Planning for the New Year – Taking Inventory
A new year is fast approaching. This year, instead of making the same old new year’s resolutions and reneging on them before the year even gets off the ground (or not bothering to make them, since you’ve failed to follow through so many times in the past), try something different.
First, take a real, honest inventory of your practice. As Mark Victor Hansen (of Chicken Soup for the Soul fame) said in a newsletter he sent out this week, “…it’s time to come clean.” Is your practice where you want it to be?
The truth is, it’s rarely where you want it to be. It isn’t what it ‘should’ be. It just is what it is. But that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Chances are, your practice isn’t where you want it to be because you keep raising the bar and keep striving for more success. The only way to make changes, to grow or to move forward is to first accept what is.
Using a modified version of Mark Victor Hansen’s suggested inventory, ask yourself:
- How do I perceive my practice right now?
- How would I describe my practice if I were being completely honest with myself?
- Are numbers 1 and 2 identical?
(If they are, you are being honest with yourself. If they aren’t, it’s time to begin making them the same.)
Sometimes taking inventory hurts, but in the long run, being honest with yourself about the status of your practice is the only way to begin to get where you want to go.
Before you can start thinking about or planning goals for the coming year, you’ve got to know where you stand now. Be brutally honest about it, whatever it is. Most of the time, we avoid the truth because we’re afraid of it.