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So, it’s the fourth week in January and people are STILL referencing new year goals and hashtagging ‘#NewYearNewMe’ in their captions.
But you’re not feeling it.
Yeah, you have business goals you plan to accomplish, but you feel a bit overwhelmed with the New Year resolution hype and you’re not quite ready to face them yet. So what do you do?
...No, I was actually asking you because you can’t just do ‘nothing’!
What you can do is take it each day at a time. I know, I know, it’s cliche but hear me out.
There is an actual way to #WinTheYear and it starts with winning each day. The ‘each day’ there actually has to be productive if you want to achieve any of your goals within this new year.
We all love to do this thing where we psych ourselves out of starting anything before even trying it, simply because we’ve already assumed the worst is going to happen.
Remember when you wanted to start your business?
You had to make a really hard decision to move past the fear of failing and being ridiculed to actually start.
You feared the unknown. You spent months overthinking every single aspect of your idea because you just didn’t know which direction to go in. You decided for a while to just take no steps at all, because that was better than making any mistakes.
You made excuses to justify your inaction. I can’t focus on this business right now because I’m too busy with work. I just don’t have the time. or This is going to take a lot more money than I can afford right now. I have school fees and bills that are more important. or People probably won’t even like my art enough to pay what it’s worth for it.
And, finally you thought about what people would think. You didn’t want your family or friends to think any less of you if things went south and you didn’t want to face ridicule in general from anyone else who would have seen you try and fail.
Despite all of that, you eventually decided to just start wherever you were and however you could. Because you couldn’t ignore those dreams any longer :)
Take a page out of your own book, from when you were just starting out, to tackle your goals for the year.
Ignore the bigger picture.
Weird, but VERY helpful.
We all aspire to grow in our personal lives and businesses but sometimes forget that ‘growth’ isn’t comfortable. At all.
Our brains are designed to hate discomfort (aka keep us safe). No matter how small, if it senses any amount of fear it (you) will start to talk you out of the decision you’re about to make.
Which is why thinking of the bigger picture, more than the actual steps you need to take to get there, can be very overwhelming.
If you actually decide to just take action instead, no matter how small, you’ll realize it isn’t so bad after all and try even harder.
Let’s go back to your journey to the big start.
Once you actually took that first step you started to gain momentum.
The fear never went away but you chose to ignore it because you realized your idea was valid and that people actually loved your products.
So just like then, allow yourself to forget the bigger picture so you can just start.
After setting your goals, make a simple list everyday [that’s based on your goals].
Try not to pack it with a million items either, because you’ll just end up with more anxiety.
Start with 5 small actions that you can do today that will get you closer to your goals.
And if a step within that goal still seems too overwhelming, then just take a deep breath and break it down some more.
If you do this everyday, within a few weeks you’ll look back and be shocked at just how much progress you’ve made. And by the end of the year, you’ll be a unicorn- someone who actually achieved their new year resolution/s!
This, my friends, is called the compound effect and you’ll be amazed at how much progress you’ll make over the new year in your businesses by just taking it one day at a time.
If this blog post helped you in any way, share it with a friend! Sometimes all you need is a simple reminder to get you back on track :)
Until next time!
Written by: Noelle Black.