2022 November 29 Time to start goal setting

Hi, this is Jim Cranston from 7EveryMinute and 7EveryMinute.com, the podcast and website by, for, and about Baby Boomers. Thanks for joining me tonight to talk about what we're going to do over the next few weeks to prepare for next year. So if you like what you hear, please remember to hit that like button and tell your friends. If not, please drop me a note and tell me what you'd like me to cover. 

So first off, I hope everyone had the best Thanksgiving possible. I was fortunate to see my children and grandchildren, which is always just wonderful. I also hope everyone managed to avoid all the deals on Black Friday - a name I really don't care for. You know, money saving tip #1: if you didn't need something at full price, you probably didn't need it at a slight discount. But buying things isn’t what we're all here about.

Money saving tip #2: short term people buy things. Long term people buy assets. What's one of the best assets that we can invest in? It's our own self worth and life satisfaction. So with just 26 days until Christmas, and 33 days until New Year's, what's the next thing we should be thinking about? Setting goals for the coming year. 

Remember, resolutions are very difficult to make actionable. What will really move you forward are goals. So now is the time to start making a list of SMART goals. Remember, smart goals are  Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant (or Reach / Stretch goals)  and Time based, something with a deadline. We'll go through this in detail again, but the point is, with most of the year behind us, now is the time to start thinking about what went right this year and what we'd like to change.

At this point, it's a good idea to just start with the list of everything we'd like to do if we had endless time and maybe even endless money. If there is nothing at all standing in your way, what are the things you would like to do this year? Seriously, don't raise any objections. Just a list of what you would like to do. You want to learn to fly? Add it to the list. Want to see Japan? Add it to the list. Want to start a company? Add that to the list, too. Want to just retire, and not work at all? Add it onto the list. A very important point: Don't judge yourself when you're writing the list. 

This is an opportunity to be creative, not to criticize yourself. Give yourself some grace and just look at moving forward from here. The point of this part of the exercise is to just get all the thoughts out of your head and onto paper. Another important point to mention, I really mean onto paper. Not onto a screen, not voice typing. If you're able, please try to physically write them down.

Why? Because writing involves much more of your mind and makes the thought more tangible. It'll help later on, in the next steps, because your mind will have more context and sensations to remember what you were writing. Another important point is that this isn't a one and done effort. 

Work on it for a couple days, a week, maybe even longer. The first goals will come readily to your mind, but upon further thought, they may turn out to be not really all that important. But after a few days, when the deeper thoughts start to appear, then you'll be able to really look at your growing list and sort the silly ideas from your real life goals. That's where the fun and the magic starts to begin. 

But that, dear friends, is for next week. For this week, I'd encourage you to grab a notebook. Maybe even go buy a nice little notebook that you can use for many months, and start at the very beginning. On the cover or on the first page, boldly write a description and a statement to yourself. John's Life Roadmap for 2023, or Mary's New Life for My 67th Year.

You can just write goals, but in reality, it's much more than that. You're asking your inner self what you really want to do for the next. Those are pretty important decisions, so I would encourage you to make a big deal out of it. So get a notebook, write a big bold statement in it, and then start writing down your SMART goals for the next year.

Don't skip anything. If it's important to you at the moment, write it down. We'll look at them again later and pick out the ones that matter most to us. But for now, the most important thing is just to get going. So we're going to go through all the steps over the next few weeks. But I just wanted to get us started on this.

That's it for the evening. Remember UKR7.com. That's our page of donation links for the people in Ukraine. If you're able and interested, please check it out, see if there's anything you can do. The link to the World Central Kitchen is on that page at the very top. Those people are really amazing. They've served millions of meals there. They're totally humanitarian, providing meals for people in need. Remember, one of the best ways to care for yourself is to care for others. So if you can and you're able, please check out not only World Central Kitchen, but a lot of links at UKR7.com.

So that's it for the evening. Thanks for stopping by. If you found something interesting and useful, please pass it along, and please hit that LIKE button. If not, please drop me a comment as to what you'd like to hear. Have a great week, and remember to live the life that you dream of, because that's the path to true contentment. Love and encouragement to everyone. See you next week on 7EveryMinute and 7EveryMinute.com Thank you.