New Year New Goals
Commit to the Lord whatever you do, and he will establish your plans. Proverbs 16:3
Well, 2020 is over! Hallelujah!!! I don’t know about you but I learned A LOT in 2020, about myself, my family and my community. I have enjoyed the slower pace of life, but I have also missed meeting friends for coffee, going to dinner for date night with my husband and going out for a fun activity like roller skating or bowling with my kids. A new year is upon us to set new goals, have new adventures and make new memories.
As we all look towards the New Year, many of us will make resolutions. I used to make New Year’s resolutions and get excited about applying the changes, only to find my excitement, enthusiasm and effort slowly fade away as time went on. I would get a month or so into the year and would give up on the resolutions I set. The fact is, only about 10% of people that make resolutions actually successfully apply those changes to their lives, the other 90% fail. This failure can be discouraging and often prevent us from future efforts to change our lives for the better. It leads most of us to believe that we don’t have the necessary willpower within us to overcome bad habits.
A few years ago, I stopped making a list of resolutions. Resolutions can easily turn into “rules” and we can feel restricted by those rules. Rules can turn into things we CAN’T do, but if we set goals, they are things we are working towards. Achieving goals can be very rewarding and we can celebrate the progress along the way, even the imperfect progress. I want to encourage us to set goals and commit those goals to the Lord. Whether it be losing weight/getting healthy; spending more time reading your Bible/with the Lord; or pursuing something in your career, the Lord cares and He wants to be included in our goals.
I also choose a word for my year and write out my goals with that word in mind. I have found choosing a word for the year helps me focus more on where God wants to grow me for that year. My word for 2020 was Stand. At first, I was unsure about that word because I am not one that likes to be out in front, I prefer to be in the background. But as I was praying and planning for the year, I kept the word in mind. How could I apply that word to my goals? Below are a few of my goals and actions that I wrote out for 2020.
• Stand firm on the Word of God – to do that I needed to spend more time in the word and with the Lord in prayer
• Stand in the Gap for the people I love – be intentional about when & how I prayed for my husband, kids, family, friends and myself.
• Stand up for myself – set boundaries when it came to my goals including my food and exercise.
• Stand up boldly where God was calling me – be confident in God’s calling on my life and allow Him to grow and guide me in that.
When we commit our goals to the Lord, He will bless our efforts according to His perfect will in ways beyond our understanding. We should serve the Lord faithfully and then leave the results to Him. Yes, God cares about what you eat and how you move your body. What we eat directly affects how we feel, which affects how we live. Exercise gives you more energy, stronger resilience, better sleep, increases your self-esteem, reduces stress, clears the mind, provides sharper thinking and so much more. When we are moving our bodies and fueling them well, we have the strength and energy we need to walk out whatever the Lord calls us to.
As we enter into 2021, let us set goals, commit those goals to the Lord, and allow Him to walk with us as we set out to achieve those goals.