Being able to share my voice is a gift I don't want to ever take for granted. This blog is a window to my heart & my business. You'll be able to enjoy my latest sessions & photography tips. But I'll also be sharing more of my passions like pursuing a simpler lifestyle and personal images from our day to day.
Every year, I get so excited for January 1st. I just love a fresh start. New year, new goals, new opportunities. Goal setting is something I’ve loved since I was a kid. It gets me all jazzed up. I’ve learned over the years that I will feel flustered & anxious if I don’t have a plan in place for how I spend my time. Before setting next year’s goals, I like to reflect back on the past year.
2018 was a year filled with so many emotions. The birth of our last baby Clara, the feeling of completeness for our family, drawing closer together as a couple, the overwhelm of three kids under 5, the satisfaction of finally designing and installing landscaping, the most memorable summer yet and a bountiful photography year. That doesn’t even cover it all, which you can see in its’ entirety in my year in review.
At times, it felt like a train that kept going whether I was ready or not, but more often than not felt exactly where I needed to be. I embraced a slower pace with very few extracurricular activities for all of us. We were prioritizing what mattered and it was amazing.
I loved my 2018 goals so much over the past year that I adopted them as my life themes. Each year, I plan to use these with specific goals in each “bucket.” By simplifying to these five areas, I can easily say yes or no to new opportunities when they come up. If it doesn’t fit under one of these, I simply say no. It helps take the guilt out of saying no.
The exercise that helped me uncover our family goals was thinking about where I wanted to be when I was 80. What will I look back on and wish I did more of? What will I look back on and wish I had not prioritized? For me, TV, social media, time on my phone, complaining, staying up too late are all things that I’ll care very little about when I’m 80. Funny thing is though this is often how I spend my time when the kids are asleep. It really puts into perspective what you want out of each day.
This exercise came out of the new Cultivate What Matters planner. I’ve used PowerSheets in the past and loved them. During Christmas break, I worked through the new Cultivate What Matters planner (which I can’t recommend enough!) and created goals for this year.
Each month, I’ll be sharing my monthly goals, how they tie into my yearly goals and how last month’s goals went. I can’t wait to share January’s goals with you next week! It’s never too late to set goals for the new year :).