How is 2025 going for you so far? Let’s take a moment to pause, breathe and set the scene for your best year yet.
Where is your head at?
What’s on your mind?
What would you like to be occupying your thoughts?
How different is the reality to your desire?
As I write this, January is shining in all its cold glory here in South East England. This month can signal the time to start afresh. The Christmas decorations come down, the house may seem bare and plain. Or it can seem clean and clear. I opt for the latter perspective. I let the emptiness of the house echo in my mind as a blank canvas for the year ahead. There is space to breathe again in January after all the busy-ness of December. I love a fresh start, a blank page. The possibilities to come. I can pause and think about what I want for the year ahead of me.
New Year Resolutions are somewhat unfashionable in today’s times, if you choose to believe your social media feed at least. And whilst we don’t need the pressure or frustration of selecting resolutions only to find they then fall by the wayside in a matter of days, weeks or months, having a chosen outcome in mind can be very powerful.
I use the word outcome deliberately and carefully.
We often talk of setting goals. The word goal implies a target or an intent. Having something to focus on, to work towards is very powerful and useful. However, there is an element of uncertainty inherent to a goal, it is future orientated – I may or may not achieve my goal of going to the gym 3 times this week… there is wiggle room in my mind as to what will happen. When you think of a goal what comes to mind? I picture a penalty taker on a football pitch about to kick towards the goal.. will it or won’t it go in? There’s an element of jeopardy to the goal in my mind.
Resolution: a firm decision to do (or not) do something – stronger than a goal, at least when comparing the words themselves. But thanks simply to cultural chatter, there is still the wiggle room, that allows our minds to shy away from sticking to it. Perhaps the very reason why setting New Year Resolutions has become rather undesirable is that it’s not a valuable use of our time if the resolution is so often forgotten. As January ticks by, the sun warms through, and life literally moves on, our resolutions are often left behind.
You might say, Katy, it’s just semantics, it’s just words. And it can be. But to our brains, words matter. They are the keys to crafting the way we think and therefore feel; the difference between getting to where you want to be and heading off in a different direction unintentionally.
An outcome is what happens; the way a thing turns out. It is a definite.
So to circle back to our questions at the top of this post, what would you like to be occupying your thoughts? What outcome do you want for 2025?
Maximise the reality of your outcome with these simple Neuro-Linguistic-Programming (NLP for short) tricks:
Phrase your outcome in positive language to really fire up your neurology around it.
e.g. I want to read more novels this year (positive) rather than I want to watch less TV (negative).
Get specific.
e.g. I want to read each weeknight for at least 30 minutes in bed.
What’s the first step to you achieving your chosen outcome?
Choose a tangible action step to take to reach your desired outcome easily. Take it step by step, with a determined and deliberate mindset and you will achieve your outcome.
e.g. To have time to read each weeknight, I need to go to bed earlier. To go to bed earlier I need to not scroll on my phone in front of the TV.
I need to just go upstairs after I’ve finished work / chores / yoga = my first step, positive language, specific yet with an element of flexibility so it works for me.
Check how reasonable this feels to you. Make sure it feels doable and will fit in with your life.
e.g. I love to read and feel very relaxed when I do it. I’m excited to do this. It feels very doable and focusing on weeknights makes it feel very doable.
So as you move through January, thinking of the year ahead, have an outcome in mind. Let it be your guiding star, filling your mind with what you really want and ensuring your reality matches your desires.
I support clients all the time in crafting outcomes in a wide range of areas of their lives, from health and wellbeing, to fitness, work, family life and much more besides. This post is just a snapshot of what can be achieved when we apply coaching and NLP to ‘goal setting’. Get in touch to find out how I could support you here.