remembering them as the year goes on. We get caught up in day to day stuff and simply do not give our well intended goals any attention or focus so no wonder we can’t achieve them.

Another issue is we don’t break our goals down into bite size chunks. There is no use getting all the way to the end of the year and saying “Hmm, didn’t do so well there!”

By breaking everything down into bite size chunks we can track our progress. This way we can re-evaluate how we’re going and whether we need to change our activities to get where we want to be.

It’s also important to include both your personal and business goals. We can often make our goals all around what we want to achieve in business, guilty as charged, and forget the personal stuff. So balance that up. It could be your annual leave, physical fitness or time out through the year.

So what’s my “Ready Reckoner” mean? Well, it’s personal but I will tell you this.

The 1 represents 1 Vulcan 2000 cruiser motorbike, because I deserve it, I work hard (Plus I turn 50 in April).

So go to work and short list what’s important for you and give it a number.

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