Part 2 Choosing Value’s Infused Goals and Action Planning to Achieve Them
The two steps described in Part 1 together provide a powerful meditative and inspirational foundation from which to now choose and develop action plans for your new year’s resolutions.
Step 1: Goals that Express your Core Values
Having identified your core values or ‘deep loves’, you are now ready to select concrete goals that will ensure that the pregnant energy within your core values can flow into each goal you select. So look at each of your core values and begin to think ‘how can I practically bring into my life the love energy of these values.’
To help you do this I will choose one of the Core Values above and demonstrate how to select a concrete goal(s) that expresses your core value. Understandably, as a psychologist, one of my core values is the building of loving relationships. So the practical question for me is, ‘How can I in the new year build deeper, more loving relationships?’
For me I have divided my relationships into four main categories: 1. The intimate relationship with my Partner. 2. The loving relationship with my children. 3. My close friendships. 4. My professional relationship with my clients. Notice that in this list of four I have not included other important relationships such as the relationships I have with my mother (my father is dead); my siblings; Bao Anh’s family etc The reason for this is that when you choose your goals that express your values you cannot achieve everything that you ideally would want. Of course these other relationships are important and of course I won’t ignore these relationships but I can only practically focus on some of them and the four above are the relationships I have chosen to focus on in the coming year. So now I need to focus on the goal I have for each of these 4 categories:
● The intimate relationship with my partner
Very simply my goal for this relationship is that I want to make more time for this relationship to deepen and flourish. By year’s end I want my partner and I to know and love each other more deeply. Out of the four relationships I have chosen, this is my highest priority. This choice grows out of my understanding as a psychologist that the most important key relationship in my life (and with anyone who has an intimate partner) is the relationship with my partner. The health and quality of all my other relationships flows forth from this relationship.
● The loving relationship with my children
I am referring here to both my sets of children - the children of my partner Bao Anh and my two adult sons living in Australia. I have different goals in relation to both sets of children. For Bao Anh’s children I primarily want to develop clearer communication in terms of the language barrier, so that we can mutually understand each other better. In relation to my sons in Australia I want to keep in regular contact with them and be of as much help as I can with their respective journeys in the coming year.
● My close friendships
I have already made some new close friendships here in Vietnam, but most of my best friendships are either back in Australia or around the world. Keeping in regular contact is the goal here. With regard to overseas friendships, I have realised that some friendships simply cannot be maintained as we were not that close and I do not have the time or energy to maintain all of them. Of course if by chance any of those friendships are rekindled, for example by one of them visiting me here in Vietnam, then they would become friendships that I would strive to maintain.
● My professional relationship with my clients
My goal here is to offer the most professional, caring, effective service that I can to my clients. My clients are not just people who pay me a fee to assist them to listen to and help solve their problems, they are also my ‘sacred’ responsibility - they come to me often in great distress and my goal is to treat them with as much skill, care and intelligence as I am capable of offering.
Photo by Huynh Phong: https://www.pexels.com/photo/a-woman-sitting-on-a-woven-carpet-while-holding-a-banh-tet-6864554/
Step 2. Developing Action Plans to Achieve Chosen Goals
Now that you have chosen your goals, that are the concrete expressions of your core values, you now needto devise detailed action plans that will help you as much as possible to achieve your goals. So I will continue to demonstrate this next step by developing an action plan for nourishing my intimate relationship with my partner:
Action Plan to Nourish My Intimate Relationship with My Partner.
1. We will endeavour each morning to get up at the same time(around 5am) to meditate and pray together and briefly plan the day
2. For professional reasons I have a Sunday- Monday ‘weekend’, and for us Monday is solely dedicated to what we have decided to call Couple Day. On Mondays we will spend the day together enjoying each other’s company - we will usually eat out for our meals; go on picnics; go exploring some partof Hanoi; go to the gym together; make love in a leisurely way; read to each other; discuss ideas and plans(especially for the week ahead) with each other; go and get a massage and sauna together; purchasing practical or fun/luxury things for us and our home - the emphasis is on having fun and enjoying each other’s company.
3. A designated Meeting on Monday mornings or evenings, if necessary. In a previous article I described what a Designated Meeting is; why to have them; and how to have them. Because the emphasis of the Monday is fun and enjoyment it is very important to keep the Designated Meeting ‘walled off’ from therest of Monday.
4. Every evening we will have a catch-up before we sleep and make-up if we have had some tense moments, disputes/arguments (letting these arguments go if we can’t resolve them there and then and follow them up in a Designated Meeting). The rule is never to go to sleep angry with each other or as it saysin the wise saying - ‘never let the sun go down on your anger.’
5. We will have quarterly meetings to see how we have fared in regard to these stated goals. We will put these quarterly check-ups in our calendars on the three quarterly Mondays remaining for the year.
3. Additional things to keep in mind in regard to successfully implementing New Year’s Resolutions
So the above is a preparatory process that you can follow which should assist you to achieve your New Years’ Resolutions/Dreams. In this last section I will make/suggest some additional guidelines
● Its okay to slip up. None of us is perfect. None of us will be able to perfectly achieve the entirety of the goals of their New Year’ Resolutions. But what is very important is that when you slip up, you see it as just that and not a sign to give up and become hopeless. Try to learn from your lapse and then pick yourself up and return to implementing your Action Plan.
● Build into each of your Action Plans, rewards for successfully implementing your plans or mini-goals achieved
● Let other encouraging/supportive people in your life know what your resolutions are,( but avoid anyone you know who is ‘controlling’ or pessimistic or judgemental’). Being accountable to these sorts of people can be very helpful. What would be ideal is to have a mentor or life coach that you could regularly report to regarding your progress throughout the year.
● You may have noticed that I have not included in my writings any references to what I would call ‘Negative Resolutions’ ie ‘I will stop smoking or stop drinking so heavily or stop any bad habit’. Although these are very valid problems one should address, it is better if they are subsumed beneath a goal such as ‘Becoming healthy and fit’, rather than being a goal themselves because by making them a goal in themselves they have the potential to stimulate the negative energies of anxiety and resistance - focus rather on fitness and health, and stopping smoking, drinking, eating too much etc can become a part of your action plan to become fitter and healthier. Also entrenched habits/addictions will often require more specialised help from a mental health professional.
Okay, that is all I have to say regarding the very exciting and potentially life-changing practice of setting and achieving Tet New Year Resolutions. Feel free to make an appointment if you would like some assistance inguiding you toward preparing for Tet.
Happy New Year and visit again soon. Cheers!