September is a great month to review your goals and set your plans for the last four months of the year. You might wonder why I don’t start in October to focus on the last quarter. Because it’s a momentum thing for me.
Back in July, we did a half year review. And then summer hit full force. There was time for family fun, vacations, and the lazy days of summer. Which is ok. Why work hard if you don’t enjoy relaxing too? But now the kids are back in school and the business world is gearing back up. It’s time to get yourself in gear too!
If you haven’t already done a review of your goals for the year, then you can use the directions in How To Do A Midyear Check-In Of Your Goals. This will give you a better idea of where you stand and what you need to do to accomplish your goals by year-end. You’ll also know if there are some goals you should jettison or even extend.
How To Jettison A Goal
I think the hardest part in goal reviewing is deciding if it’s time to jettison a goal. Especially true if you’ve done a lot of work already. The idea of stopping work on a goal might make you feel like you are quitting and no one wants to feel like a quitter. But, there can be times in which it’s ok to give up on a goal and move onto something else. It’s the best decision to make and you’re not a quitter, you’ve just realized that you were going after the wrong goal.
Here’s a simple example of why it’s sometimes best to change your goals. What if you want to be a Doctor but keep failing your anatomy exam? It’s time to sit back and pick a new path. Or what if planning your wedding was part of this year’s goals, but you broke off your engagement? It’s time to jettison that goal and set a new one. While these are extreme examples of what might happen to make you want to change your goals, they should get the point across.
Ask yourself if there were life changes that make the goal impossible or not meaningful anymore. Are there any goals that you’re not enthusiastic about anymore? Then ask yourself why. Again, it could be that other things in your life changed, but it could also be that you set goals that weren’t meaningful to you. I did this when I first started blogging. Trying to follow what other people were doing, setting goals that other people had on their blogs made me hate blogging. I stopped blogging for about a month and re-evaluated my goals. And now I’m happy with my direction.
Another thing to ask is whether the goal is too big. Perhaps you’re trying to meet an impossible timeline. Then you need to break that task up some more and move some of the tasks into the following year. Using the above example, it takes years to become a Doctor, so it’s not something you can just accomplish in one year, but you can meet specific smaller goals this year to get you closer to your bigger goal.
Tools To Help You Meet Your Goals
Once you’ve done your review and determined what to keep and not keep it’s time to look at the tools that can help you achieve those goals. First and foremost, you might guess that I’m a huge advocate for Vision Boards. Portable Vision Boards in particular. You can update the one you’ve already created or create a new one with a special focus on the year-end.
You’ll also need to know How To Prioritize Your To-Do List. The steps in this post will help you break down larger goals into smaller steps. The post also covers a method for tackling goals that an efficiency expert showed to Charles Schwab’s management team. Schwab was so impressed he paid the man the equivalent of $500,000 in today’s market. All for spending just 15 minutes with each member of his team. It’s that quick and easy to learn.
I hope you use these tools to make the last four months of the year the best four months of the year! Go ahead and crush those goals.
This is really helpful and resonates with me.
Rachael | https://rachaelstray.com
I’m glad you find it helpful. I know you’re a planner.
I do need to take a step back and look at a few things on my “to do list” that have been there for months and decide… do them or not! It’s hard to drop something from the list because I know at one time I really wanted to do it. You’re question about is it still meaningful where I am right now is helpful.
Hi Jennifer, another motivating post and I agree that sometimes we have to re-evaluate our goals but that doesn’t mean we have to give up. I can’t believe we are into the last four months of 2018!!!!! Have a great week and thanks for the resources.
Yes, yes, yes. Saving this post for post-tomorrow, when my boys head back to school. (Yea!) Without much time for me over the summer, I feel like I’ve been scrambling to get the bare minimum done. Now, it’s time to get serious about working toward my goals (starting with figuring out exactly what they are!). Thanks for the inspiration and direction!
I’m glad to be the inspiration. There’s something renewing about September that makes me want to renew my goals and plan through the end of the year. Must be all that time spent in school.
I will definitely do this. Thanks for the idea!
Glad you like it Mandy!
So funny, I don’t ever think of reassessing goals other than around New Year’s day. I think it’s a great idea to review more often, it would be a more efficient use of my time and energy.
Lots of good advice here. As far as blogging goes, I don’t want to be like every other over 50 blogger which is a good thing, because I can only be me. At this time of my life, I’ve downsized the physical things in my life, but I still have time for goals, and not all of them I’ve downsized. Brenda
Downsizing to live a life of less impact (and less dusting) doesn’t mean your goals need to downsize. Dream big and go for it.
I’m a planner, too, and I love that you do this in September instead of waiting until October. This way, in October, it’s time to implement for the last quarter of the year. When do you start planning for the next year’s goals?
I’m glad this resonates with you Patty. I do it in September mainly because it really feels like a month in which to “pick up the pace” because summer is over and things are starting to pick up again. As for the next year it’s a three week process that I start at the beginning of December. One week to dream and plan. The next to schedule or figure out my timeline and the third to create a vision board. Since November is my birthday month that’s also a time I do a lot of reflection on what’s been working and what hasn’t been so I’m prepared to move into December planning.