A New Take On New Years Resolutions – Lets keep them
Most people remember a time when New Years Resolutions were pretty standard: get perfect marks in school, make a couple of new friends and find the perfect boyfriend or girlfriend. As everyone gets older, however, New Years Resolutions become fewer and more specific. Some people resolve to lose a bunch of weight. Others resolve to make a bunch of money. Some, even as adults, still resolve to find Mr. or Mrs. Right before the year is out. There are even some people who resolve not to make resolutions because they find their usual resolutions too hard to actually accomplish in a single year!
Perhaps you are someone who has decided, after years of good intentions, to stop resolving altogether. It's easy to understand your frustration: when you don't meet your resolutions, you get frustrated with yourself, making those resolutions feel even farther out of your reach!
The problem with New Years Resolutions is that, in spite of the good intentions behind them, many people try to take on too much all at once. To use a stereotypical example, Alex may resolve to lose fifty pounds—something that is certainly possible to accomplish over the course of the year. Unfortunately, Alex might also decide that the best way to lose those that weight is to follow a very strict diet—one that is impossible to follow diligently. When Alex forgets the diet for a second and eats something that isn't within the diet's guidelines, guilt sets in. Guilt leads to stress, which leads to more "wandering away" from the diet. Before Alex knows it, it's December again and the New Years Resolution has been chalked up to another failure.
This year, instead of resolving to change your whole life in a single swoop, perhaps it is a better idea to make resolutions that are easier to keep. Instead of resolving to "finally get organized" you can identify one area of organization that is particularly vexing and work on that. Obviously there is no reason for you to give up your long term goals altogether. Think of "realistic resolutions" in terms of defining the steps you need to eventually accomplish those long term goals. Most people find that lofty goals are easier to accomplish when the steps that need to be taken are well defined.
Had Alex decided to simply learn to eat better and find healthy foods that tasted just as good and were just as satisfying as the unhealthier snacks, that fifty pounds might have been lost with little effort! Had Alex decided to work on getting in shape instead of focusing on the number of pounds to lose, those pounds might have been lost as a by-product of Alex's increased exercise regimen.
One of the best reasons to set realistic goals for your New Years Resolutions is the satisfaction you will get when you accomplish what you set out to do! Nothing feels quite as good as looking back at January's resolutions in December and realizing that you accomplished everything you wanted to accomplish!
Think what area or areas in your life you want your goal or achievement to be in. What do you want the goal or outcome to be? Where are you on a scale of 1 -10 of achieving the goal, 1 being you don’t think you will achieve the goal 10 being you are 100% sure of attaining the goal? How do you feel when you score yourself? If you scored below 8 write a list of how you came to the score. Ask yourself do you really want this goal.
Write the goal down stating it in a positive statement? How do you feel that you have it down on paper? Now look at the goal does it need to be chunked down in smaller more manageable steps? If you think it needs to be broken down I suggest you do this now.
Now you should know that the goal or outcome you have written down is what you really want to achieve. I suggest you write a positive statement want you are going to achieve and when by keep this paper and look at it every morning and night to keep in mind what you want and go for it.
"We will open the book. Its pages are blank. We are going to put words on them ourselves. The book is called Opportunity and its first chapter is New Year's Day." ~ Edith Lovejoy Pierce
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Be a Better Professional by Finding the Right Work/Life Balance
Creating a successful work/life balance can be difficult, but most people would agree—today's global economy has increased the pressure to succeed! Thanks to the internet and the global market, clients can be located anywhere on the planet, and therefore in many time zones too. This lure of potentially untapped profits can cause
many professionals to let their personal lives slide under the guise of "earn now, spend later." Unfortunately, this only creates more stress which can lead to burn out- both at home and at work.
The pressure to be perfect in the roles you have at home is another reason so many
people have trouble establishing a successful work/life balance. Many people feel guilty about the number of hours they work. Most people have been taught that home life
should come first and that work should come second. In today's economy however,
with the financial pressures on everyone increasing almost daily, this cannot always
be the case. Which might be understood intellectually but not emotionally.
Many articles talk about the need to find a good work/life balance so that personal relationships (family, friends, etc) don't suffer. What these articles often fail to mention is that finding a proper work/life balance is also important for their professional life as well. When work and home life are unbalanced, people tend to burn out more quickly which damages their careers. When the career suffers, home life suffers and this self perpetuating spiral can quickly get out of control.
So how do you, the average Joe/Joanne, create the perfect work/life balance?
One of the first ways is to reduce stress.
Here are a few tips to help you reduce your stress so that you can be a productive
member of your professional team:
1. Figuring out which aspects of your life are the most important as well as which things
are the most enjoyable will help ease the guilt you might feel when you take time away
from one activity to complete another. Be honest with yourself and devote the majority
of your time to the things that are most important to you.
2. "You time" is not the same as "Down time." It is important that everyone takes some
time for themselves each day, whether it be going for a walk or scheduling a meeting
later in the afternoon so that you can relax at lunch. Taking care of yourself will reduce stress, which makes it easier to focus on your work.
3. Asking for help is a sign of strength, not of weakness. Asking for help shows that
you are willing to learn and to work as part of a team. This will build esteem with your colleagues as well as with your friends and family.
In addition to reducing stress, it’s a good idea to ‘take stock’ and see where you are spending your time and energy.
Write a list of things you like to do, a list of things you have to do, and then see
how you can balance them.
Maintaining the perfect work/life balance is difficult, but should not be neglected.
In short, good balance between home and work will actually make you more productive, successful and happy in all areas of your life.
"Life is what happens while you're busy making other plans"
John Lennon
Contact me here for more tips and to find out about in house workshops
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tips To Release Stress
Can you help reduce your stress levels? My answer to this is yes. We listen to the radio, watch the television and read newspapers about loss of jobs, the economy, the credit crunch and many other stories of doom and gloom.
One thing that these recurring stories achieve is that it gives us an enormous amount
of stress – both emotionally and physically.
Below are a few of my effective stress busting tips:
Morning Meditation
Twenty minutes in the morning of being still and quiet. Sit in a quiet room with a temperature that you find comfortable. When a thought pops up in your mind acknowledge it then just say “let go” or “stop”. This will take a lot of practice as at first and you may find sitting down still one of the hardest challenges you have during the course of your day. However I say keep at this, practice every day and you will start to feel the benefits. I find that after meditating it is a good time to look at problem solving.
Positive Self Talk
Every time I catch myself having a negative thought about myself I stop and think do I really have any evidence to back this up and if the answer is no I reword what I am thinking in a positive way. A good way to do this is to practice affirmations. Negative self talk is internal dialogue that is feeds by draining you of energy, confidence and your self esteem.
Accept what cannot be changed
If you know that you something is not in your circle of control/influence then accept it and move on. Use your energy to change the things that you can change not the things you cannot.
PMA + A = Positive Mental Attitude + Action
Life has a wonderful way of sending us things that we don’t actually want at times. It is not what life sends us that give us a positive or negative outlook on life; it’s how we choose to react to it. We can choose to look at it negatively and feel uneasy, unhappy, sad, angry or many other unproductive feelings. Or we can give it a positive meaning which is more productive for you and those around you. The action part of PMA + A is when you have the positive mental attitude then take action.
Having a positive mental attitude puts you on a better state to deal with the issue.
Contact me here for more tips and to find out about in house workshops
All Articles by Amanda Joseph