Do you pick a word for the year? Last year, I picked brave, and it helped me to make some really big changes in my work and in my life.
If you’re a subscriber to my newsletter, you’ll have read all about my 2019 goals and how they went, but today I want to talk about the year ahead.
I’ve picked ‘space’ for my word of the year, and the things I want to do roughly break down into three areas.
Physical space
I want to feel happy with my home. Not feel happy IN my home, because that’s a whole other thing, but just feel happy with the physical space that I live in. I’m still potentially going to be moving later on this year, but in the meantime, my house is completely neglected and it’s bumming me out.
There are things which frustrate me Every Single Day, which I’ve just been putting up with. Things like our curtains being ever so slightly too small, so every time I close them I have to tug at them. Whether I’m moving or not, I’m now working through these changes, because doing them improves life immesurably! I mean – they are CURTAINS. If we move, I can take them with me.
I also hired a cleaner. That’s been on my list since last year, and it felt very good to tick it off. She’s not coming regularly yet, just once every 3-4 weeks, but wow, the difference it makes to have someone actually properly clean the house!
Financial space
I’ve been doing reasonably well financially, but have started to think about where my money goes a bit more. I bank with Starling, and they have ‘spaces’ (funnily enough) where you can move money to save for different things. I’ve set up spaces for education, my pension, my kids’ savings (poor Beatrice is still far behind Theo in her savings account as we had way less money when she was born, so I’m trying to rectify that now!), and for just having fun. I’ve got a ‘treat time’ space and I’m thinking of fun ways I can use that at the end of any big project.
I also looked at some of the projects I was working on and ended the contract for one that didn’t feel like it aligned with what I wanted to do any more. Technically, that means I’ll have less money coming in, so less financial space, but I completely believe that by letting that go, I’m making space to work with more wonderful one-on-one clients, which is the work I want to focus on long term.
[Side note: If you’re full of ideas, but need someone to focus, break your goals down into actionable steps, and generally hold you accountable, take a look at my mentoring packages – I have availability from the end of February and would love to hear from you!]
I’ve also started working on a new ecourse. Now that I have the space in my calendar to work on it, I’m feeling really excited about it. And I learned from my course failure last year (I launched it before writing it, then felt really under pressure and crappy as I envisioned working on it over the Christmas break) that I need to have the content written and ready to go before I launch. So, that’s what I’m doing now.
Mental space
Last year and the year before were so busy. And I hate being the person who says ‘I’m so busy’. I want to be someone who says ‘I’ve got a great balance going on right now.’ That means I actually need some time and space for myself.
I have really neglected my fitness in recent years, and my body has been craving getting back into some kind of exercise routine. I’m also going to book in the haircuts that I neglect until I’m a mass of split ends, and go for the massages beacuse why the hell not, and go to the cinema, and eat well and just generally put myself first from time to time.
It’s really hard, with two small kids, to prioritise myself, but the older the kids get, the better I’m getting at doing it and it feels SO GOOD.
So – no ‘SMART’ goals this year. Right now it’s more about embodying a feeling than anything else. It feels pretty good and feels easy to do. It also acts as a good way to make a decision – how is this adding space into my life?
Do you do the ‘word of the year’ thing or have you settled on any goals? I would love to hear about them.
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