Is “Good Enough” good enough

One will, one won’t, one word.  

Next year things will be different. 

Have you ever decided that, and come up with a set of new years’ resolutions that will resolve everything that’s holding you back?  I know I have, and I have had the lapsed gym memberships and unused sports equipment to prove it. 

“Now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions. Next week you can begin paving hell with them as usual. Yesterday, everybody smoked his last cigar, took his last drink, and swore his last oath. Today, we are a pious and exemplary community.”~ Mark Twain

It seems that one year we get all fired up and set a load of resolutions that get abandoned before Easter, and the next year we decide not to get “caught up in all that” again and set none, and then another year we decide not to be so awkward and set some really rather unchallenging goals so that we can be sure to meet them.   Or is that just me?

The most common reason for failing a resolution was setting impossible goals, with 35% of those who failed admitted their goals were too unrealistic … 33% said they didn’t keep track of their progress while 23% forgot about it … 10% claimed they made too many resolutions.~ finder.com.au (New Years’ Resolution study)

The Christmas period is one where we can sometimes find ourselves feasting on far too much food and festive cheer, and overindulging in expenditure in one way or another, and the start of the new year is a time where we feel that we need to do something to restore some kind of balance in our lives.

However, the plethora of “New Years’ Resolutions” and “Best Year Ever” programs that emerge during the start of the new year don’t seem to provide a very good answer either.  So we can get to a place where we reckon that if last year was good enough, then let's have another one of those, or perhaps just choose one of the previous years when all seemed to go well enough.

A strategy that I have found to work well is one that’s made from an amalgam of ideas and one that I call: One will, one won’t, one word.

“One Will” encourages us to look forward to the new year and begin with the end in mind, that is to say, what one thing do I want to have achieved by the end of this year that would make a difference to me and those around me.  What's my dream for this year, that will give me something to strive for, something to get up early for, something to spend time on when I have time to spend? 

“A dream is an inspiring picture of the future that energises your mind, will, and emotions, empowering you to do everything you can to achieve it.”~ John Maxwell

Maybe this could have something to do with a career goal, or it could be a new personal pursuit, or it could have to do with investing time with a loved one that needs particular attention this year.  For me, that has to do with seeking new public speaking opportunities and getting the chance to share some of the thoughts on leadership that I have, beyond my current circle of activity. 

“One Won’t” is some habit or activity that I would like to be missing from my life by the end of the year.  For some this may have to do with getting out of a bad habit, something that’s being unhelpful and life would be better without it.  Often this can relate to something that “won’t matter for a day or two more”.  However, if we give ourselves a new perspective of a year then we can look forward to looking back and saying “this was the year that I quit nnn”.  I can remember when I was able to say “this was that year that I became a non-smoker”, rather than just a smoker that hadn’t smoked a cigarette in a while.  The mind-shift associated with that changed outlook was really significant for me, and I’ll probably write a blog post about that later this year.  For me, this year’s won’t has to do with achieving a healthy weight, so cutting back on calorie intake is top of that challenge. 

Weight loss isn’t about “willpower” it’s about “won’t power”.

“One Word” is a challenge I picked up recently that introduces one word to use as a focus for activities, to define and direct the small details that can make a significant change to everything we do. 

My One Word for the year is “Faithfulness” and for me, that’s about focussing on being faithful to regular habits and disciplines on a daily basis.  I found a few great apps to use for tracking some habits, and I’ve settled for “HabitBull” to help me keep track of a variety of daily habits including some regular music practice, learning Spanish, exercise and memorising some useful quotes for the public speaking.

What about you?  What’s your One will, one won’t, one word?