19 Dec From 1% to 100% – Before You Make Your New Year’s Resolutions, Do These 3 Things!

I have made over 100 new year’s resolutions in my lifetime, and of those, maybe 1% actually happened. Most years I wrote them down, and after a week, never looked at them again. I was more tied to the idea of setting resolutions than the actual resolutions themselves.

Now that we’re at the end of another year, it’s the perfect time to reflect on this past year and set outcomes for the new year. Personally, I find this to be an amazing ritual! When you sit down to do this for yourself, follow these three steps:

1. First, identify your successes from the past year. Whether you wrote down your resolutions or not, take the time to identify everything that went right this year. Make a written or typed list of the times you took a risk, the relationships you strengthened, the memories you made, and the fun you had – anything and everything that you liked about the year. Be specific! Don’t spend any energy on what didn’t happen or what you didn’t like about the year. This step is all about giving thanks for everything great in your life. It will immediately raise your vibration, so that you go into the rest of your planning over flowing with high energy and focused on the positive.

2. The next step is to DREAM. Most of us stop dreaming in our early twenties, and just let life happen. Life didn’t work out as planned, so we just gave in to “reality”. We are filled with should’s, must’s, and have to’s, which deplete our energy, instead of visions of what would truly light us up from our core. At that point we shake our heads and ask ourselves, “Is this all there is?”

Utilize all the energy you created in the first step, and allow yourself to DREAM about what you really want. What would be your ideal career? What would be next level with your family? Where would you love to travel? What adventures would you like to have? Everything goes here! Write it all down, whether you believe it’s possible or not. Connect back to when you were a kid, and you dreamed of being a professional football player or a rock star. Dream with that same fervor!

Next, pick 3-5 dreams that make you giddy. Write down why you want that dream. Describe it in detail. Get super clear on this picture. The more detail the better. What will it feel like? Spend as much time as you need in the dream. This could literally be the most important thing you do all year.

3. Finally, it’s time to set your outcomes for the year. Those outcomes should be directly tied to your dreams. Resolutions usually fail because they aren’t tied to a strong purpose or a why. They are just things we are interested in doing or we think we should do. That’s why Step 2 is so important. When we connect our outcomes to our dreams, there is a much greater sense of commitment.

The great thing about dreams is that you don’t have to figure out HOW to get there. You just have to WANT to get there and be willing to take the first step. If you spend time on the HOW, likely you will stop because it won’t fall into place exactly according to plan and you will get discouraged. Do it differently this year! It’s how I went from 1% success to 100% success on my resolutions.

Set your outcomes for the first 30 days. What is the first step you can make towards your dreams? Short, focused outcomes lead to long-term results. It’s like setting a revenue goal in your business. If you focus on the annual goal it’s overwhelming, and often paralyzing. However, when you break that goal down into just what needs to be done this month, this week or even today, it becomes feasible.

For the ultimate in resolution success tie your outcomes this year to your dreams. Resolutions without dreams will get you 1%. Monthly resolutions, or what I like to call outcomes, tied to your dreams, will get you a lot closer to that 100% you desire.

At High5 Leadership we believe so strongly in the power of dreaming that we designed our Dream Guide Program to help people connect to their dreams, identify their why’s, set powerful outcomes, and develop the accountability to make those dreams a reality. This year-long coaching program will open your eyes and heart to what’s possible.

Email Kevin Fink, our Chief Dream Officer, at kevin@high5leadership.com to schedule a FREE first session to see if this program would be good support for you in making your dreams come true!