Oh My!

Another year is upon us. It feels just like yesterday when the year 2019 it started and it has rolled away joining the previous years before it, and against all odds we are still here.

There are a lot of people who would have written down their New Year resolutions and some of these resolutions are going to be broken between few days or few weeks into the year. They will be broken not only because the people involved won’t do their best but because there are some things that they are still not getting right.

I’ll explain

For some years now, I have always written down a particular amount of money to save up. At the beginning of the year, I’d write it, but because I didn't have the proper understanding of what it entails and how I could achieve it, at the end of the year, I’d only have a fraction of what I proposed to have. This year was quite different, I even exceeded my financial goal for the year, while this is not spite others who didn't attain their financial goal, or to declare myself as a millionaire, but it goes a long way to show the power when we seek to first become before we do, and when we finally understand the how, things just flows almost effortlessly.

If one of your goals for several years is to maintain an unbroken relationship with God, you might end up flunking your daily devotion two weeks into the new year (I know how this feels, I was a regular customer too), but if rather than striving in the flesh to always want to do the devotions and then we can move to trusting God to quicken our mortal bodies, or we build structures around our lives that ensures that we also communicate with God every single day of our life, and then we build a great relationship with God where His voice is the loudest in our spirit and our souls does not find rest until it rests in him. In that kind of realm, not doing devotion will not be the problem, we will have a new set of challenge which will be that of losing track of time once we are in his presence.  I once read of a lady who had to do her devotion in the night, and couldn't afford to do her devotions in the morning, due to the fact that once she starts communing with God, she becomes lost in His presence and can’t seem to track the time. What a good problem to have! It doesnt start in a day. And although there will days when the body when our body just wants to rest, but we will always keep working hard to follow Him.

So, let’s dive into the things you can do differently to make this year to make it your best year yet.

Except you have been told otherwise by God not to have anything planned out but just see where he is ready to take you, I believe everyone should set goals for their life and beyond the setting of goals, adequate plans should be put in place to see those goals come to pass.

For the men, I’m sure there will be nothing interesting about football if 22 men are just running over the field with no goal post, the goal post is what measures the achievements and if  a team is either winning or losing.

Writing down goals goes a long way to measure progress in one’s life. Although some of our plans might not come to be, but that should not be an excuse to fold hands and just watch our lives ebb away.

These are some areas you might want to set your goals and some questions to guide you;

Spiritual Life

How do you intend seeking God more this year?

What will you stop doing, reduce in doing or do more in the year as you seek God?

How many sermons from God’s servants will you be listening to per month?

How many programs will you be attending?

How often will you be fasting per month?

How many times will you be going on a personal retreat this year?

Mental Development

How many books will you be reading per month?

How much will you choose a great program on TV over home videos?

What kind of programs will you be watching?

Assignment/Purpose

What is God calling you to do?

What can you begin to do now in those areas of your calling?

What are the major distractions on your way and how do you minimize them as you go through the year?

Will you need to connect to other people with similar calling as God leads?

Health

How many hours sleep will you always give your body per day?

How much calories are you allowed to take into God’s temple; your body?

What is your definition of junks and how do you intend cutting down on junks and begin to eat healthy?

How often will you go for medical check-up during the year?

Finance

Will you always pay your tithe (10% of your income) or are you permitted to stab it in case of pending personal projects?

What percent of your monthly income will you always save per month?

How do you intend to invest your saving, will it be government bonds, real estate e.t.c?

What other stream of income will you be having as the year goes by?

Have you come to the understanding that you do not have to prove a point to anyone and so your spending is not from a competing stance?

How much will be giving out to different individuals as a means of God’s blessing them?

Career

How do you intend bringing excellence into your job?

What certifications related to your career path do you intend getting as the year rolls by?

Will you be going for your next level of degree?

Setting Goals makes sure we do not just keep boxing into the air, but that we are deliberate in all that we do, and we should also bear in heart that the Lord of our life  might interrupt some of the things we have set as plans for ourselves all for the glory of His name.

This is a term mostly used in the store or where things are kept to be able to know what has been exhausted over a period of time and what needs to be refilled.

And although a lot of people make this stocktaking a one-year event which is usually towards the end of the year but it should not be so. We have 12 months in a year, you can choose to reflect upon your progress at the end of every month. Yours might be towards the end of each quarter, we have four quarters in the year; January, February and March is a quarter, April, May and June is another quarter, July, August and September is another quarter while October, November and December signifies the last quarter. You can chose the last day of the last month of every quarter.

Review time should be a time when you ask yourself deep questions, questions such as;

Am I as devoted to God as I said I would in this year?

Am I giving as much as I said u would?

Am I saving as much as I said I would?

What professional courses out of what I said I would do am I doing?

Have I started work on that business idea or am I still stalling on it?

The time of stock taking/Review is a time to be sincere with yourself and God.

Taking stock or reviewing your life at those intervals helps you look back at the beginning of the year at those things you said you would do and if you’re really doing them, it helps you stay on course or if you have to re-strategize or just completely quit doing a particular thing. Doing this helps you feel the same or something near the adrenaline rush you felt while crossing into the New Year.

Most great firms and organizations take time out of their busy schedule to do this, it is so important that it has the capacity to steer your life in a great path.

While some of us are good at putting our thoughts on a paper, there are some who struggle to do that, but either you are a writer or not, endeavor to keep a journal, by keeping a journal I don’t mean all these ten pages souvenir we are given at parties but something with a thick cover pack that can serve you for the next 365 days. You don’t necessarily have to write into your journal every day or every week, but it should serve as a book of reference that can still be looked into years from now.

It is meant to be your personal file where you document happenings, instructions you are getting per season and what God is communicating to you.

My pastor was saying something the other day about the importance of keeping a journal, he said, if you are trusting God concerning a thing and it seems He is silent, you might just take time off, bring out all your parchment (journal over the years) that you document the instructions he gives to you, there is almost a great certainty that the answer you seek at present lies in the instruction that has been communicated years back, now imagine if you didn't use a good journal or didn't even journal at all. The temptation to throw a book with few pages into the thrash is real, or you might just misplace it.

So keep a good journal!

If for previous years you have used party soveniurs in lieu of a hard cover diary, now is a great to invest in one, it will definitely be worth every naira spent on it.

One of the reason some people don’t keep a journal is because they don’t know what they’ll be writing inside for the year, try to buy a diary and watch how the pages gets filled. You might turn a particular section to a place where you write out things that are going right in your life as they unfold (a gratitude list), this will serve as a place to start thanking God from as you review the quarter or at the end of the year. Another section might also be dedicated to writing down the people you want to pray for or your various prayer requests, you can see the pages are all getting gradually filled now.

Remember, you are not keeping a journal to compete with people, but it’s first about God, you and your life.

-CREATE STRUCTURES

Structures are plans put in place that guarantees the sure outcome of a thing or a purpose.

If all the previous year you have always wanted to grow in your career and it keeps looking like a mirage, there is no point in deceiving yourself that you are moving forward when your life is stagnant, it might to be sincere with yourself and do something different.

As a singer, if one of the goals you wrote for the year is to launch an album, the album won’t just automatically launch itself.

The structures to put in place might go along this line;