Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.
Drawing up an extravagant plan of great quality for the coming year
Submitted by RagsToRich on Thu, 2009-12-31 14:27
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A new year is an absolutely perfect opportunity to draw up an entirely fresh and potent plan for the realisation of your dreams. It is a time to let your creativity flourish, and to create for yourself a perfect image of the year to come.
It is a chance for you to consolidate the person you became in the year gone by, creatively change and add the traits which you know you will need to realise your goals in the future, and then become that person in the new year.
How my yearly plan has evolved
Every year for the past five years I have reflected upon my achievements of the year before and wrote some-kind of set of targets for the coming year. Each consecutive time I’ve drawn it up, my plan for the following year has become more spectacular, more grandiose and received a greater amount of my attention and time into its construction.
Several years ago I would merely write up a list of objectives by category, a set of measurable mini-goals which I would aim to tick off one by one. In stark contrast the plan I have drawn up this year is something more along the lines of a university dissertation or an epic project proposal.
Carefully written, and with no extreme of the imagination spared; this year I have spent many hours carefully crafting my plan for the coming year.
This is the only life you can be sure to live. Can you really afford to cut corners on something so important as your plan for the coming year?
If you cannot muster the effort to create a new year’s plan of exceptional quality then you must instead put your effort into locating and strengthening your desire to change at all.
Before you begin this process – realise that done correctly it is a very exciting and enjoyable process. If it feels as if the process is not as enjoyable as it should be then take a step back, and rethink your approach.
Reflecting on the year just past
First of all it is appropriate to spend at least a good 15 minutes reflecting on the year which is drawing/has drawn to a close.
If you wrote up a list of targets or a plan for this year, then now is the time to pull that out. If you didn’t, then try to recall what it is which you had at least mentally planned for yourself.
On examination of the year gone by you should primarily be looking at three separate areas:
1) The greatest things which happened in the year gone by (not necessarily that you planned for).
2) The things which happened in the year gone by which you worked towards and achieved (the things you planned for).
3) The things which you wanted to happen in the year gone by, but which did not happen.
Once you have run through these things you are ready to create your future.
Guide to creating your plan for the coming year
You should follow no strict rules for how your plan will look or what will be contained within it. I am merely providing a loose guideline for you to follow, but if you feel you can create something better without my guidance than follow that instinct instead because it’s right.
A good place to start is to list the areas of focus for your life over the coming year.
For example these could be Lifestyle (including health, fitness, where you live, how you live, and so on), Career (including, for example, any financial projects you may have, and any academic studies you may be undertaking), and Social Circle (including your old friends, the new friends you want to make, and all the people you associate with.)
Then you can begin to think and write about each of these areas in turn in more detail.
Begin with a short description explaining how you feel the area progressed through the previous year, and how comfortable you are both with how it is now and how it has improved.
Then you may address specific subjects within that area, for example in lifestyle you may first decide to consider your fitness and think of all the things you’d like to do with that and how you intend to do them.
Repeat this process until you have a lengthy descriptive and extravagant plan which you are happy with.
Let your imagination loose and allow yourself to write of how you would love for things to go over the coming year.
However, be sure to include targets and goals which you can actually know you have achieved. You need to have targets which you can conclusively say that you have achieved or not.
For example it is not as useful to write a target that you are going to "be happier" as it is to say that you are planning to "buy a new house in Spain". Definite goals for which you can say for sure if you have achieved or not are more useful for measuring and tracking your progress.
You are writing the most important plan there is to you in your life at this moment. The more serious you take it, the more effective a vision you can create.
The overall process should be fun and exciting. When you re-read over the things you have written you should feel somewhat like you are reading targets you have set for yourself, but also you should feel as if you are reading something more akin to a premonition.
The most important rule in creating this plan is to really allow your imagination to run wild. The most extravagant and pleasurable vision you can have of yourself over the coming year is the one you should be describing in your plan.
You may find it useful to adapt a mindset akin to the chairman of the board of directors of an extremely large and important multi-national corporation. You are preparing a report for the shareholders predicting the coming year, and you are very confident of how accurate your vision can be.
List of mini-targets
If you aren’t able to create something you’re happy with from the above process, then a simple but still very useful plan to create is a list of mini-targets for yourself.
As I already mentioned above, this is how my new years plans began, and it is from this that they evolved into what they are today.
Just open up a text document and write down as many targets you’d like to achieve over the coming year that you can think of.
Do not stop until your mind is completely empty. Just keep writing the things you’d like to make happen for yourself.
A target can be something as extravagant as become a millionaire, or it can be something as simple as to join a gym.
Keep these targets somewhere not too far away, throughout the coming year you will look forward to ticking them off.
Using your plan
Every so often in the coming year you can come back to your plan, you can note the things which have already come true, the things which are coming true, and the things which you have yet to work on.
If you find there is something in your plan which you no longer desire, you can make an amendment to it.
But it is equally important to look at the visions which you had which you still desire deeply which you do not feel you have yet moved towards, and to decide to take action to begin making those dreams come true.
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This is pretty awesome, I'm
This is pretty awesome, I'm almost inspired to do it. But I like it.
Do it, it's fun. :D
Do it, it's fun. :D
Starting is the hardest part.
Reminds me of what my Goju Ryu sensei said about karate... that the first move you need to perform is the hardest move there is...
That's getting off your arse and leaving the house.
Really, really need to do
Really, really need to do this. I have so many things I hope to accomplish. I get home from work exhausted most nights, and I think a structured regiment would be very helpful in keeping me focused.
Hi James, The idea is more
Hi James,
The idea is more that it's a fun excercise which sets your targets for the whole year...
So it's not so much your daily habits that you're planning out...
But what you want to acheive over this year.
One of the best parts is seeing some of those things come true within the first quarter of the year and then knowing that you will acheive the other things in the rest.
Rich
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