A New Year!

On December 30 I went away on a day-long retreat to celebrate my wins for 2008, deepen my learning on the parts of my life that did not go the way I wanted them to, and get clear about my intentions and goals for the New Year.

Studies have shown that many people start off the New Year with resolutions, and by the third week into January, they've already "blown it" and have given up on striving toward those goals.

Who says that we have to start working on our goals the first of the year? We can start fresh anytime we choose! It's okay to make mistakes, as long as we learn from them and make adjustments. That's just the way we learn.

If getting more productive, organized, and profitable is on your list of New Year's resolutions, please note three FREE teleclasses I am teaching Tuesday, January 13, as well as a radio interview Thursday on Strictly Business Radio: "Get Organized - Tips for Entrepreneurs at Home and Office with Kathy Paauw." More information follows at the end of this article.

I've found three key ingredients to successful planning for the New Year:

1. Celebrate your wins for the past year.
2. Clarify your intentions for the coming year, as well as the motivations behind them!
3. Build in daily accountability and support as you live through the coming year with intention.
   

Before planning for 2009, I encourage you to celebrate your wins for 2008. You may not realize how much you have accomplished, so I am sharing a resource that will help you to record and celebrate your wins. Jim Bunch is a Life Coach I am working with, and he offered a free Year-end Review process through a teleconference call. Jim has graciously made a recording of this available to anyone who wants to access it. Go to http://www.jimbunch.coachgenie.com/yirregistration.html when you can write down your responses to the questions Jim asks.

CLARIFY YOUR INTENTIONS AND THE MOTIVATIONS
BEHIND THEM:

At year-end I received this email from one of my mentors, Jack Canfield.

Are you ready to get moving in 2009?

My coaching staff sure is! They wasted NO TIME in putting together a collective Vision Board in their offices. It's something everyone contributed to as a daily reminder of what they're wanting to create for themselves and our customers in 2009.

What stands out most is their vision board mantra, "LIVE BIG." BIG is an acronym for Be In Gratitude, an inspiring daily affirmation to live in gratitude.

Will you be ushering in 2009 with optimism, gratitude, and clarity … or pessimism, lack and confusion?

Don't let a shrinking economy dictate your level of success or fulfillment! To thrive in 2009, it's essential to stay in gratitude, keep focused on your goals, learn new skills, take inspired actions, and develop supportive habits.

By maintaining a positive and joyous emotional state (and laser-like focus on what you want) you're practically guaranteed to achieve your goals.

You probably have a few New Years resolutions for yourself, but do you have written goals that are specific, measurable, and BIG enough to really take you to the next level?

If not, I've created a simple, yet effective, worksheet for plotting   out your goals and intentions for 2009. This free resource is available via download: http://www.thesuccessprinciples.com/resource/TSP-DecideWhatYouWant.pdf

Enjoy! 

In love and gratitude,

Jack Canfield, America's #1 Success Coach
Taking you from where you are to where you want to be http://www.jackcanfield.com/cmd.php?af=689826

Jack's worksheet is an excellent tool for getting clear about what you want to be different in several areas of your life. When you complete this worksheet, I encourage you to dig as deep as you can for the WHY behind your intentions. For example, if one of your goals is to leave your office by 5 PM daily, you might be inclined to write down for your WHY, "Work less hours." I am asking you to identify what is behind that.something that has some juice to it! A deeper WHY might be, "so I can be home for dinner with my family and build deeper bonds with my spouse and kids." The best way to uncover the deeper WHY is to ask yourself "so what.." Or another way to get at it is to complete this sentence:

I want ______ (your goal) so that I can ________ (your deeper why).

Every time you say YES to someone or something, you are, in fact, saying NO to someone or something else. By identifying the deeper WHY, you are creating a more compelling reason to say NO to an old habit or activity so you are available to say YES to a new intention.

Last fall I started connecting daily with an accountability partner, and it has really made a difference in my success.  I would like to share how that works, and encourage you to consider doing something similar.  Below is my outline of how the accountability process works.

First, please note that I set THREE kinds of intentions daily -- HAPPY, HEALTHY and WEALTHY. This is to provide balance in my life -- a very important part of success.  (Why strive for wealth if we are not happy and healthy in the process?) You determine what will make you happy, healthy and wealthy, however you define each of those. In order for this to work, you and your accountability partner need to commit to emailing each other by the end of the previous day for the next day.  My accountability partner and I do this Monday-Friday. So on Sunday night I am reporting what happened Friday (done or not done) and what my intentions are for Monday.

Here is a sample email that I sent to my accountability partner last week:

SUBJECT LINE OF EMAIL:  KP 1/7/09 intentions

BODY OF EMAIL (keep it short):

Tuesday:
Happy: Dinner with niece before she goes back to college Weds.  - done
Healthy: Workout with Personal Trainer - done
Wealthy: Show up for calls with two prospects, 2 client coaching calls - done
BONUS:  Follow up with Joe and Kelly - not done

Grateful for: investment opportunity Ryan shared with me today

Weds:
Happy: Dinner with Doug
Healthy: Personal training session
Wealthy: Half day planning session to finalize 90-day plan for first quarter
BONUS: Research on how to form an S-Corp. for my real estate investments

Tips to make this process work most effectively:  

• Do not identify a long list of things in each category. You are committing to yourself that if you do nothing else, you will do these things.

• Once you make the commitment to do these things, block out time on your calendar for the next day for WHEN you will do it. Consider reserving the first 90 minutes of your day for focus on some of your most important activities.

• Consider building in additional accountability. If I do not do everything I listed in the happy, healthy, wealthy intentions, I will set my alarm for 3 AM that night and have a "Walk with God" to discuss why I did not keep my commitment to myself. If you choose to do this, be 100% honest with yourself.  If you cheat, you are only cheating yourself.  (Trust me -- you will get really good at keeping your commitments to yourself, as it is not much fun to do this often!)

• Note that under my Tuesday "wealthy" intention I said "show up for calls" rather than "talk with". That is because I have no control over whether or not the other person will be available to speak with me, even if we have an appointment.  (I do not want to do a Walk with God if I showed up and they did not.)   In other words, be sure you state your intentions in a way that you have control over whether or not you follow through with your part of it.

• This is not a place to shame, blame, or justify.  If you do not follow through, simply write NOT DONE.  Do not go into listing WHY. If you choose to commit to the Walk with God, share with your accountability partner if you did it or not do this.

• The Bonus activity is exempt from the Walk with God. I am saying that I would like to do it, but it is not a firm commitment like the happy, healthy, wealthy intentions are.

• The "Grateful For" section helps me build more gratitude into my life. You can list as many things as you want here.

• My daily email to my partner also contains my 30-day and 90-day goals at the bottom. This gives me an opportunity to look at my goals daily and also reminds my partner what my bigger goals are so she can better support me and ask me about some things if I am not setting daily intentions that hit the mark.  (I suggest that you block out NOW on your calendar a half day every 30 days to work on your monthly planning and a full day every 90 days to create a quarterly plan.)

• To make this easy, I just look up the email I sent to my accountability partner yesterday, click the forward button, add DONE or NOT DONE to the intentions listed for the day before, list what I am grateful for, and add the next day's intentions before sending it off. I send this to my partner in the evening, so my intentions are set for the next day before I go to bed.

• Decide if you want to connect by phone or just by email with your accountability partner. I suggest that you have an initial conversation to discuss how you want to structure your relationship.

• If you do not receive an email from your partner, be sure that you check in and let him/her know that you missed receiving it. This process will only work if you are consistent and if you keep it short and simple so it does not take over your life.

• Even if your accountability partner does not read what you sent, the power is in writing down and sending your intentions. This is so for a couple reasons: (1) It pushes you to declare your intentions before the start of the day so you are clear about what to do. (2) By telling someone else your intentions and then reporting whether or not you did it, you are much more likely to follow through.

I’d love to receive feedback about how this process works for you. I can be reached at Kathy@orgcoach.net.

On the air live Thursday, January 15 for one hour Noon PST / 1 PM MST / 2 PM CST / 3 PM EST “Get Organized – Tips for Entrepreneurs at Home and Office with Kathy Paauw” Entrepreneurs, do you need to take time out to get your home and work life organized? Join us on Thursday, January 15, 2009 (Noon PST / 3 PM EST) when Kathy shares with Strictly Business Radio host, Anna Banks, how to increase your productivity and enhance your personal and professional life. Kathy will cover how to: Organize your office and home Organize your time and your life Organize your travel You may call in with questions during the live show: 718-766-4021. To listen to the live show or access the archived show, click here.