EP 205 Reflections Before Resolutions
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[00:00:00] Welcome to the bold goal crusher podcast for anyone looking to stop letting life get in the way and start crushing bold goals. I'm your host, Sara Mayer, and I'm thrilled to navigate this journey with you because it's time to start boldly achieving without working double time. So let's dive in.
Sara Mayer: Hello, bold goal crushers. I'm super excited about this episode. I'm excited about every episode. Happy holidays. This is the time of year that I hope that you have allowed the magic to settle into your life and you're not so stressed. Hopefully you've planned out your holidays and you are truly enjoying the magic of the season.
Sara Mayer: It's also the time of year that people start to think about finishing the year strong, next year what they might want to accomplish, the things that maybe they [00:01:00] haven't done. And I don't know if that's you, but if you've already started thinking about next year resolutions, goals, themes, words, vision boards, any of those things, I want you to stop really quickly and take a pause because it's critically important that before we start setting our goals or our resolutions, if you do that, That we take a pause and really reflect on our personal and professional experiences over this past year.
Sara Mayer: There's a lot of research out there on the positive effects of self reflection. And so often we do this analysis of how we did last year in the last month of the year, December, and we forget about all the things that have happened throughout all the months. So [00:02:00] I do encourage you to do weekly reflection.
Sara Mayer: Some people do daily. I think weekly is enough. If you don't do any reflection, start there. But most importantly, before you go setting your next goals, the next things that you want to achieve, it's time to take a step back, highlight your year and come at it from a place of positivity rather than a place of I didn't do this and I didn't do this and I never got to that and I never did that.
Sara Mayer: That's not healthy. So it's. Always great to come at it from a place of positivity. This allows you to take those nuggets that you learn from the reflection and use it for personal growth and learning so that you are able to then really craft your next year. So when you're reflecting. Again, come at it from a place of positivity.
Sara Mayer: The question should be positive. I have [00:03:00] a, I do have a yearly reflection worksheet. I also have a weekly one and you can find that on my website, sarahmayer. com slash free dash tools dash and. Dash resources. So go ahead and check those out. You can also find those on the drop down and I'll link those in the show notes.
Sara Mayer: One of the things that we want to do is we really want to highlight the entire year. So a question that you could ask yourself is what are the highlights of the past year? What are the highlights of the past year? What did you learn about yourself in the past year? What brought you joy? What accomplishments are you most proud of?
Sara Mayer: And in what areas did you learn and grow? Those are just a few of the questions. You could also ask yourself, when did I [00:04:00] feel the most creative? What season felt right to me? What month truly lit me up? What activities did I really enjoy? And now you do need to take a look at some of the things that maybe didn't go so well.
Sara Mayer: But I want you to celebrate all the positive things first. I want you to truly sit and think about all those things that you were able to accomplish. What were some of the obstacles that you overcame? What challenges were presented to you that you were able to crush? In what areas do you feel that you learned the most?
Sara Mayer: And now it's time to really think about What do you want more of? If you could do more of that, what would it be? How do you want your day to be designed? After you sit in a lot of those questions, then it's [00:05:00] time to think about what got in the way. What stopped you from moving forward on certain things?
Sara Mayer: Spend. More time on the positive coming from a place of positivity and a limited amount of time on the challenges and things that stopped you in your tracks. And then next, it's time to really think about who came into your life or helped you throughout your journey that really provided you that support guidance mentorship.
Sara Mayer: And then if you were able to do it all over again, are there things that you may change about the year? What would you do differently? What would you do more of? What would you eliminate completely? After you sit with that for a little bit, it's time to truly celebrate your achievements. I always I cringe, I guess is the word.
Sara Mayer: I don't know if that's really the word, but I cringe [00:06:00] when I see people who are like, here's my next new year's resolutions yet or goals because some people don't do resolutions or here's my next theme, but they never recapped what they did. I accomplished this. It's like closing the loop of what you accomplish.
Sara Mayer: So truly celebrate that incur. I encourage you. Yeah. To acknowledge your efforts to put them out there to really celebrate the progress you made because your big, bold goal. If it truly is a big, bold goal, you probably can't accomplish it in a year. So it's time to celebrate the steps you took to get towards that goal.
Sara Mayer: What steps did you move forward to get there? What steps did you take to live the life you want to live, even though it may take you 10 years to get there? Okay, celebrating those achievements is so critical and it's big and small victories. Maybe it's [00:07:00] sharing some of your personal story throughout the year of challenges that you faced in order to achieve that goal and overcame.
Sara Mayer: But those celebrations not only remind yourself that you can accomplish tough things, they also remind others and they find people who are maybe also working on the same type of goals. So celebrate those achievements. And now it's time to really look at your reflection worksheet and pull out the things that were really positive, things you want more of do you want to pick up your kid more at school?
Sara Mayer: Although I've heard those carpool lines are. Quite not fun, but do you want to pick up your kid more? Do you want to spend more time being creative? Do you want to get ahead on recording your podcasts or some of the things that you have to do in your home? So think about those things that really lit you up and that you want to do [00:08:00] more of.
Sara Mayer: And so start to jot those down. That's super important because then that Helps your brain to start thinking about ways to present you with more of those opportunities. Maybe you want to spend more time writing your book. Maybe you want to spend more time working on your business instead of in your business, because you really enjoyed that.
Sara Mayer: But it all comes from those nuggets at the beginning of the reflection. And those are the things that you're going to jot down and you're going to ensure when you craft your goals for the next year, you're putting those at the forefront because you already know those are times and things that bring you joy and allow you to move forward.
Sara Mayer: And then it's time to truly identify and learn from your challenges. Transcribed Really exploring the concept of resilience from those setbacks where you did face a setback, but you were able to overcome it. And how can you overcome those things a little more [00:09:00] quickly? And so there are many challenges that you probably faced in the year.
Sara Mayer: And it's okay at this point to list those if you did in the reflection part. And then really think about the lesson, what's the lesson in those setbacks? What are the lessons in those obstacles? What did you learn from them? Because there really are no failures. There are no wrong decisions. It's really a lesson you're learning throughout those processes.
Sara Mayer: And those setbacks are truly opportunities for growth. And then next up is It's critically important to think about your values. When you look at your year, was your year aligned with your values? Was it out of alignment for some reason? And it's important to know your core values, but also to align your goals with your core values.[00:10:00]
Sara Mayer: But take it one more step and align your daily life with your core values. It's not that easy. And to set and crush goals, but the reflection is the key that guide you for the future. Now, when we start to think about setting goals, I think it's really important to remember that resolutions are resolving not to do something.
Sara Mayer: Themes, words of the day, words of the year, vision boards, and goal setting. They're all a mechanism. to help you achieve. They're an achievement mechanism. You need to choose what works best for you. And that's, what's really critical. It doesn't matter what you set. You could do any of those things or all of those things or none of those things.
Sara Mayer: But what's really important is that when you're setting meaningful goals, there's a connection between this reflection and [00:11:00] informed setting. Your reflection should guide. What your path is for next year to ensure that you're able to course, correct, but also able to continue on the path that was working.
Sara Mayer: Now, I know that many times people will talk about smart goals and I don't like them because as you reflect and get all these nuggets, I think it's important to ask yourself a question. Am I really dreaming big? Am I really being bold with my goals? Or am I playing it safe because I'm chasing achievement?
Sara Mayer: So are you really playing big? Or are you chasing achievement? Because those are two different things. And if you're not playing big, and if you're not setting bold goals, I encourage you to look at your reflection and think about all the things that you said that you wanted more of, or that you were very proud [00:12:00] of, and think of a way and brainstorm, jot everything down that will help you get closer to doing more of that.
Sara Mayer: Now having a plan of action for your goals is critically important, and we're going to talk about that over the next couple weeks. So don't worry. I'm not leaving this as a cliffhanger. I want you to dig in and do that reflection because so many times people start to set goals before they've really taken a look at where they're currently at and bold goal crushers.
Sara Mayer: If you were involved last year, we're having a new year party and this party is all about setting goals that work for you so you can crush your goals and everything that gets away, it gets in the way in the year. So get ready for that. It will launch. The 26th of December, you'll be able to start signing up and I cannot wait for you to see all the speakers and all the lessons in the [00:13:00] New Year's part because this party will set you up for success for your next year.
Sara Mayer: So get ready because you're going to crush your goals and everything that gets in the way. So let's get to it again, download that worksheet and do your yearly reflection.
Sara Mayer: Thank you for tuning into the bold goal crusher podcast where we crush goals and everything that gets in the way. I always love to support my community.
Sara Mayer: I look forward to seeing you crush your goals this year.
