Happy New Year! 2018 is here and a new season is upon us. In my last post I covered how to set goals and what good goals look like. Today I will be sharing my personal goals with you.
According to true My Triplicity’s form, I have characterised my goals according to Faith, Family (personal) and Fitness. The main goal in each setting is simple, specific and to the point. I will also describe the specific steps I will be taking to make sure my goals are achieved come New Year’s Eve 2018, God willing.
Before I start, I want to quickly mention something. Setting goals requires an element of faith: faith in yourself, to achieve things that are important to you, and faith in God to help you achieve these things. In Jennifer Smith’s book, The Unveiled Wife: Embracing Intimacy with God and your Husband (wives, I highly recommend you check her out!) she said something that really stood out for me:
“Without hope and faith I have no purpose. If I don’t have purpose, I don’t have any reason to strive to be better, to choose good, to be positive with the influence I have or to care about the results that follow my actions.”What is the hope and faith in? Simply put, in God. By setting personal goals I want to live out my purpose for Him, to be better for Him, to choose godliness, to be positive with my influence on my blog, in my classroom or simply at home. And when we have goals that aim to make us better versions of ourselves for God’s glory, then we can be confident in the faith we have, echoing the words from Hebrews 11:1 – 2:
“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For it is by faith the people of old received their commendation.”Quite a few of my goals scare me a little and excite me a lot…but I need it because I have decided that 2018, the year in which I turn 25, will be the year that I have committed to make real changes, changes I have wanted to make for a long time.
With that said, let’s dive in!
Following Jerry Bridge’s advice from his book, The Practice of Godliness, I will focus on the five key aspects required to develop a relationship with God: listening to the gospel preached, prayer, reading, meditating on and memorising His word.
- Read the Bible in a year using a thematic reading program – this groups daily readings according to themes
- Set aside daily prayer and quiet time to read, meditate on and memorise passages of Scripture
- Engage in an in-depth study, once a week, of different books using “Flower Mound Women’s Bible Study” (anyone who wants to join with me is welcome, accountability partners for the win!!)
Fitness has always been a goal which takes up a lot of my heart, mind and time. This year, by prioritising my faith and relationships, I aim to work on my fitness in a constructive and balanced way. I love working out and being active always makes me very happy, but I hope to go into the New Year with a more God-focused intention, praying that He will bless my hard work and dedication.
- Train Monday to Saturday using the Tone it Up App (Studio Tone it Up…it’s super awesome!)
- Keep track of my workouts using a journal or log
- Meal prep every week
- Follow the Tone it Up nutrition plan/guidelines to eat meals which are lean, clean and green and eradicate junk food
- Drink a ‘health shot’ every morning after the 5 Daily Moves
- Participate in fitness activities (Pilates, rock climbing and trail runs) with my work friend, who is super fit and inspires me daily
- Walk and hike more with the dogs
- Run my first 5K before the end of March
- Do the parkrun in the Pretoria Botanical Gardens once a month
I struggled to label this category. ‘Family’ did not quite cover everything I needed it to. So for the purposes of this post, I have attached these goals under the heading of ‘Personal’. I also have more than one specific goal that falls under this category.
Prioritise and make time for my husband- Spend a few minutes every afternoon to discuss the day’s highlights
- Take time to walk together in the afternoon (and with Mara and Loki, who would be utterly disgusted if we left them behind)
- Spend time doing devotions together because the more intimate you know God, the more intimate your relationship with your spouse become
- No more coffee (I know…blog post coming soon)
- Set intentions for the week and for each day, as the week progresses (using my whiteboard at home to visualise my tasks and goals)
- Make a point to visit with friends or invite people for dinner during the week (my husband and I thought to work with meeting up with 2 couples/friends at home a month)
- Read at night to calm my mind and so complete a book every month
- Publish one blog post (at least) every week
- Avoid pointless Facebook and Instagram scrolling which does more harm than good and wastes valuable time
- Engage in a deep stretching session or a calming yoga video once a week
- Take time to be mindful and record three things to be thankful for each day
- Notice things that happen which are worth remembering or sharing and jot them down in a notebook/on my phone
So there you have it! My goals and the steps I intend to take in order to achieve them. I hope that you will be inspired to write your own goals, if you haven’t already, and think about what is important to you. And if you have set goals, I’d love to hear about them in the comments below!
Blessings and love
Morgy
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