One word. What is one word to describe what you want 2021 to be?
A gazillion years ago, I heard Matt Church recommend a focus word for the year. I have been doing it ever since. He’s so smart.
A contextual word allows you to focus your time, attention and energy into the people and projects that matter most to you. Could you create one this year?
New Year’s resolutions get broken. I don’t set them because it seems if I couldn’t master the behavior last year, it’s not going to happen with some silly, over-tired, champagne-induced resolve!
In 2016 my contextual word was attention (and that resulted in a new book called Attention Pays and I am often asked to be the opening keynote speaker on this topic virtually, and in-person). My desire is to always pay more attention at home, at work, in my community.
Here are a few ideas to help you implement your word:
Choose Five: We set goals in five areas: spiritual, relational, physical, financial, and educational. Maybe you could use a similar framework? This year I intend to be more focused by continuing daily mediation (spiritual), deeper connections (relational), stronger and fitter (and definitely need to weigh less, boy oh boy when I stopped paying attention to my food and champagne choices I gained those pandemic pounds, yuck), invest diligently (financial), and read more (educational). What are your 5?
Choose ‘No’ – choosing to focus on your word might seem selfish to others (it’s not!) and it means you might have to say no to things more often and in awkward situations. It’s no secret I love champagne, next month I am avoiding it (stop judging), I will also avoid chocolate, fries, and anything else that seems to stay around my middle. I have also said no to people who want time that drains my energy (do you have anyone like that in your life), projects that sounded fun but weren’t profitable, and invitations that don’t make me happy. Selfish? Maybe? I prefer to say self-full. No is a complete sentence!
Choose now – make a decision. Determine your focus. Write it down. Share it with a friend, your partner, and/or your team. Share it online to accelerate accountability. Now go and implement it. Easy peasy (well not really, but it will become your new decision filtering system).
You don’t have time to everything, only time to do what matters.
Today choose people, projects, and passions that are going to help you stay focused on your contextual word… and share with me your word, I’d love to hear it. Let’s do this together.
Many of you have shared you want to be more productive this year. Our new Group Start Strong 2021 Coaching program has just been released, check it out and join us! You can also get daily texts from me: 1-813-303-0086 or you can sign up for our newsletter and each week I will pop into your inbox (well not literally) with videos, blogs, white papers, interviews, templates, and all kinds of goodies – sign up today!
My word is mastery. Our Master Mind group each picked one word. It has improved every day by asking “What would be mastery in this situation?”
what a phenomenal word Jim – love it!