Looking at 2016...

The first full week of the New Year has past and the rest of the year is out the windshield. It's time to decide what kind of goals to set and how to go about achieving them to become a better human.

Resolutions are a waste of time. Nobody follows those things. If everybody I knew followed them all my friends would be thin, live in castles and have the kind of relationships most people dream about. However, nobody keeps resolutions. I myself am just as guilty.

This year I've decided to focus on principles instead of actual goals.

Where did this come from? Good question. A week ago I could have cared less about goals and probably would have said, "yeah, those. I'll get to that in a week, or two."

I received an email from a friend that had me thinking. She said, "maybe if things were more in our language we could adult better."

Our language is similar. Once we achieve a goal we often relish for a moment in the accomplishment, and then can be caught emailing each other saying, "well now what the eff do we do?" We are guilty of conquering a peak, and then plateauing through the rest of the days. So, how do we avoid the plateau?

The basis of her email was to share a twist on how to set yourself up for achieving the real successes. The success that comes from being better than you were yesterday. So over my salad at lunch, I decided to take some of the steps in the email to see how this would shake down.

The first step was to time yourself for three minutes and write down all the highlights of the year. I got out my trusty purple pen and post-it notes, tapped my phone timer, and started to write. I had things like South Africa, a new job, new town, new friends, yadda, yadda, yadda. When the three minutes were up I started to evaluate it. I was actually surprised at some of the things that made my list. These were mostly the things that brought joy to my life. The list was full of fun stuff I'd done. Boy, I've had some fun lately!

Then I moved to step two but skipped it because I didn't have a friend close and no time to email. I made sure to pretend I was a couple people in my mind - and believe or not, I added a few things at their 'prompting'.

Next was step three (look for a pattern) and four (notice what gives you pure joy). I did notice a pattern. Then thought to myself, "why haven't I been doing these things more?" There were a lot of things on this list that have contributed to my ability to chill and relax. I was able to evaluate what exactly I needed to do in order to feel good about moving forward in 2016.

I tackled the last step. Step five. Choose five things you want to focus on. Only five. I was to use the list I'd made and the observations of my analysis and choose just five things that I could focus on as I work to be the best me I can be.

My five things are simple. Relationships (new and old), creative outlets, adventure, playing, and engaging my faith. They were all things that brought me joy last year, and as I continue to develop as a person I hope they will continue to bring me joy. To be rewarded you have to do things and focus on things that actual light you up, or spark a passion in you. Granted, not every day is sunshine and roses, but having something to focus on may help get through those days that are just hard.

The world can be a horrible place, and if we all decided to be better than we were yesterday maybe the world wouldn't suck so much. Attitude is everything and I have to make a conscious effort to pick my attitude. Happy is hard work.

I may not be able to change the world, but I can change my world.