Daily Ramblings – Motivation Monday – Completing your yearly goals

Tags

Consistency, December!, End of Year Eval, Holiday Season, motivation, Serving Others, Setting New Goals, Weekly Schedule

Well, we are in the last month of the year. It went by quickly didn’t it?

This is the month to grind it out before we hit the holiday weeks. When the holiday week hits, the family will be coming, you’ll be doing last-minute holiday shopping, and it will preclude anything you want to finish. So dig in now, at the early part of the month and knock down any of the goals you have left. It’s not too late.

Between Christmas and New Year’s is the perfect time to take a tally of what you set out to do this year, where you missed the mark, and plan accordingly for the new year. There are a few goals I missed, not due to a lack of effort, but they reached a little too far. This year, I’ll use that data and set more realistic goals that I can achieve by the end of next year. They’ll still stretch me, but won’t be so far off in the distance that it will be impossible to accomplish.

One of the greatest learnings I have discovered this year is consistently showing up. I started the year with a goal of reading 48 books, at last count, I am at 60+ for the year and still going. I also finished the rough draft of my non-fiction book on technical recruiting and began work on my fiction story. These would not have been possible, had I not done something every day to move the needle forward.

What goals did you set? Did you accomplish them? Did you fall short like I did? If you fell short, how will you goal yourself in that area next year? I’m really curious to hear from others on this topic. Feel free to respond in the comments below. Ok, here’s my weekly schedule!

This week:

• Work on Story Beats for my Fiction book daily
• Exercise daily (see my workout routine for the week of Dec 1, 2019)
• Read 1 hour daily
• Meditate daily
• Complete 1 session for each of the 5 classes I’m taking daily
• Clear the circles on my Apple Watch Daily
• Hang out at my local coffee shops or a restaurant daily
• Read my Bible Daily
• Do a random act of kindness while I’m out running errands daily
• Help my wife with her Master’s Degree work daily
• Have some fun daily (Netflix, Xbox, NFL Football, or Disney+) daily
• Log my food in MyFitnessPal daily

Well, that’s it for now, folks! I hope each of you are looking forward to the holidays like I am. I realize there are some in my audience who dread the holidays and my heart goes out to you. You know what I’ve found? When you’re down, volunteer. Go to an animal shelter, an orphanage, hospice, or some other charitable organization and pitch in. It’s a great time to do this, and it is also a way to focus on something else. I have always found that giving and serving others is a great way to cheer up.

Have a great Monday, all!

Until next time…

Dave

 

Daily Ramblings – Ted Talk Tuesday

Tags

Adam Grant, Asking for Help, Giver, Matcher, Organizational Psychology, Serving Others, Taker

Another great Ted Talk by Adam Grant. Check out why givers should be taken care of in your organization and why takers need to go.

Until next time…

Dave

Daily Ramblings – Daily Quotes – The Plus Factor

Tags

Deterioration, improvement, Selfishness, Serving Others, The Plus Factor

“The more we do, the more we can do.” – William Hazlitt

This quote speaks to me about our ability to continually improve or continually deteriorate. There are some days where everything I do builds on previous successes. At other times, I feel less than motivated to do anything. Interestingly, it is easy to fall into a pattern pursuing improvement or deterioration.

Have you ever witnessed someone who is happy and motivated? Everything they do is out of joy. Everything they do adds to them. Conversely, we probably all know that one friend or acquaintance who is avoiding life. They drink too much, do drugs, engage in overindulgences of all kinds, never realizing how they are wasting away their own life.

Positive lives filled with continual improvement are driven by goals and achievement; negative lives are those that are whimsical, procrastinating, and lack focus. One life is increasing, while the other is decreasing. I think all of us have experienced a traumatic situation that has put us in a tailspin. We lose all motivation. We lose that spark within that encourages us to pursue higher achievement. We stop living.

I’ve experienced these dark periods of life. Divorce, bankruptcy, losing my way, and feeling that I am some sort of victim that life will never give anything to. Have you experienced this? It is a tough place to be and sometimes the hole we’ve dug for ourselves is so deep and dark, we don’t even remember what a good life is. What did I discover during these dark times?

I discovered that much of our misery is caused by focus on the self. When you focus only on your feelings, your comforts, your wants, the selfishness begins to isolate you. It creates an emptiness that has no end. When I began to realize this, I sought to look outward. I sought to give of myself to others. How could I make someone else’s day just a little better?

When you focus outward and serve others, even if it’s a smile or wave at a stranger, a light begins to show itself. Our suffering begins to taper as we focus more and more on others. I can’t explain this but do know it’s true. The more we focus on others, the less we think about ourselves. The more we give, the more we get back.

Imagine a world where there was a peak of achievement. Once that achievement was accomplished there is no “better”, no improvement, no more hills to climb. Can you imagine how boring that existence would be?

I believe that we will never be perfect but the road to perfection is infinite. There is always one more thing we can do, one more step to take, one more place to go. This plus factor is what makes being human a wonderful experience. We can always achieve more, learn more, listen more, love more, and so on. This is what this quote means to me. “The more we do, the more we can do.” What a great life this is.

Until next time…

Dave

Daily Ramblings – Ted Talk – The Way to Help is Often Just to Listen

Tags

Being there, Connecting, Listening, Serving Others, Ted Talk

What an absolutely inspiring Talk about the importance of just listening to another person without judgement or giving advice. This is one of the biggest challenges I have. I have friends and family that have challenges they want to speak about and I always have to jump in and give advice.

People don’t want advice in most cases. They just want to be heard.

I hope your week is going well.

Until next time…

Dave