If you have ever set a New Year’s resolution, you’re likely already aware that, for the most part, they are not an effective way of achieving goals.

New Year’s resolutions don’t work for the same reason why most people don’t successfully achieve their goals at any time of the year.

One of the number one reasons for this is that people don’t set clear, inspiring goals.

First, you need to state your goal clearly.

Second, you need to make sure that your goal is actually meaningful and inspiring to you.

This is the step many people get hung up on, especially during the New Year.

What often happens is that during this time, people feel pressured to set a goal, and in doing so, they pick a superficial goal that has little meaning to them.

Rather than creating something that is truly in alignment with what they desire and that they are willing to put the action into achieving, many people get caught up in the idea of a fantasy-based goal that sounds good only on paper.

For instance, let’s use a health goal.

Let’s say you set a goal to work out a certain number of days per week in pursuit of a big audacious health goal that isn’t actually centred on what you truly want. When it comes to investing the time, money, energy and effort into moving that goal forward, you likely aren’t going to do it.

This can feel frustrating, and essentially you are setting yourself up for disappointment.

Which often leads to decreased self-worth, lack of confidence and trust in yourself and your abilities. It may also create an aversion to you not wanting to set future goals out of fear of failure.

I strongly believe in the power of having clear and inspiring goals and moving your dreams forward; the key, though, is to ground them in something meaningful and inspiring to you!

When you can come from that approach, it is way more fun, and the likelihood of you achieving them is substantially higher!

True success is living from the values of your heart.

This new year is all about going within and creating from this place.

Success is no longer about what happens on the outside. Instead, your worth and real success comes from living by that which is most important to you.

When you can create from that place, you will have a more likelihood of taking consistent action steps towards achieving your goals, which is a success!

You need to admit what it is you want and then get into action and make it happen.

It’s simple!

Not necessarily easy, though.

Odds are if you have been doing personal development or any type of inner work, you already have goals that are meaning and inspiring to you.

Rather than setting all new goals in the new year, another way to look at it is to ask yourself how you can revise and upgrade your current ones to be even more inspiring and in alignment with what you want.

The key is to keep tweaking and reevaluating your goals. They are evolving, and so are you.

If you’d like more information on creating meaningful and inspiring goals and how to successfully move them forward, be sure to continue to follow me on Instagram and LinkedIn, where I’ll be sharing more tips and advice.

I am grateful for you being on this journey with me.

My hope for you for 2021 is that you take the time to make yourself a priority and know that you are worthy of what it is you truly desire.

Remember, the key to true success is living from the values of your heart. Taking time to admit what it is you want, and taking action steps towards it will lead to you living your most fulfilled and successful life.

On that note, I wanted to share a few of my New Year rituals that help me align with my heart’s desires. Feel free to take what resonates and leave what doesn’t.

1. Gratitude. This one is key!

Ask yourself what you are grateful for.

What were some of your big or little wins?

How did what happened this year help you move towards living your dream?

How were these challenges on the way?

2. What is it that you would love to create or bring into your life in 2021?

How do you want to feel this year?

What is it that you would love to be doing, being or having?

The key is to create inspiring and meaningful goals that are linked to your highest values.

If you don’t know what your highest values are, be sure to check out my previous blog post. How do you know you aren’t living someone else’s values? Check out my last blog here.

Moving forward, it’s not about what is happening on the outside that’s important; it’s about what is happening on the inside that’s key.

The ‘new’ way is all about aligning with what your heart wants.

Having gratitude and appreciation is the best way to connect back to your heart. When you’re in your heart, nothing’s missing. It’s the safest place to live.

So my hope for you moving into 2021 is that you continue to follow your dreams and desires and that you do it from a place of love, inspiration, and fun!

I’m looking forward to sharing the new year with you.

Lots of love,

Andrea

 

When you choose in favour of your highest values, that’s when you feel most inspired, fulfilled and in alignment.

When you choose in favour of someone else’s values or unknowingly adopt someone else’s values, that is when life often feels draining, overwhelming and unfulfilling.

A clue that your living by someone else’s values is when you feel like you “should” or “have to” do something.

It’s what you ‘think’ you should be doing as opposed to what it is you would love to be doing.

This is important because it gets a lot of people stuck.

When you live outside of your values, not only does it take you out of your power, but it decreases your self-worth, confidence and negatively impacts the other areas of your life.

Let me give you an example.

One of my clients had been feeling guilty for not calling her family.

She loves her family, and she had been playing this tape in her head where she felt like she should be calling them more often and then would get down on herself for not doing it.

Feeling guilty took up time and energy in her head, and she wanted to let it go.

As we worked through it, she discovered that calling her family was a “should” and that the reason she wasn’t doing it is that it wasn’t her highest value.

Although she loves her family, connecting with them on the phone wasn’t on the top of her love list.

Talking on the phone wasn’t something that she loved doing at all. That wasn’t the way that she wanted to connect with others.

Along the way, she adopted it as a “should” because that’s how her family likes to keep in touch.

The truth is, what was meaningful and purposeful for her was having conversations and interacting together in person.

Through working together, she realized she hates small talk. That was such an ah-ha moment for her.

Once, she admitted that it’s not that she doesn’t love her family; it’s just that she hates small talk and that it didn’t matter who it was she didn’t want to pick up the phone; she felt like a weight had been lifted off her shoulders.

All this time, she thought something was wrong with her for not wanting to pick up the phone. The truth is nothing was wrong with her; she was just trying to force herself to do something that wasn’t actually in alignment with her heart.

It was pretty cool to see this shift in her. By realizing that she had adopted someone else’s highest values, most likely one of her family members, she was judging herself for not ‘wanting’ to do it and beating herself up because of it.

This is important because when you feel you should or have to do something, it most likely isn’t what you want to do.

So how do you navigate this?

Step one is to figure out your highest values and clarify what is most important to you.

This is crucial because you always choose in favour of your highest values. So the more clarity around this, the better.

If you have no idea what your highest values are, I recommend taking Dr. John Demartni’s  Values Test. This is something I get all of my clients to do and is free. You can do it for free at https://drdemartini.com/values/.

If you have already taken the test, I recommend revising it frequently. The more you do the test, the clearer you become.

Step two is focusing your time and energy on things you ‘love to’ instead of ‘having to.’

When a ‘should’ pops up, ask yourself where did I get this idea from that I ‘should’ be doing this?

The more you can admit to yourself what you truly want and live in alignment with your highest values, the more inspired and fulfilled you will be.

From this place, you’ll have a more significant impact and more loving relationships. It will increase your self-worth and boost your self-esteem.

The more you can live in alignment with your highest values, the more you can live an amazing life.

Take a few moments and fill out the test. Click here!

I would love to hear what your top values are. Please comment below your highest values or send me an email at [email protected].

Here are a few of my top values in no particular order: Spiritual Growth, Lifestyle, and Business.

 

What do you do when you feel like others aren’t respecting your time and boundaries?

A few weeks ago my friend, who has a successful Osteopath clinic, shared how a few of his clients were consistently going over their scheduled time and how this has been impacting his business.

This is important because if you aren’t owning your worth and making yourself as important,  odds are, others won’t either.

This principle applies to business as well as with relationships with friends and family.

So, how can you effectively own your worth and ensure that those around you respect and value your time?

There are three ways you can show up.

You can be Passive.

You can be Aggressive.

Or you can be Assertive.

My friend, in this instance, was being passive.

Rather than ensuring his appointments ended at the allotted time, he was allowing his clients to stay and chat for as long as they liked. And in one extreme case, the client would stay over an hour past his scheduled appointment.

By being passive and not speaking his truth, his business and his well-being were both negatively impacted. For instance, he was increasingly late for clients and started to lose customers; he regularly missed his lunch, after the sessions, his energy felt depleted, and his confidence had decreased.

By being passive and not speaking his truth, he was making others more significant than himself.

This is a principle that Dr. John Demartini teaches.

When you are passive, it always leads to being aggressive.

Imagine a spring. Every time you are passive and making someone else more important than yourself, it’s like putting more pressure on the spring, until eventually there’s too much pressure, and it bursts open.

When this happens, it leads to you becoming aggressive.

When you are aggressive, you act out the opposite and make yourself more important than others.

In this case, my friend was becoming aggressive with himself. He was angry and hard on himself. He was also becoming aggressive by not wanting to take on those clients anymore.

Aggression can look like lashing out, but it can also look like leaving or taking off.

I see this often in relationships or with a career. Someone puts up with something for so long and eventually gets fed up and just leaves.

The key to navigating this situation in a loving way is to be assertive.

When you are assertive, it means you are making yourself as important as others.

Not more important or less important, but as important.

When you are doing this, you are coming from a loving place.

Many people think that by only supporting others, they are being loving. The truth is love has both support and challenge, not only one side.

By just ‘supporting’ his client, my friend wasn’t loving himself or them.

What was happening was the opposite effect.

By undervaluing himself and overvaluing his clients, he created an imbalance in the relationship, which led to resentment and anger, resulting in him not wanting to help that client and vice versa.

In this case, being assertive could look like having a conversation with the client about the time. If the client continues to go overtime, charge them for that time.

The key is to both support and challenge. That is loving!

Whether it’s business, relationships, etc., the key is to do both!

The more you can be assertive, the more you’ll increase your self-worth and confidence and the more you’ll attract people who respect and love you for who you are!!

I invite you to take a quick look at your life. Where are you being passive or making yourself less important?

Also, ask yourself, where are you being aggressive and making yourself more important?

Rather than stopping yourself from being aggressive, try and find out where you are being passive and focus on taking baby steps towards being more assertive in that area.

If you are looking for more guidance on owning your worth, you can register for a free 1:1 clarity call with me.

In the meantime, I’d love to hear about what area of your life you would love to be more assertive in. Comment below 🙂