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Like most people, you probably find it difficult to stick to your New Year’s Resolutions.
But this year will be different if you follow my advice.
In my previous blog, I wrote about identifying your specific goals and setting a game plan of daily habits that lead up to your goals for the new year.
But the best-laid plans can still go by the wayside, especially if you don’t have a big enough reason for wanting to make a change in the first place.
To stay on course toward your goals, you need to write them down along with your reason why and post your daily action steps where you can see them every day. Usually 20 consecutive days is sufficient enough to form a new habit.
So buy some sticky notes and post your daily habit-forming activities on your bathroom mirror, on your fridge and on your car’s rearview mirror until your new habits become second nature.
Also, choose an accountability partner and give that person your goals and game plan to remind you of your goals and push you to stay on track.
I actually have two accountability partners named Nathan and Dustin, who encourage me every couple days. One of them developed a software for me to input my daily progress for further analysis. They also had me make a vision board with pictures from magazines that represent who I want to be, what I want to do and what I want to have. Actually, I’m still working on it.
I don’t know if you want to go so far as to create a vision board or a tracking software. A journal would be sufficient to track your daily progress.
I also would recommend rewarding yourself as you progress toward your goal. Nathan, the president and founder of my work-from-home business, is actually buying me a flat screen TV if I get a fourth of the way toward my goal, and if I reach my entire goal, he’s paying for me to go on a trip to the Bahamas at the end of the year for New Year’s, which is very ironic.
Anyways, remember in order to achieve your New Year’s Resolutions, you need to:
– Make your goals specific
- Identify a big enough reason why you want to achieve your goals
- Devise a game plan of daily habits to lead up to reaching your goal
-Place sticky notes in visible places daily to form habits that work toward your goal
-Write down your daily habits in a journal
-Find 1 or more accountability partners and give that person your game plan to encourage and push you to stay on track
-Reward yourself as you progress toward your goal culminating in a big prize at the end.

Good luck in achieving your New Year’s Resolutions. I would love to compare notes during the middle and the end of the year. If you want to know one of my New Year’s Resolutions, click here. And feel free to email me at teneshia@mytensense.com if you want to share your progress toward making your New Year’s Resolutions come true.

By Teneshia LaFaye
Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/teneshialafaye
Add me on Myspace: www.myspace.com/tlafaye

By now you’ve made your New Year’s Resolutions.

But are they goals or dreams?

Dreams are what you hope to accomplish, but you haven’t really figured out how you’re going to get it done. Dreams may be to lose weight, make more money or get out of debt.

Goals are specifically what you plan to accomplish and you probably have some idea how to achieve them. A goal may be to lose 20 pounds, to make $5,000 extra or to pay off $10,000 in credit card debt. And if you’re still in school, make As and Bs.

Goals are more likely to materialize than dreams because you have identified your target instead of some generic, unspecific dream.

But don’t expect to reach your New Year’s goals or dreams unless you make a game plan to form daily habits to achieve them.

An NFL team can’t just say it’s going to the Super Bowl. The head coach and his staff has to set specific goals and make a plan to reach those goals, such as winning three out of every four games and winning the division, which would produce a 12-4 record and likely home field advantage in the playoffs to have a better shot at being in the Super Bowl.

But an NFL team also has to break down the goals to the basics of what it takes to even win a single game, such as players’ daily eating and work out habits, daily work on technique, daily analyzing video on opponents, daily strategy meetings and daily practicing of critical situations in a game. These daily activities help a team form habits that will materialize in victories and possibly a Super Bowl.

So in order to reach your New Year’s Resolution, you have to specifically identify what you want to achieve and make a game plan.

But along the way, you will be tempted to get off track, but that’s only because you didn’t identify a strong enough reason why you want to accomplish your goal. So make sure you understand what you hope to do with what you have once you reach your goal.

I actually recognized what I wanted to change in 2010 at the end of last year, but I didn’t know how I was going to do it. Now I do after spending the last four days of 2009 out-of-town with the young president of a company that I plan to work from home to reach my goals.

This young president and his mentor (who each own their own private planes, sports cars and hefty bank accounts) personally took time out of their holidays to teach me how to identify my goals and maximize my potential by making a game plan of daily habits. They treated me like family and we look forward to building on our friendship to help me stay focused on the daily habits that are required to reach my goals.

One of my New Year’s Resolutions is to earn $300,000 from the young millionaire’s company. $300,000 seems like a lot for some people and for others not much. But hey, it’s my goal, not yours.

To make a game plan for my goal, I had to break down how much I need to make per month and then per week and figure out how many sales I need to make per day.

So now I know in order to make $300,000, I have to form the habits of making 40 phone calls a day, setting 6 appointments a day and making 13 sales per week for 48 weeks (because I plan on going on four week-long vacations) to make $300,000 this year with one company. I know I’ll be tempted to get off track, so I have also detailed everything I plan to do with the $300,000 so that I stay the course even when I’ve made $150,000, which is double what I made last year but not enough to do everything I want.

If your resolution is to lose 20-50 pounds, you have to break it down to how much weight to lose per month and per week and what daily habits produce the weight loss, such as specific eating habits and exercises. And also figure out what you want to do once you have lost the weight.

To be successful at reaching your goals, you have to make habits of doings things you don’t normally feel comfortable doing because if doing what you’re comfortable with created what you really want, you would already have it. Eventually, you will feel comfortable with your new habits and achieve your goal.

However, being successful also requires constant growth and therefore changed habits or you will stay where you’re at.

For instance, I made a goal to be the No. 1 agent with another company in 2009, and I achieved that goal to build a brand new house, pay off my debt, publish my first book and take my family on a lot of great vacations, such as Barack Obama’s inauguration, Michael Jackson’s memorial, Disney World birthday celebration and a Bahamas cruise for being the No. 1 agent.

But since that company decreased its compensation and increased my responsibilities, I quit and sought another work-from-home opportunity to achieve even greater results, and I’ve found it and have made a game plan to be even more successful in 2010.

By sharing one of my New Year’s Resolutions and how I plan to achieve it, I hope you have an idea of what it takes to make your New Year’s Resolutions come to pass. Don’t just say what you want. Make a game plan and work on it daily.

By Teneshia LaFaye
Follow me on Twitter: www.twitter.com/teneshialafaye
Add me on Myspace: www.myspace.com/tlafaye