There’s something nostalgic about a year coming to an end don’t you think? In many aspects it’s just like any other ordinary day. Except that it forces you to review, to contemplate, to want to start things new. How has your 2014 been?
Personally, I had a breakthrough this year with my “New Years Resolution”. Used to be, resolutions are written to die. Its time bound. It’s supposed to last for a year then in reality it will only last for a month – if I’m lucky. This year, I realized that it was more important to build the right habit rather than reaching a goal. The things I aimed for in 2014 are lifestyle changes that really is not time bound. I’ve came to accept that they were things that I needed to do from that moment on till the rest of my life. The change in perspective, really helped a lot.
Here’s some example:
1. Lose weight – In 2013, my fitness regime was basically – nothing haha. With a whole year of barely no exercise, I definitely had some unwanted weight I needed to get rid of. But I didn’t have any specific weight goal in mind, I just wanted to lose some weight – pretty vague. I signed up for a gym membership. Several months of going to the gym, I realized that there is moodiness related to it. Sometimes you just feel like doing it, sometimes you really don’t. And the difficulty of the task doesn’t really improve much in a span of a few months. So I decided that it was more important to keep going even if i do less today and do more the next day. After a while, it becomes a part of you. You make time for it in your schedule, you feel something is off when you don’t go. And at the end of 1 year, I did lose some pounds and many people noticed. Not too bad right?
2. Read the bible in a year – My insane schedule in 2013 had caused my quiet time to really suffer, so I set it out to have an improvement in this area. I started the One Year Chronoligical Bible reading plan in the YouVersion Bible app. It’s a really cool app, it has check marks on the chapters you’ve already completed and encourages you with “good job” and tells you how many % you had already completed. The reading plan has about 3 to 8 chapters to read in a day. I find it a bit overwhelming. But more importantly, I find that if i missed it for a couple of days, I have a ton of things to catch up on the day after. To avoid this pain, it really helped me to remember and make time to read it every day. I think the worst I missed was 4 days, and after that if I am late it will only be for 1 to 2 days. I realized that big goals really do take time and you have to do a little of it everyday rather than one time big time and a lot to catch up. Besides I get to enjoy the process so much more with having a little bit to chew on every day than to cram for it to the end.
In Creating Info, we also realized that we had a tendency to focus on big goals but wasn’t doing a good job in building the right habit of breaking it down to workable tasks for now that will lead us to the goals where we wanted to go. This year, we had been more disciplined in this area by consciously setting weekly goals and reporting on our status for its completion. Among us partners, we’ve consciously indicated tasks and follow through them to get more things done. We did our best not to get caught up on big problems that are not yet relevant today and focus on what we can achieve now. Not perfect yet, but we’ve done better this year than before.
How about you? How had your resolutions been? 🙂
Lastly, 2013 was a pretty bad year for me. I prayed earnestly to God for a better 2014 which I am happy to report that it had been. Despite grief, pain and loss, God is enough and His grace is enough. He gives us new reasons to hope, to be happy, to be grateful 🙂
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness! Lamentations 3:22-23 ESV
You have turned my mourning into joyful dancing. You have taken away my clothes of mourning and clothed me with joy, that I might sing praises to you and not be silent. O Lord my God, I will give you thanks forever! Psalm 30:11-12 NLT
Happy 2015 to us all! 🙂