With a new year, comes new resolutions. Today, I share my 2017 goals and ambitions – to hopefully make 2017 a much better year than 2016. Here we go!
Honestly, would it even be a new year if we didn’t kick things off with silent reflection on our resolutions? It seems hard-coded in the the human psyche that January 1st is a time to self-evaluate, criticize your mistakes and amend to do things better. I shared a post similar to this in 2016, sharing 4 objectives for the year and upon review – I give myself a B. You can look back at that post here, but the main gist is that in 2016, I successfully maintained a better work/life balance, accepted new opportunities and found new adventures.
So where does that leave me as I look forward to another year?
I spent a good chunk of time over my new year’s weekend thinking about my personal 2017 goals. While 2016 was a ‘decent’ year, the thing that really jumps out at me is just how unhappy I was with myself. For whatever reason, my confidence took a hit and I found myself feeling inadequate a lot of the time. Of course, I can’t just snap my fingers and resolve that…but I think I can take strides to feel more comfortable in my skin and proud of accomplishments. The truth is, we have to be our personal cheerleaders. While it all does take a village, we often have to rely on ourselves to cheer ourselves on because we live in an age when it’s not likely someone’s going to be on the sidelines doing it for you.
My 2017 Goals and Ambitions
Push Myself Outside of the Comfort Zone
As the saying goes, nothing great ever comes from being in comfort zones. While 2016 was a very unsafe year around the world, personally I felt fine. That needs to change. In 2017, I want to push myself to be nervous more and live outside of a comfort zone. I want to take more risks and stop worrying about how it will make others perceive me. In general, I think a lot of self doubt comes from being a woman and I’m sick and tired of that. I’m sick of seeing women who are strong and confident being labeled as pushy or a bitch. I’m sick of seeing women feel like they have to soften their ambitions or voice to fit into a nice mold. And frankly, I think society in general defines what our comfort zones should be because that’s how society is comfortable accepting women. In 2017, I’m calling BS on that and want to push myself to take more risks.
Work Smarter, Not Harder
In 2016, I vowed to put the stressful days of working overtime and not taking care of myself behind me. If I had to grade myself, I’d give myself a solid A on following through. No longer was I bending over backwards to make everything happen on my own. That said, I think I want to do more in 2017. Rather than reverting back to life as a stressed-out workaholic that can’t tear herself away from her laptop, I want to make use of every tool available to help me work smarter. A big part of that I think will be developing a plan and sticking with it. In 2016, I so often would change and rearrange my editorial calendar, goals, post ideas, etc. That left me working from behind quite a bit because I spent so much time second-guessing myself. In 2017, I hope to be much more straight forward and take advantage of every time-saving measure that I can. Hopefully, I’ll be able to report back to you next year on ways to do more in less time. Goals!!
Celebrate Progress
Wow, what a novel idea to actually celebrate personal progress, right? Well – in my book, it sadly is. In 2016, when I would meet or surpass a goal – I would mentally jump to comparing myself to others and determining how I can do even better. That’s great. Wanting to push further is great. An important missing step, though? The act of acknowledging and celebrating the milestones along the way. Progress is progress and rather than beating myself up over not being further along (I did this A LOT in 2016), I want to celebrate the progress I am making. Already I’ve worked out a goal-tracking system for 2017 that I really hope to stick with to measure and celebrate my progress. The saying ‘Rome wasn’t built in a day’ is true. It wasn’t. And chances are your main objectives can’t be accomplished in a day either. I’m going to go back to one of my favorite movies of all time called What About Bob – and think baby steps. Baby steps to the elevator. Baby steps to a better life.
Take Time for Me
I did a novel thing over the weekend, I turned off my cellphone to completely disconnect from emails and social media. Between work, Dream in Lace and life in general – I’m constantly juggling three social and email accounts for different areas on my life. It can be a lot. It can also get in the way of a lot things and make it a struggle to focus on what I’m actually doing and where I am. Who else is hanging out with their friends/family while reading and responding to work related emails? I know I can’t be alone on this. When I am juggling a full-time job, the goal of growing Dream in Lace and trying to stay up-to-date on industry trends/news, it doesn’t seem likely that I’ll be able to take every single weekend for a digital detox. It does seem reasonable, though, to do so one weekend a month and to at the very least – step away from it all past 8 o’clock at night. Okay, fine….9 pm seems more reasonable. *wink*
I’m going to stop it there with four big 2017 goals that will hopefully have me sitting in a much better place next January 1.
If I’m being honest, I really do think 2017 is going to be another difficult year for the world. What I am optimistic about? Making it a better one for me. Like I said, I was very difficult on myself in 2016 – most notably in the last couple of months. In December, some days I barely wanted to get out of bed I felt so low about certain things. I think that celebrating milestones, taking more time out for the things that make me happy and working smarter will go far in making 2017 a better year. Here’s hoping I can stick with these 2017 goals and give myself a solid B (or even A) again next year!
Of course, a very happy new year to you! I’d love to hear what you’re trying to do better in 2017. Let’s be each other’s cheerleaders!
As always, stay stylish and keep chasing your dreams!
XOXO
Kelly
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