How to Set New Year's Goals That Will Transform Your Year

 

1:29 The Difference Between New Year’s Resolutions and New Year’s Goals

8:48 The 3 Qualities You Need to Set Smart New Year’s Goals

17:13 New Year Goal Setting with Rachel Hollis

28:31 Challenge: How to Love the Enthusiasts in Your Life

Resources

2020 Business Boutique Goal Planner

Get going on your goals and make 2020 your best year yet! Order the new Business Boutique 2020 Goal Planner at BusinessBoutique.com/Planner and use the code BBPLANNER to receive Christy’s Setting Goals video that you can watch right now!

If you have a success story you would like to share with the Business Boutique community, email me at podcast@businessboutique.com.

New podcast episodes are available every other week.

Forget about New Year’s resolutions this year. They’re a waste of time.

Instead, set smart New Year’s goals you’ll actually accomplish.

Believe it or not, they’re not the same thing!

The Difference Between New Year’s Resolutions and New Year’s Goals

Resolutions might as well be considered a wish. It’s an idea of something you want to try that year. Sure, it’s fun and inspiring. But the truth is: We fall off the wagon by February. It’s the reason why you can’t find an empty treadmill at the gym in January. But by February, you can walk right into the gym and start running.

Goals are different from resolutions because goals are action oriented.

Zig Ziglar made goal setting popular with something he called the Wheel of Life. We talked about this in a recent podcast episode so if you haven't listened to that already, go back and hear me deep dive into the Wheel of Life in episode 88. To give you a quick recap, there are seven areas in your life you should prioritize and set goals in (especially New Year’s goals!):

1. Career (or business)
2. Finances
3. Spiritual growth
4. Physical health
5. Intellectual growth
6. Family
7. Social

Today, I want to help you start 2020 on the right foot by setting New Year’s goals in each of these areas.

Because your ability to set goals will completely affect not just how you start the year, but also how you end it.

The 3 Qualities You Need to Set Smart New Year’s Goals

Every goal you set should have these three qualities:

1. Specific

A New Year's resolution like, “I want to run more,” doesn’t work because it’s not specific. And when you’re not specific, you can’t track your progress or even know if you’ve accomplished it or not.

For example, if you told me you wanted to run more, I’d ask you, “Well, how? Do you want to do long-distance running? Sprints? Do you want to run on the treadmill or outside? Do you want to do trail runs on your own or join a running group?” There's a lot of different ways for you to run more, so get specific.

2. Measurable

Then, I’d tell you to make the goal measurable by asking, “How much more?” Maybe you can run one mile right now without stopping and you'd like to work your way up to running five miles. Or maybe you want to sign up for a race and run a 5K or a half marathon. What is the measurable distance you want to be able to run in order to know that you've actually achieved this goal?

3. Have a time limit

Finally, I’d tell you to give your goal a time limit by asking, “By when?” If your goal doesn’t have a time limit, you won’t be able to measure whether you actually reached it or not.

Related: How to Write Smart Goals<