It’s time for our 4th Book Club book of the year.
I don’t know about you, but that kinda makes me crazy!
Time is a fickle girl and it’s hard to decide how I feel about it.
And that’s why I set goals.
If I don’t… then a year is gone before I have a chance to figure out what I want to do and by when. When I merely have good intentions about getting something done, it doesn’t get it done. It just keeps getting pushed to the next day, the next week, the realm of “someday” I’ll get around to doing that…as soon as things slow down.
One of my favorite things to do to set my goals is by taking time every November (remember that’s the beginning of my year because it’s my birthday. You can listen to past podcasts to hear why I do that) to read the book I’m sharing with you today as our 4th quarter book club book. I read it to get myself focused on what I want to do and WHY I want to do it.
The book I’m talking about is “Your Best Year Ever” by Michael Hyatt.
Now, don’t think that this book is only for someone who want to run a business or someone who is always doing, doing, doing. That’s not true. This is for those of us who like to stay comfortable. I’d say, that’s ALL of us. Who doesn’t like to stay where it’s comfortable? Our brain likes to be comfortable. But did you know that you don’t progress or experience growth when you’re comfortable? It’s the truth. Burdens also tend to get heavier and heavier if we’re comfortable because we’re not strengthening ourselves. So, my overburdened no more listeners, if you truly want to become less burdened, you’ve got to get out of that comfort zone, even if it’s just a little, and get those burdens to feel lighter.
That’s why I love this book.
Each year that I read it, I’m going on 4 years now, I feel stronger. Just a little at a time. I don’t want to add burden by trying to take too big of a leap, right?
That’s why I love this book.
He walks you through a series of 5 steps to help you design the year you want and achieve the goals you feel are most important.
Here are his 5 steps:
Pay attention to the way you feel when I read them to you.
Do you feel tight in the chest?
Do you feel excited? Hopeful?
That is an indication if this is the book for you. Lean into the things that give you a spring in your step…because that spring is what gets you through the discomfort…because it comes to all of us.
Ok, the 5 steps he teaches are:
Step 1: Believe the possibility
Step 2: Complete the past
Step 3: Design your future
Step 4: Find your why
Step 5: Make it happen
STEP 1: BELIEVE THE POSSIBILITY
In this step, the author helps you to focus on understanding the power of your beliefs. According to Michael Hyatt, “One of the biggest reasons we don’t succeed with our goals is we doubt we can”. He truly believes that in order for you to achieve anything you first have to believe that you can. Many people have limiting beliefs that are usually subconscious, you don’t even know they’re affecting you, so he developed a 6-step process for you to review your beliefs. I like his process, and I think you will too.
STEP 2: COMPLETE THE PAST
In order to move forward in your life, you have to come to peace with your past, meaning, what you haven’t achieved when you’ve set goals in the past. However, no matter what happened in the past you can learn from it and use it to support you going forward. That’s a way to grow!
STEP 3: DESIGN YOUR FUTURE
The author believes that “Great result don’t just happen”. Instead, you need to get intentional about what you want to achieve. This step goes into great detail about how important it is to writing goals down. I like how the author expands on the common goal-setting method of ‘SMART’ goals and turns it into ‘SMARTER’ goals. I’m excited for you to share with me what you think about the SMARTER method. Does it help you or make you feel overburdened?
STEP 4: FIND YOUR WHY
If your goals are big enough then it will take time and work to achieve them. This means you need to have a why to keep you motivated during tough times. I even think you need to have a reason to do the smaller goals. Why would you want to do anything without a why? I talk more about this in my “Connect to Your Time” Free Guide. You can get that in the show notes if you don’t have it already or you can take my Connect to Your Time Workshop. I’ve just created a space to have all of my workshops in one place and this is up and ready to go right now. You can get that link in the show notes as well.
STEP 5: MAKE IT HAPPEN
The last step is to take the necessary action. The first and most important part of this step is that you need to be committed and this starts with your language. The author teaches you how to use triggers to help increase the chances of you taking action. Then, you are walked through how to review your progress on a daily, weekly and quarterly basis. And last but not least, you are encouraged to celebrate. I don’t do a great job with celebrating…maybe I should make THAT one of my goals!
There you have it! A quick overview of the book club book for the last quarter of the year.
I hope you’ll join me in lightening our burdens by setting reasonable goals that gently get us out of our comfort zone and into a growth zone.