EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

We made it!

2022 here we are, well not quite but now what?

Chances are you’ve spent the last few months saying 2022 has to be better so let’s do our best to make that happen. Let’s face it the last couple of years have been a bit of a shit show for most people. For some they’ve been amazing years and for others full of tragedy. I’ve been in that middle ground where it hasn’t been great, but it hasn’t been terrible.

Now it’s up to me and to you to work on what we can control and make 2022 the best year we possibly can. Now what on earth does what a feeling that song have to do with planning your year?  If you listen to the lyrics take your passion make it happen pictures come alive you can dance right through your life. I think it’s kind of perfect the pictures in our minds are what help us to create the big plans and the teeny tiny goals. Besides if you google songs about planning your year there are really limited options.

Planning Your Year

For me planning my year begins in December and continues nearly till the end of January. When I finally feel like I’ve assembled all the pieces got my ducks in a row that kind of thing.

Planning your year is so much more than setting some lofty new year’s resolutions after to many champagnes. Do that and you’re likely to be one of those statistics that doesn’t achieve what that moment of wohooo I can do anything was.  Success and failure rates over that first six months of those news resolutions well after one-week 75 percent of people are successful, two weeks 71 after one month the number drops and drops and drops. Till about 46 of people who actually make a resolution are successful in keeping it. And what do we set? we want to exercise, lose weight, get organized, learn a new skill or a hobby, live life to the fullest, save more money, spend less money, quit smoking, spend more time with family and friends, travel more, read more, all sounds pretty reasonable and exhausting.

So why if we set resolutions that seem blindingly obvious do most of us fail? have you heard that saying if you fail to plan you are planning to fail by Benjamin franklin?  Well that’s the biggest reason. Which is why we’re going to tackle planning your 2022 like the extraordinary success I know you can and want it to be. Some other reasons we don’t measure up to the fireworks visions we have of ourselves are:

•         things like not creating the daily habits to support us
•         thinking too big, not actually wanting it
•         trying to do it all alone
•         not celebrating as we go
•         and well giving up too soon

So, let’s work together to make sure that doesn’t happen to you and yes, I’m talking to myself here too.

Reflection

Let’s be honest 2021 was not a great year but I want you to reflect on it. I want you to think about how you showed up. Are you happy with what you did? could you have done something differently?  Did you step outside of your comfort zone? Were you fully present with people? What could you have done better?  What can you let go of that didn’t serve you in 2021? Is there something that’s you feel really really really holding you back? Reflect on it and then we want to let it go.

Setting Goals, The Right Way

When most people set a resolution with their mates that they’re gonna smoke less, get back into their skinny jeans and have more money. They think they’re setting goals. Big problem *babom sound effect* they are not, a goal is so much more. How much less are you going to smoke? What size skinny jeans? How much is more money?

You see to achieve something you want you really need to get specific. That’s where setting smart goals comes in. So, what is SMART? Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant or Realistic, and Timely. The attainment of the goal is the destination, but the magic is what happens to you as a person while you’re working towards that goal. Who do you need to be? What do you need to do? How do you need to think?  What do you need to feel in order to achieve something you really want? That’s special.

Way back long ago when we’re at school we start learning how to do this, but we don’t know what we’re really doing. Stick with me, our teacher said an assignment. Specific. We know what needs to happen for it to be deemed complete they know our age our skills our knowledge etc. and we can do it. It’s relevant to our education. There’s a clearly defined time. The only thing missing really is that we didn’t create it and that’s probably why some of us don’t do so well on those assignments.

Letting Go

Then what I want you to do is if you write it down burn it get rid of that crap and then on the flip side if there was something amazing that happened in 2021 celebrate every second of that with a friend it’ll be fabulous have a great time but whether you’re looking at the positive or the negative let it go.

10 Step Formula

Here’s a really simple 10 step formula to set a goal.

1. Work out what the goal is, be very detailed. If your goal is to own a new car, what’s the make? What extras do you want? Color, is it manual? is it auto? All the kitten caboodle.
2. Get a taste of your goal. I’m all for doing this before you get further along in the process. So, using the car example I’d go for a test drive in your gold car take a picture of you with it while you’re there sitting in the car. Do you still want it after the drive?
3. You want to work out what steps are needed to reach your goal. Staying with a car idea, will you need to save money?  will you need to arrange finance?
4. Then we’re going to write a smart goal. So smart goals been detailed for a gazillion years and we just went over it. And we want to go, it’s Specific you’ll own XYZ car, Measurable you’ll need to save a thousand dollars a month every month for 10 months, Achievable you have saved ten thousand dollars in ten months for that car deposit, Realistic are you willing and able to save the money uh-oh, and Timely on the first of the twelfth 2022 you’ll be parking XYZ car in your garage.
5. Then I want you to turn that goal into a powerful statement. It’s the 1st of December 2022 and I’m so proud and grateful for what I’ve been able to achieve. I felt like a princess driving in my new XYZ car into the garage this morning. Now I can get anywhere I want in the style I like to travel. I’ve got a DVD player in the back so the kids aren’t annoying me with “are we there yet”. I no longer have to rely on public transport when john has the car, who’s John? So now I have so much extra time to do what I want when I want. How does that sound?
6. Then I want you to surround yourself with a goal. Keep a picture of the goal in your diary, on the fridge, the bathroom mirror, everywhere. And keep copies of that statement visible everywhere as well. For this goal (car goal example) I’d also get copies of the car brochures if you can get them to give you one. And then stick a miniature version of the car in your handbag that’s a cool trick.
7. And keep a goal tracker handy, for each goal it’ll be different. For a savings goal you’d have an *expensive expenditure sheet that’s hard to say. And I want you to review it weekly but we’re going to get to more of that later.
8. Then I want you to get a goal friend. In this case it might be great to have a friend that’s a savings pal doesn’t actually have to be a person. That goal friend could actually be the direct debit taking money out of your savings account and putting it into a better account for you that you can’t access when you want to buy shoes. How good would that friend be for you? So, if it’s a fitness friend maybe they check in with you to keep you on track you need them.
9. Then I want you to stay in tune with your goal. Some people set and forget and see what happens. I’m more of a keep experiencing your goal so you keep the fire in your belly. Tell the guy at the car yard what you’re trying to do and see if he’ll let you sit in the car once a week. There’s nothing like that smell of a brand-new car to keep wanting it. If it’s a slinky black dress, go into a shop and try it on every single week.
10. Then I want you to celebrate your goal. I’d do this in little steps and then have a massive celebration. So, staying with the car celebrate every thousand bucks with a small treat. Maybe buy yourself a coffee if you’ve given it up to save the money. And then when you get to the end you need a big celebration, because reaching a goal is a big thing that many people don’t fully appreciate. I’d probably give my car a new name, pop a bottle of champagne in it. And when I drove into my driveway for the first time crack it open, but don’t crack it open on the bonnet of your car like you do on a boat that would be bad.

📹
Produced by Rebecca Saunders and Pyrmont Studios

🎶
What a Feeling
Songwriters: Irene Cara / Giorgio Moroder / Keith Forsey
© Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Warner Chappell Music, Inc

🎙️
Produced by Samantha Leith / Michael Allen
Vocals by Samantha Leith

Email me the latest episodes

FOLLOW ME ON