Are you spending more time planning your next trip, your next vacation, your weekend plans, what’s for dinner than your year ahead?
Keep on reading! This will be worthwhile for your life!
I just spent this afternoon doing a 2021 year review and 2022 goals.
I actually have been looking forward to it all week!
I first started this in 2019. I got some ideas from one of Michael Hyatt’s books, Your Best Year Ever, and Rachel Hollis’s podcast.
First, I do a year review, in this case of 2021. I sit down with my planner and start back in January flipping through it and have 3 columns on paper: what happened that was awesome, what I never want to do again, and what made me feel like I was living my best life.
So some things that were awesome for me in 2021:
- I started working with a career coach
- Took painting classes
- Left a toxic job and took time off
- Went to Florida to see family
- got my Fellowship from the AGD (Academy of General Dentistry)
- Started working on my health by investing in a nutritionist/accountability coach
Some things that I never want to do again:
- work FT in dentistry
- move across country
- be underpaid for my worth and value as I was in a position I had
- get a dental license in another state
- continue to eat poorly, gain weight, and have high cholesterol
And finally, things that made me feel like I was living the good life:
- getting regular massages
- Being fitted for my own golf clubs
- having time off and time abundance
- sitting out in our backyard in NC
- celebrating
- travel (going to FL, back to OH to see fam, Austin for AGD conference)
I hope you can see already how insightful and amazing this is to do! And these are just a handful of items from each of my 3 columns.
Then I made goals for the year in 9 various categories – spiritual, intellectual, emotional, physical, marital, social, vocational, avocational, and financial. I usually try to list 3-5 goals in each.
These are to be S.M.A.R.T. goals – specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound. I’ll admit mine are not always that but it’s good to have something to keep working on 😉
I’ll share a few below to give you some ideas.
- Spiritual
- Meditate daily
- Practice gratitude
- Keep working on developing my intuition and listening to it
- Intellectual
- Read 2 books/month
- Write 1 blog post/week
- Emotional
- Continue to see my therapist
- Take time to slow down and rest
- Physical
- Daily walks
- Strength workouts 3x/week
- Get back into running (possible 10 miler 10/22/2022)
- Marital
- 2 vacations/year together
- Fun date nights (other than just going out to eat 🙂
- Social
- Make friends here
- Running store group runs
- Vocational
- Keep working on what’s my next
- Coaching training or ?
- Avocational
- Golf at least 2x/month
- Explore – new cities, hikes, things to do
- Financial
- Get back on track saving
- Pay extra to mortgage
- Keep having our budget meetings
Again, it took just a couple hours to do this. Some people may block out a half or even whole day. I love reviewing the year and realizing how much happened and how much I’ve done. It’s great to think on what you don’t want to do anymore, have on your calendar, or what is not beneficial to live the life you desire.
Be deliberate about your time! I strongly encourage you to take the time to plan your year ahead. And, look at the year behind to help know what you want in year ahead.
Cheers! Happy New Year! Let’s do 2022!
