The New Year is already here, and I just sat down this morning to figure out my New Year’s Resolution. I wanted it to actually be achievable goals for the New Year. It was a tough call because I can honestly say I won’t be going to the gym every day (or even once a week… I have 5 kids LOL), I also won’t ALWAYS eat healthily so I’m not going to restrict myself there, either. Every resolution that I considered just didn’t seem right.
I instead thought about what areas of my life I wanted to improve in, and things that I wanted to learn about. It seemed that everything I desire fits into two categories:
- Finances
- Home improvement
- Routine
- Family
Why This Didn’t Work For Me
Instead of heading into the rest of the year with vague resolutions to improve finances, improve our home, and focus on family, I decided to make a list of how I can accomplish all of those things.
I didn’t go overboard. There are so many more things I could have added to my list, but I wanted to start with an achievable goal. I figure that I will be more likely to follow my goals through when I actually have a goal that seems possible, instead of a vague idea to work toward the goal.
I didn’t want this: Spend more time with family.
Instead, I wanted something specific: Dates with kids weekly.
Then, I even went further into it and wrote:
“Dates with kids weekly. One kid each week, rotating schedule. After 5 weeks of individual kid dates, one big family outing. Then start over.
Not all of my achievable goals for the New Year were that long, either. That was probably the most complicated one. (List of all 10 of my goals for the New Year will be listed at the end of the post).
Later tonight I plan on sitting down and making a concrete schedule of dates with the kids. I may make and print out a calendar of the whole year and write it on there. Then I can put it into a binder so that the kids can always look and see when their next date is.
Plus, it might be fun to put a memento from the date in the binder afterward. Then, next year on New Year’s Eve we can look back at all of our date memories from the year.
I wanted to figure out a plan to implement each of the things I wanted to achieve. Once I narrowed it all down and wrote out my detailed list, all of the fun ideas came naturally when I began typing up my plans. The “date binder” was one of those that just came as I was planning.
So – back to the achievable goals for the New Year. Instead of just choosing one or two vague ideas of which areas I wanted to improve in, I came up with 10 smaller achievable goals.
10 Achievable Goals For The New Year
- Follow chore/payment chart (blog post about that is coming soon so check back!!)
- Start seeing a larger increase in the savings account.
- Hire someone to do the yard work. (so serious. we can never keep up and I’m sick of stressing about it.)
- FREAKING LAUNDRY. (and yes, this is how I wrote it on my list. I guess this one might be vague but I will be typing a schedule for everyone in the house to follow.)
- Dates with kids weekly. One kid each week, rotating schedule. After 5 weeks of individual kid dates, one big family outing. Then start over. (We have 5 kids, hence the 5 weeks. If you have less/more, adjust the number accordingly).
- Crunch numbers for vacations for the year before January 14th. Come up with a savings plan and a plan of when to make payments by February 1st.
- Post a new blog post 1 time per week.
- Make $150 on TextBroker every week.
- Lose 40 pounds. 10 pounds every 3 months. First goal: Lose 10 pounds by March 1st.
- Buy “clutter baskets” for each person in the home. Put anything they’ve left lying around the house in those baskets and distribute accordingly after school.
Final Thoughts On Achievable Goals For The New Year
All 10 of these goals are achievable goals for the new year. I won’t have to make a HUGE change in my lifestyle, I’ll just have to plan a little better and look for ways to cut costs while also making more money. Plus, I just need a plan to contain all the freaking clutter that my family accumulates each day.
I never follow through with my New Years Resolutions because I never come up with a list of ways to actually accomplish my goals in life. This time is different.
It may sound crazy to have 10 New Years Resolutions, but if they really are achievable goals for the new year, you can hit your goal sooner and see all the progress you have made. Plus, when you do accomplish one, you can come up with an even bigger goal next time.
Did you set any goals for yourself for the New Year? Tell me about them in the comments!
