This time of year, we tend to focus a lot on the things that we’ve done in the past year, the things that we hope to do in the upcoming year. It’s a vicious cycle for some. It comes every 365 days, every 12 months and stuff. We just get into this habit. It has to do with the new year. And with that new year, so often we want things to be different.

As we go through and we make our list of the things that we’ve accomplished in the last year, we naturally tend to make a list of things that we didn’t get accomplished, and a lot of times that gets us down. I know a lot of people that this happens to. It happens to members of my family. It happens to me from time to time, just everybody. I think what happens is, just naturally, especially nowadays, it seems to be if you make a mistake, you’re told, basically, that you can’t escape from that mistake. You’re told no. You’re stuck with this mistake. Everything is going. This one moment defines who you are for the rest of your life. That’s not the case.

Depending on what we go through and depending on what happens, yes, we might have to go through some sort of penance or process to make amends. But to lose hope and sight on the fact that we can actually make a change can really harm what we’re trying to do. Whether you’re branding yourself as a life coach or you’re branding yourself as the expert in creating some kind of product, for your customers, you’re establishing with them that your product can change their life. But then, what happens is when we go home, we look at ourselves and we think, “Oh, I can’t change. I can’t make my life better.” That’s why this time of year is so important.

It might be kind of cliché to sit there and say, “Oh, you need to make goals for the new year, and everybody does that. You know, people refer to as New Year’s resolutions. This next year, I’m going to do this differently.” But, I think what happens is when we go through and we make those plans, we forget to understand and dive a little bit deeper into the reason why we want to make those changes. Those reasons are based, at the very core, of branding. It’s your why. Why re you going to do these things differently? Why is it important? Let’s say your focus in the new year is to spend more time with family and friends. Why? Why do you want to spend more time with family and friends? Why is that important to you?

Once you start asking yourself these why questions, you’ll start to understand more of why and how come it’s more important to focus and make sure that you do succeed. You don’t want to just give yourself an arbitrary goal. Goals are a dime a dozen. They come and they go. And if we don’t have anything tied to it, we really don’t worry whether or not we don’t hit those goals.

This year, I’m going to challenge you a little bit. Yes, it might seem a little bit cliché to go through and set up the goals, but on a simple piece of paper, write down what your goals are. Write down the top three goals that you want to do this next year, the three areas that impact your life the most. I would recommend you do something where you’re focusing on you personally, your family, and your business. What are your three top goals? Maybe some of those goals in those three areas align with each other. But right next to it, under, write down why you need this goal to happen. Then, write down how you’re going to bring that goal to fruition. Set yourself some timeframes, some deadlines.

But then, take that goal and share it. Share it with other people. That way, they can sit there and they can become your champions to help you. They can turn around and ask you, “How’s it going on spending more time with your family and friends?” If it’s a good friend that you share that goal with it, they might even encourage you and say, “Hey, remember you told me you were going to spend more time with friends. Why don’t we get together this weekend?” What happens is it starts to build a change in your life.

This comes naturally at times throughout the year, not just at the beginning of the year or the end of the year, when we make big life choices. We commit to them. They become a part of who we are. This last year, my family and I, we made the choice to move, to move closer to my parents, to those around us. It was a big commitment. We had to sell our house. We had to move our kids out of the only school that they’ve known the entire time they’ve gone to school. They also meant leaving friends and family that we’ve come accustomed to being around. We had to commit. We couldn’t sit there halfway through the move and then decide, no, that this isn’t going to work out now.

Once you commit, once you come up with the reasons why, it becomes a part of, like I said, a part of who you are, and it’s easier for you to fulfill that goal. It’s easier and you understand the importance of it succeeding. For us, when we moved, the big part, one of the things that we were worried about, is our kids with school. We really looked at the school to make sure … And the town we moved to only has one school. We looked at it to see whether or not it was going to be a good fit for our kids.

I’ve shared before in other places that when they moved schools and switched they … It wasn’t just a straight grade class change. We moved on purpose at the beginning, or the end of the school year so that way they could start a new school year in a new school. But, we also moved early enough in the summer so that way they had the whole summer to make friends, so that way when they started school they were able to start with people that they knew and people that got along with him and were excited for them to be there.

It was also a change in not just changing schools but also the type of school. If they had stayed where we originally were, they would have stayed in elementary school for another year, but now they’re an intermediate school, or junior high, essentially, which meant more responsibilities for them. So, we had to worry about whether or not they were going to be able to handle this. We talked with the kids and made it part of their plan and their goal to get ready for this change and know that it was going to be a little bit harder, but they had to commit to it. They had to understand the importance of it.

I’m glad to say that so far the kids have thrived in their new school. They love it. They love their friends. They love the added responsibility. It makes them feel older. And what kid doesn’t want to feel older? It just turned out to be a good thing. But, those things and that transition wouldn’t have happened if we hadn’t made a plan. The same thing needs to happen for you as you make your goals and plans in the three areas of your life: your career, your business, and your family. I promise you that if you do that, you’ll actually find a lot of times that those goals might intersect with each other and they help build each other up.

You want your business to be more successful, and at the same time you want to spend more time with family, let’s say. By doing that, you’re going to work harder so that way you can free up time, so you’re not going to sit there and spend 12 hours at work when you know you have to get home. You’re going to work harder during the normal business hours that you’ve established. That way, when you get home, you can relax more because you know you’ve gotten more done. You’re able to spend time with friends and family. Maybe one of your goals in your personal life is to take up a new hobby or to reignite the passion that you had with a hobby. You can do that by making that plan and seeing how your plans for those other areas in your life can help build on that.

I challenge you to seriously sit down and do this. You have a couple of weeks before the end of the year. Even if you are watching this and it’s not the end of the year, you can do this exercise any time. It doesn’t have to be at the end of the year. But, really sit down and share that with somebody. Share it below. Let me know what you’re going to do differently in the upcoming year, just three things. You don’t have to go into too much detail or anything, but I love to see and hear what you’re going to do. And by doing that, I’ll help champion you to encourage you to move on and hit your goals. This really needs to be something that you embrace and you take part of in your life so that way you can see the changes in the new year and be happy. The next time you reflect back on what happened, you’ll realize that you did hit your goals, and your life will be better, and your brand will be better. I’ll see you next week.