It’s officially been a year since I first started to get into the habit of making goals. Those goals have been a big help and I am so thankful for the last year working with Laura Casey’s Powersheets. They were super helpful in making me look deep into myself and see what I wanted out of life, what fears held me back (without even realizing it) and challenged me to reach higher than I thought I could go. They set me on the right track and made goal-making a reality in my life but now I feel like it is time to change things up and work on my goals through a little different process.

As I mentioned before, I am taking Mystie Winckler’s online course Work the Plan.  The course technically does not open until January 1st but I was able to get in early when she had early enrollment in September. I’ll post more about the course in the future but one element that I really like is that instead of monthly goals, she recommends “interval” goals lasting 6-9 weeks. She said our smaller goals should run for at least six weeks since it take that long for an act to form into a habit. Makes sense.

She is also helping us to make our yearly goals and break them down into interval goals. (I’ve chosen to make my intervals bi-monthly so I’ll be working on these smaller goals through November and December.) For each interval, we pick 1-3 projects we want to accomplish by the end of it. We list the tasks that we need to do to accomplish these projects. Those tasks will compromise my even smaller weekly and daily goals. Those along with the daily habits I want to work on will keep me busy for the next two months!

I kept my daily habits really simple because I know what the holiday season is like. I am super busy and I’m prone to get super stressed! So I need to just work on the basics – prayer, sleep, vitamins, water, etc because all these just seem to get forgotten when I am going full speed! I am also really trying to be intentional about my time and making sure that I am not wasting it by wandering around aimlessly working on too many things at once and not actually getting anything done. Ugh!

My main big goals do not change but my mini-goals change depending on the areas I need to work on the most. So here is a summary of my progress and my mini goals for November/December.

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Main Goal #1: To always have God at the center of my life and to deepen my love for Him. I want his will to be my will and motivation.

October Mini-Goals Reviewed

• Continue with the 15 minutes of prayer in the morning until it becomes second nature. – For the most part, yes but could still use some work.
• Substitute a half-hour (or so) of watching TV or listening to music with something of greater substance, like listening to an uplifting podcast or reading a devotional/ spiritual book. – I’d say 50/50. It was improved but some nights I just wanted to veg in front of the TV and not think. LOL.
• Get away from the regular routine for a bit and go to the chapel for prayer and confession. – Done.

Nov/Dec Mini-Goals

• Continue with the 15 minutes of prayer in the morning using the Jesse Tree devotion for the first time this Advent. I won an Advent Devotional Book for Women from Jenny at The Littlest Way (Yay! Thanks, Jenny!) so I’ll be using that along with the beautiful new Advent cards from Blessed Is She.
• Short exam and Act of Contrition at end of the day.

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Main Goal #2: To be a loving and holy wife to Brian and to work at keeping our marriage strong, to nurture our friendship and spend time alone to reconnect.

October Mini-Goals Reviewed

• Continue to plan weekly date nights and monthly out of the house dates. – We had our first lunch date with Bella babysitting the boys. Having a child old enough to babysit for short periods of time is a game changer!!
• Make a conscious effort to thank Brian more when he does something for me or the kids and not just take it for granted. – I’d grade myself with a sold B-, with room for improvement.
• Let Brian help me out when he offers and stop acting like he can’t do it the way I would do it. Let him have his own way of doing things. (I’ll tell you right now, that one is going to be tough!) – Yeah, this was tough but I think I did fairly well. Well, except for that time…yeah, I can still work on this.

Nov/Dec Mini-Goals

• Continue to plan weekly date nights and monthly out of the house dates. Our lives are so centered around the kids and work that we really need to keep this up. It helps out so much I don’t want to it to let it slip away.
• Continue to make a conscious effort to thank Brian more when he does something for me or the kids and not just take it for granted.

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Main Goal #3: To be a good mother that loves her kids and spends time with them and is not always “too busy.” I want to teach them about their faith and how to love and serve God in their young lives.

October Mini-Goals Reviewed

• Continue to work on doing what dinner prep I can in the early afternoon so I can spend an hour in the late afternoon helping the kids with their homework. – This was a huge fail. I need to work on a better plan to help the kids with their homework and not leave it all to Brian when he comes home. Realistically, with the holidays and upcoming school vacation days, this won’t be properly tackled until January. We’ll revisit it then.
• Get the boys involved in Just Run at school and take walks as a family on the weekend. – Yes, on the Just Run and so-so on the family walks. Lots of busy (or rainy) weekends.

Nov/Dec Mini-Goals

• Make an Advent Plan to help us keep our eyes on Christ and not get wrapped up in the materialism and busyness of the season. This year we will be doing the Jesse Tree for the first time and I will pick one (or two) of our other Advent Activities to do with the kids.

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Main Goal #4: To bring order into our home so I am not stressed out by the mess and chaos. When things are organized our family life runs smoother and there is more peace.

October Mini-Goals Reviewed

• I’ve been slacking on my meal planning and going to the store too often so back to weekly meal plans on Sunday. – A couple weeks were good and a couple were no bueno! Grr.
• Spend time on the weekends with Mystie’s Work the Plan course. I have a full calendar in October so the weekends will be the only times I can have a little extra time for this. – Yes. I wanted to be done with the course by now but I’m not. However, I have made progress and feel like I had a things in place to make it through the next two months with my sanity intact. 😉

Nov/Dec Mini-Goals

• Make a travel plan for our yearly Fall trip to Disneyland and visiting my family so I can enjoy the trip and be adequately organized.
• Make a Christmas plan and budget and stick to it so I am not overly stressed and over budget.

* * *Main Goal #5 – To take care of myself physically, spiritually and mentally so I can be a happy and healthy wife, mother and friend. Taking care of myself mentally also means challenging myself to come out of my comfort zone and facing my fears and trying new things.

October Mini-Goals Reviewed

• Once summer is over I tend to drink less so this month more H2O and take my vitamins. (So easy to do yet I always forget!) – Not super bad but not great. Seriously needs more work.
• Complete the #write31days blogging challenge and write a post each day on my topic – 31 Days of Gratitude. – I did it, baby!
• Complete the Lisa’s online class #LoveYourLettering about how to love your own handwriting and learn the basics of hand lettering. (I started here.) – I made it about 1/2 way but had to stop because there was too much other stuff going on. However, I do love the course and what I’ve learned so far and REALLY want to continue as time allows.

Nov/Dec Mini-Goals

• Basics – water, vitamins, walk at least 20 minutes and in bed by 11 on school nights.
• Follow the plan! Don’t do what I FEEL like doing but get the priorities finished. This month’s motto – suck it up and get it done!…with a smile. 😉
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• This may be crazy but this month I switched my planners. I know! I have loved my Erin Condren for the past year and a half and I posted last month about how I set it up BUT as I’ve been taking Mystie’s course, it talked about how well the bullet journal went with the plan. The more I looked into the bullet journal the more I sort of fell in love with it’s simplicity yet room for creativity. I decided to try it out in November and December when my planner is really put the test. If I like how it goes, I’ll stick with the bullet journal. If I don’t, I’ll go back to my EC planner in Jan 2016. I’ll write a separate post about setting up my bullet journal soon.

Okay, that’s it for now. Time to get dinner on the table.

What about you? What is the one thing that you really want to work on this month?

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