Happy New Year, Done, Now set Goals

Now that everyone is done celebrating the New Year and making New Year's resolutions, we can make another important decision. We can decide to sit down seriously and map out a plan to make real changes. Because let's face it, some of you have already broken your New Years resolutions.

Sit down and plan some realistic goals for you to obtain in 2009 and beyond. It generally a good Idea to plan 5 years ahead. Set short term goals that lead up to long term goals. If you had to swim across a channel, you wouldn't aim for the shore that you couldn't see. You would first shoot for the channel marker in plain site. Put some goals up within reach that are steps in the process of obtaining your long term goals.

How do you set goals? Well, first remember that we talked about the five areas of life, Faith, Family, Friends, Fitness, and Finance. The first being the most important and respectively down the line to Finance being the last of importance. Many people have it backwards.

C.S. Lewis said,”If you shoot for Heaven, you will get both Heaven and Earth, but if you shoot at just for Earth you will wind up with neither.”

So set some goals in your faith, for me that would be a better relationship with my Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. It is natural for us humans to search for the truth, and you will find it in the Bible.

Take each area of life and grab some paper and ask yourself; “What would I like to Have? What would I like to do? What would I like to become?” Maybe you would like to have more time to be with your family, or maybe you would like to do more exercise this year to become more fit. If it is to loose weight then set dates with the amount of weight you would like to loose. Say, 20 lbs in 90 days? Maybe you want to be a better Mom or Dad to your children? Maybe you want to set a financial goal and add 500 dollars per month to your income in 60days. Financial Goals are generally goals that support the other areas of life. For Instance, Let's say you want to be a better Dad, so you set a goal to spend more quality time with your daughter. You may need some financial goals to afford to take her to Disney Land. You can see how the areas of life all effect each other and need to be in balance. Maybe you need to develop a greater servant heart in you faith goals? Well that will effect your goal to be a better Dad, don't you think?

I recommend people set some goals to make new friends, learn how to love people, and in turn God will bless you for it. Quite frankly if you stop learning and growing in any of these areas of life, your progress will be hindered. Well, that leads me to the next thought.

You must continue to learn in all areas of life. Why you ask? Because you can never make serious changes with the same knowledge you currently have. If you keep the knowledge the same, the results will definitely not change and you can expect 2009 to be the same year as 2008. Now for some, that may be good if you are satisfied with the results. But if not, then you will need new information as a catalyst to change your results.

In specific, start reading some good books, such as, Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People, Napoleon Hill's Think and Get Rich, and of course the Bible. Get you hands on the recording by Earl Nightingale, The Strangest Secret. That should help you make some significant change for 2009.


Happy New Year and continued Blessings throughout the year.

Why Faith, Family, Friends, Fitness, and Finance?

Finally getting down to why I’m writing this blog and sharing with both people I know personally and those who don’t even know who the heck I am. Well, I hope that something I say here on the blog will help someone. I hope that there will be some seed of thought here that will be planted on fertile ground.. As said in the bible in Mark 4:20,

“Others, like seed sown on good soil, hear the word, accept it, and produce a crop—thirty, sixty or even a hundred times what was sown."

So people are probably asking why these five areas of life? And the answer is important, as these are the categories that all humans have in common. Each one affects the other and yet is important on its own. Take for instance, Friends as the third category, who your friends are will effect the other four areas. The wrong friends will tear those other categories down and you with the process. The right friends will build you up and cause spillover into the other 4 areas of life or categories. The truth is that a balance between these areas is what will give a more fruitful life.

Second, the order, Faith, Family, Friends, Fitness and Finance, is for a specific reason. It is the order of priority. Faith, being the highest priority, also transcends itself into the other 4 areas of life. Faith is the belief in things not seen. It is the ability to see positive things for the future even when bad things happen. That’s why leading a spiritual life is so important, as it benefits all areas of life. Generally, when a person lacks Faith then Fear takes over. Fear is just the other side, also a belief in things not seen, but is the lack of hope, a negative attitude. Yes, Faith is by far the most important indeed.

The last of the five is Finance. You can have all the money you need and still be unsuccessful. Sure, money is a good tool, but not the secret to happiness. However, the lack of this area will, like the other 4, spillover and affects the other areas of life.

Family and Friends mainly has to do with cultivating good relationships. It is amazing to me how much modern peoples lack in this regard. Learning to nurture your relationships will only have a positive effect on your entire life.

And of course, Fitness is so important. We have all heard the saying, “Without our health we have nothing”, although not absolutely true, it obviously trumps how much money you have in the bank.

It is amazing how much time has gone by after starting this blog. I have so much to share with you and look forward to covering some more on this topic. I will also be covering specific elements from all the 5 areas of life.

Blessings to YOU! I will leave you with a very funny video about priorities, WHAT WOULD YOU RATHER BE

The Video is no longer available. So I removed the link.