The New Year is only a couple of weeks away, but before we start setting our goals and making our plans for 2020, let’s push pause. Let’s take a minute and do something equally as valuable. Let’s look at 2019 in review.
A popular way to conduct retrospectives in the business world is the WWW.
-What worked well?
-What kinda worked?
-What didn’t work?
You can use this for any aspect of life, but of course let’s think about it regarding the health goals you had for 2019. It seems easy to first ponder the things that didn’t work. Maybe you did not lose all the weight you wanted to or didn’t get into the exercise routine you might have planned. Our brains are quick to point these “failures” out to us.
But before you do so, can you first try to think about the things did work this year? It can be as small as less trips to the fast food drive through. Or maybe you did more exercise than the year before. Maybe you turned down more desserts or ate more vegetables.
See if you can come up with a list of things that you did that you are proud of, that worked well. Your brain will want to keep going back to the things that didn’t work. Tell it to hold on, there is plenty of time for that.
After you have come up with a nice list of successes, then go ahead and think of the things that “kinda worked”. These are the things that worked somewhat or you made progress towards, but need some improvement or refining. Maybe you did some planning, but only half the time. This worked but could be improved on.
I often talk about failing our way to success. If you did not make any plans/goals that you failed at this year, you may have not expected enough out of yourself. Setting “impossible goals” is a great way to push yourself beyond where you have always been. The progress you make and the things you learn along the way is where the real value and growth comes from. Remember from my series of blogs about the book Atomic Habits, that the systems that you put in place to help achieve goals are way more important than the goals themselves.
As we look at these lists, we can start thinking about what we will do differently in 2020. In next week’s blog, we’ll start to explore 2020 planning, but for now – pause and give yourself a moment to reflect. It’s been a great year!
