{"id":1309,"date":"2012-12-26T19:03:37","date_gmt":"2012-12-27T01:03:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/?p=1309"},"modified":"2012-12-26T18:32:10","modified_gmt":"2012-12-27T00:32:10","slug":"consider-setting-resolutions-or-not","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/2012\/12\/consider-setting-resolutions-or-not\/","title":{"rendered":"Consider Setting Resolutions – or Not"},"content":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s a certain amount of dread I find as the New Year approaches.\u00a0 I feel an obligation to talk about resolutions and goals, as this is the expectation for this event each year.\u00a0 Part of me wonders how many of you actually set New Year\u2019s resolutions.\u00a0 Or how seriously you take them.\u00a0 As time passes, I have a sense that people sitting down to make their list has dissipated over the years.\u00a0 It seemed like everyone did it when I was kid and you needed to be prepared since someone (more likely several people) were bound to ask you what your goals were for the coming year.\u00a0 I\u2019m not sure how many of us view this event the same now.<\/p>\n

And let me be perfectly clear, I am all for setting goals.\u00a0 I\u2019ve mentioned before that I just personally resist this once a year on January 1st<\/sup> list making.\u00a0 I strive to incorporate it into my life, throughout the year.\u00a0 I do dislike how we have the potential for undermining our confidence by setting goals and not meeting them.\u00a0 This feels extremely contrary to the intention.\u00a0 What I want for all of us is positive self-regard, the feeling of being successful in all our life.\u00a0 Anything that challenges that needs to be reevaluated in my book!<\/p>\n

So, let\u2019s talk about goals here.\u00a0 You probably know all the guidelines \u2013 start small, set concrete and specific goals that you can measure, and keep the list short.\u00a0 I\u2019ve even written about these things before in Goals, Already?<\/a><\/p>\n

Yet I can\u2019t help but wonder, maybe we half-heartedly set some New Year\u2019s resolutions simply expecting that they probably won\u2019t happen.\u00a0 Most people I\u2019ve talked to know about the above guidelines for being successful in setting goals and yet when they\u2019ve set goals, they\u2019ve neglected to develop their goals far enough to apply those guidelines.\u00a0 That\u2019s part of why it occurred to me that New Year\u2019s resolutions might have become almost an almost rote task for some of us.<\/p>\n

Probably the biggest thing for me is that taking steps to reach our goals can\u2019t be so easily proscribed.\u00a0 I remember years ago I desperately wanted to lose weight.\u00a0 I went through phases of wanting a quick and easy fix since I blamed some medication for my weight predicament.\u00a0 Then I accepted that there wasn\u2019t going to be any quick fixes and made some beginning efforts at exercising.\u00a0 Those often faltered with the realization of how far I had to go \u2013 even 5 minutes on a stationary bike was exhausting.\u00a0 Then finally I was able to commit to the process, starting small with specific goals at 5 minutes each time 3 days a week.\u00a0 That progressed to 1 hour 5 days a week and guess what – the weight came off.<\/p>\n

Except that this goal had to move through various stages before it was truly prepared to be my goal.\u00a0 It took me a long time from the \u201cI want to\u2026\u201d until I was ready to set small and specific goals.\u00a0 That didn\u2019t correspond to any set date on a calendar.<\/p>\n

And this really is the crux of why part of me dreads writing about setting New Year\u2019s resolutions, I don\u2019t want to propagate that you need to set goals at this time of year.\u00a0 You don\u2019t need to be ready to make changes this moment.\u00a0 Changes take time and you really need to be prepared in all ways to begin to make those happen.<\/p>\n

Therefore, if you are ready to make a New Year\u2019s resolution, go for it.\u00a0 If you\u2019re not, then cheers to you too.\u00a0 And remember the other part of New Year\u2019s is to review your successes over the past year \u2013 I hope there were many. Happy New Year and I hope it\u2019s a fabulous one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The New Year is upon us once again \u2013 are you setting New Year\u2019s resolutions? Here\u2019s a reminder of the guidelines for that, but more so, a reminder that what\u2019s more important than setting goals at this time of year is to consider whether you are ready to make changes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[10,8,18,13,9],"class_list":["post-1309","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-holidayhelp","tag-behavior","tag-discipline","tag-goals","tag-gratitude","tag-motivation"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7p82c-l7","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1309","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1309"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1309\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1313,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1309\/revisions\/1313"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1309"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1309"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1309"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}