Scraps Of Mind

Scrap Your Goals for 2008!

A fresh New Year is always the perfect time for folk to review their life, take stock, set goals and make plans for what they want from the coming year. Even though we can do this at any time (and there are probably better times than just after a holiday season to do it), most of us like to have milestones to mark beginnings and endings and the New Year makes an ideal milestone.

And of course, many of us refer to these plans as New Year’s Resolutions. But whatever you call them, they help us to start our fresh, shiny New Year with some sort of a road map of where we would like to go over the next twelve months.

The Challenge, however, is keeping focussed on our goals and remembering to keep taking the actions needed to achieve the outcomes we desire. Well here’s an idea to help you do that:

Take your Resolutions or Goals and Scrap them!

We all know that once something has become a Scrapbook Layout it must be real. So this way you can make your Resolutions ‘real’. Or another idea is to make a tag for each one of your Resolutions.

And when you have created your Resolutions Scrapbook Layout or Tags stick copies of them in places where you will constantly see them and be reminded. Because half the problem with making New Year’s Resolutions work is remembering the things you want to do or change in your life at the right time. Having these memory jogging layouts and tags handy to your eye will help you overcome that. And the actual act of creating them will help you to think and focus on your goals as well.

Maybe you could even do a progress layout each month or so to remind you of your achievements as you get closer to your goals.

The Bring it On! layout was created using Valerie Randall’s Altered State Collection. There are some very groovy papers in this collection. The journaling reads:

“Thank you, 2007 for being such a great year for me.

I have loved the changes in my life over this year, as well as all the fun and wonderful things that have happened.
And now it’s time to look towards 2008.
What will this year bring?
What goals will I strive to achieve?
What differences will I see in my life?”

And my Goals are:

1. Quadruple the number of Scraps of Mind readers. Plan: Produce regular great content that encourages readers to tell others about.
2. Give back to the Community. Plan: Provide meaningful help to at least one new person each week.
3. Improve fitness. Plan: Walk a minimum of 4 times per week.

Don’t overburden yourself

One thing I would suggest when deciding on your New Year’s Resolutions is to pick a small number. It will be far easier to achieve success if you only have to focus on two or three things rather than a whole list.

And small successes breed larger successes. So make sure you measure your progress towards achieving your overall goal. That’s what will keep you going and will gain you the outcome you really want.

So are you going to set goals or challenges for yourself in 2008? What is it that you’d like to accomplish this year? Just because Jan 1 has gone certainly doesn’t mean the moment to set up your plan has passed. How about sharing your plans with us here? You know you’ll get plenty of support from Scrap of Mind readers.

Other related Articles:

Scraps of Mind 2007 – the year that was

Do you make Scrapbook Layouts without Photos?

Interview with Ro Paxman – CEO of Scrap Girls