Focus on the feeling

In the coming days there will be an awful lot of noise, both online and offline, about the new year. There will be endless chatter about goals and resolutions. There will be hundreds of adverts telling you about the habits you need to change and the new routines you should adopt. There will be articles sharing the secrets of how to make this your best year ever, and statuses full of proclamations and ambitions.

It can be easy to get lost amongst all of that noise. To lose connection with what you actually want, and to instead get swept up in the tide of bold resolutions and bucket lists (before inevitably getting spat out again in the bleak greyness of mid-January). It can be tempting to believe that someone else has the answers, that if you just read the right book or adopt the right morning routine, then your life will finally change once and for all.

As a coach, I know that despite my best intentions, I sometimes add to this noise. I know that people might stumble across my Instagram page or podcast and think that I have answers to the questions that trouble them - what should I do with my life? What would make me happy? How can I find some balance in my life? You might even have signed up for this newsletter because you too are looking for those answers.

But I also know that the very best answers, the ones that help you actually change your life for the better, have to come from yourself. Because we are all unique. We all have different hopes and dreams and priorities. We will all have different challenges and curveballs, and different opportunities available to us. And we will all have a different definition of what joy and success and a life well lived mean to us.

So this new year, instead of rushing straight to the goals, instead of getting swept up in other people’s plans and dreams and expectations, I encourage you to start with this question: how do you want to feel in 2023? How do you want to feel, not on the big days, but on an average day in March? How do you want to feel when you wake up on a Monday morning, or as you finish work for the week on a Friday evening? How do you want to feel by the time we reach New Year’s Eve this time next year?

Often, clients tell me that they lack willpower or determination. Not once have I seen this to be true - instead, the problem is usually that they’ve set goals that don’t mean anything to them. Goals that don’t inspire excitement or joy or a sense of possibility. Goals that instead feel like chores on a to do list, or a heavy weight reminding them of all that they are yet to achieve. It’s little wonder we struggle to take action when we’re operating from a place of obligation instead of hope and optimism.

Getting clear on how we want our lives to feel helps us to avoid falling into that trap. It helps us to connect our goals and actions to a greater purpose, to a vision of our lives that feels exciting and inspiring to us. And it helps us to ensure that the goals we set for ourselves are authentic - that we’re spending our time working towards things that are right for us, instead of trying to achieve a life we don’t actually want.

So in the next few days, try to stay focused on the feelings. Think about those questions I shared above. Journal on them, or talk them through with friends and loved ones. Get clear on how your best average day would feel, and then think about what needs to change to make that possible. And then, when you’re ready, set goals from that place. I promise that it will serve you better than any plan anybody else could give you. 

If you'd like a little more help setting goals and a vision for 2023 that feels truly authentic to you, my tried and tested programme, The Intentional Year, will give you the tools to help you do just that. Enrolment closes at midnight on Friday 30th December, and you can find out more via the link below: