It is that time of the year…the days are racing past like the landscape as we look out the window of a speeding train, and soon it will be time for that familiar countdown.
10..9..8..7..6..5..4..3..2..1………“Happy New Year 2021!!!!”
Drunken revellers partying on the streets, strangers hugging each other like long-lost friends, grand fireworks in cities across the world…and the cycle begins all over again!! Another year, another celebration, and another round of hopes.
That’s the usual routine for 31st Dec, right? Every year, year after year…But hang on, has Covid changed the script for 31st Dec 2020?
This time I’m sure there’ll be one giant sigh (think 7.8 billion sighs rolled into one humongous SIGHHHH!!) of relief that we’re finally bidding goodbye to 2020. It’s been that kind of year…pandemic, masks, social distancing, bubbles (not the kind of bubbles that are associated with good times!) and what-have-you.
So what about the celebrations? Will they be different this time? Could people in some parts of the world be forced into having online parties perhaps? We’ve already had tons of virtual cocktails throughout the year, with Zoom playing host! And in any case, the only friends we’ve been seeing for most of the year have been the online ones!
NEW YEAR, NEW HOPES
Well, however people may end up partying this year-end, the theme remains the same. The new year always brings with it new hopes, and of course, the “resolution armies” come out in full force! Out come the diaries, planners, and journals and people feverishly start making their resolutions for the year ahead. I’ve never been much of a “new year resolutionist”, but I know so many people who make resolutions religiously, year after year, even if they have a very poor track record of sticking to the resolutions. Be it health goals, relationship goals, financial goals, or career goals…they just seem to come and go, and for many people, it has just become a tradition and a formality to set these goals at the start of a new year. In fact, I’m pretty sure some people just roll over their goals to the next year, year after year. That way, you don’t even have to think of new goals!
GOAL SETTING
I often come across people who find goal setting quite challenging. So they either never set goals or set vague goals that do not motivate them enough to work towards achieving them. I’ll be honest – I used to belong to this group some years ago. I drifted through life, rather aimlessly, and then wondered why things weren’t going well. I tend to think that it is hard to fault people like my former self because a vital life skill like the importance of having goals isn’t something that is taught in schools and colleges. Our education system is still focussed more on Shakespeare and Trigonometry than real-life challenges!
After a period of soul-searching and getting myself immersed in the personal development field, I realized that if I didn’t become the captain of my ship of life, the ship would end up shipwrecked or marooned at an unwanted destination. So I decided not to leave my ship at the mercy of the waves and took action to gain control of my life. Once I did that and started setting goals, I found that after the initial effort required to overcome inertia, the process was actually quite easy and interesting.
In one of my earlier blog articles (https://www.thinklifecoaching.co.nz/post/it-s-a-goal), I talk about the need for goal setting in a person’s life. Please see if that blog resonates with you.
In the second part of this blog, we'll look at why it seems so difficult to achieve our goals once we've set them. What makes it so challenging to stay committed after we've gone through the effort to set our goals? Do let me know your thoughts and feelings on Goal Setting and if you have any questions you'd like to ask me, please ask them in the comments section or contact me directly through my social media pages or my website. I'd love to interact with you and if I end up including your inputs in the next part of this blog, I promise to give you a shout-out! :)
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