Welcome to 2008 - is it going to be the year that you want it to be? Becky Hall from Bradley Stoke motivational firm Focus:Future has compiled her top five tips for a great start to the new year.
And if the tips have got you interested in making changes to your life, Becky is offering readers of The Bradley Stoke Examiner a fantastic 15% discount on a course of four sessions of life coaching.
Contact Becky Hall on 07977 132124 or email becky@focusfuture.co.uk and quote ‘BSE1′ to learn more about taking control of your life this year.
Tip one:
Put aside some time: Create space and comfortable environment, so that you can focus on what you want to achieve. Write down what you want, if this doesn’t inspire you, use pictures, draw, or print some out from the internet and make a poster for yourself.
Tip two
Be realistic, let’s face it, you aren’t going to be an astronaut in 12 months, so think about SMART objectives, specific, measurable, realistic and time bound.
For example, if you want to lose weigh it would be:
S: I want to drop one clothing size.
M: I need to lose 8lbs
A: I can put things in place to achieve this
R: Is this realistic? How much do I want to make this my priority?
T: When, in realistic time will I achieve this? At a rate of 2lbs per week, in one month, so by the end of February, for example.
These objectives really help you focus on the HOW part of your resolutions. It’s easy to say you are going to try to lose weight, for example, but unless you really nail it down as a tangible, measurable goal, you won’t ever know when you have achieved it. By doing this you risk becoming disheartened and losing motivation.
Tip three
Plan for failure: Always have plan B ready! Life has a cunning way of jumping up and changing things suddenly. What will you do? Using the diet example; your partner takes you out for a slap up meal. What will you do? Fall off the wagon and compensate for this afterwards, reviewing your target, or will you diligently choose the most healthy options from the menu and limit what you eat? Or even warn your partner that you are really committed for a certain amount of time, and therefore would like to do things together that don’t threaten your endeavours.
