Do Resolutions Work?

Well, if you're watching this live, Happy New Year. So we are doing a little bit of planning and preparing with the rest of the year and kind of inspired me with the emails that I'm sending out with the starfish stories that one of the most common things that I get asked for the New Year is, do you do a resolution? And there's psychology for both sides around setting a resolution or not setting a resolution. And the business community even discussed this. I have an email this morning from the Small Business American Express blog about, you know, should business owners be setting resolutions? And my response is that, you know, a resolution is just a fancy word for a goal. And should business owners or should individuals have goals? Absolutely. Otherwise you're not really sure what you're aspiring to. But there's also this idea that, you know, once you fail, like, it's over. And so I want to share with you kind of a funny New Year's resolution quote that, you know, this individual's New Year's resolutions start procrastinating. And they're not starting until next week, though. And so I think that it's funny that January 1st becomes this magical day that we're all going to start doing stuff where we're all going to make all these big changes. There's a lot of stress around January 1st. The kids are off school, and then there's gonna be a lot of change in a couple weeks. And the gyms are all flooded. And so if you make a goal or make a resolution, and January 3rd, which is today, the date that this is being recorded, you're struggling. Don't give up. And if you happen to trip up, don't completely give up on your resolution. Because at the end of the day and at the end of the year, it's just to be better, not just to, you know, it's not a black and white pass fail. At least not for some of the goals that I'm familiar with setting in business. I think that it's important that you get better, and I think it's important that you try and that you learn. And we're going to be discussing failure later on this year and our star for stories and creating some videos around that. And I'll share with you some of the experts on failure, and I might as well have a PhD in the subject. And so really, I think the only time where it's appropriate to say, no, you know, let's not make a goal is if your goal is to just learn from completely from the experience and not have a plan. Other than that, I think you should have a goal, I think you should have a resolution, I think you should have a plan and I think you should not give up. Even if you miss a day or you miss a week or you miss a month, you know, get back on it. You made it for a reason. It's important to you. Also remember the why of it. So here's a good quote for you and smart fellow. In preparing for battle, I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable. So this was President Eisenhower's knowledge that he shared. And I really agree with this. I think that I learn more from the art of planning than I actually do from, you know, having the plan I used to or a better place Consulting used to do these big long 80 page strategic plans for companies. And unless you want a really expensive doorstop, I don't Recommend Doing a 5 year or 10 year, you know, hundred page, several hundred page strategic plan. I think that there are better ways to spend, spend your time and energy. But I think that coming together and deciding on a common vision and a common goal as a team and getting some clarity about what that's going to be and why it's important to your team is absolutely one of the best things that you could possibly do as a company and as a team. And so at the end of the day, what I want to share with you is that even though it, as I said, It's January 3rd while we're filming this, if you're watching this at any other time in the year and it's not New Year's, remember that you can make a goal for the day. You can make a daily resolution, not just a yearly resolution. How are you going to get through today? How are you going to make your one, your dream one step closer by your acts of today? And so think in terms of the day's resolution, not the years. And that's really what I have for you on should you make resolutions? What are resolutions? How come I can't say that? It's a difficult word. Okay. Anyway, my resolution tomorrow is going to be to practice saying resolution, but not in time to have this video go out. So that's my resolution, to get a little bit better every single day. And I really like being able to think about it in bite sized terms that ultimately accomplish a giant year's. Cool. So thank you for making the world a better place. Would love to know what your resolution is. I'm getting better. One word at a time. There we go. So post that in the comments. Share it in the Difference Makers page. And again, thanks for making the world a better place.