Limitless

 

So, how many of you have made some new year resolutions?  I know that I have not really made any this year.  I actually am not a great believer in new year resolutions, because they are normally not even worth the paper they are written on.  I mean, honestly, how many of us ever stick to them beyond the first week of January.  If 2020 taught us anything, then it is how absolutely unpredictable life really is.  We can make all the plans, and all the resolutions we want, but life has its own ways and plans with us.  If we are not flexible in our ideas and hopes it can really throw a person for a loop.  We simply cannot even imagine what the future could be like.  However, that does not mean we should not make plans.  It is very important to make plans, because the saying goes : he who fails to plan, plans to fail.  But planning and making new year resolutions are actually two very different concepts.

First of all, resolutions tend to be ill-defined and often a spur-of-the-moment idea.  Secondly, they are often set impossibly high and lack thought as well as a time frame except for the words "this year".  This sets it immediately up for failure.  By the time the novelty of the new year, normally by the second week of January, has worn off, we can hardly remember the resolutions we have made.  So what is the alternative?

Goal setting and planning.  When we write down our goals we immediately set an intention.  It tells your sub-conscious mind to sit up and pay attention.  Having written out your goals, it is then important to formulate a plan of action.  How am I going to tackle this goal, what action will I have to take and what sort of time-line do I look at.  You see, for a goal to become real a person needs to have a clear idea of when do you want the goal to be achieved.

Last year my friend and I took on a major venture, and as we went along we put our plans and goals down on paper every day with a time line and we achieved each one of those.  However, when it got to the launching stage we faltered.  We had a vague idea of when it should be, but every time we shifted the goalposts.  However, once we put the date to paper and we spread the word, it became real.  There was no turning back.  We were committed.  If we did not do that we would still have been waiting to launch.

This year I decided to make a vision board for my goals.  The photo above is my vision board for 2021.  It is an invaluable tool to help make your dreams, hopes and desires a tangible, visible reality.  When you place it where it is visible to you on a daily basis it serves as a reminder of where you are headed.  It helps to manifest those things which are important for you to achieve.  The action of making a vision board helps to release your creative juices and it also helps you to really think about your goals.  Often you will find, that while you are searching for images for your board, you discover other ideas or goals that speak to your heart.

That is exactly how I found my word for the year. "Limitless".  I have so many limiting ideas about myself, my abilities and talents that they seem to keep me firmly tied down to the ground, and prevent me from soaring.  No more, I want to spread my wings and fly.  When we let go of our limiting beliefs, our lives become limitless.  Then not even the sky sets a limit to what we could potentially achieve.  We take the focus off ourselves and our focus becomes Phillipians 4:13 " I can do all things through Christ who gives me the strength.  Limitless.