BEGINNING 2017 RIGHT

Recognise Your Achievements

With the new year beginning, it is tempting to write off the previous year and throw oneself fully into setting goals for the new year. I counsel my clients not to do this. The previous year carries many achievements, rich relationships and yes, some difficult times that brought with them valuable lessons. Unless you take the time to conduct that review you deny yourself of many riches, most unsought, that you have come your way.

‘The unexamined life is not worth living’ so wrote Plato, and in my experience, by taking time at this time of year to examine one’s own life, you can see things that are often hidden or overridden by the exigencies of daily life. You can determine to make significant changes in your own mindset, drawing on your internal values, and consciously make decisions that carry more power, to enable you to execute speedily and effectively.

Before being taken over by your every-day life and the external requirements of others at work, make space to recognise your own achievements:

• in respect of the goals you set and achieved,
• the unlooked-for gifts and benefits that life delivered to you,
• the contributions you made to your community, at work and elsewhere,
• the value you made to other people’s lives
• the new relationships you formed
• and the ones you deepened by the activities you did together.

You will be astonished at how much you achieved and how rich your life is! I did this myself last week – spending three days examining family, work, community, business and relationships and it was a thoroughly satisfying and enriching process.
I’ve written about this before, but it’s worth mentioning again:

Appreciate what you have already.

We are graced every day with life and consciousness. Each day we have another opportunity to see our loved ones, to work and contribute to the benefit of others, to be creative, to learn and grow. Sometimes we forget how rich these things make us. We forget that all of these important things are mostly free and available to us and that our habitual familiarity with them undermines their value. Remember to remember to be grateful. So, begin this year with the riches that last year gave you and you will feel better resourced to meet the challenges and opportunities of 2017.