Where do you even begin when it comes to the new year and resolutions?  The new year brings a new vitality for life.  We are often so excited we over set goals.  We want to fix everything in every area of our life.  Why do we put so much pressure on ourselves and how can we change and actually achieve our goals instead of fizzling out by the end of March?

This is how.  We make realistic goals with baby steps and a timeline to help us accomplish what it is that we want.  We need an action plan.  We need support and we need to make time.

Here are my starting goals for the year and how I plan to accomplish them!

Health

I love to play sports and want to be active with my kids.  December 2016 I had ACL reconstruction surgery due to a basketball injury which really set me back.  My baby was young and I didn’t feel like I had time to go to physical therapy.  I asked my surgeon about his thoughts on PT and his suggestions were that I could do my own PT.  To cut out all the boring details I ended up not doing PT, riding the bike, trying to walk without limping and focusing on my stretches to get my range of motion.  In addition to riding the bike, I did some Beachbody workouts to help build strength and I did some running to build cardio.

Little did I know that skipping out on early PT  would be a bad idea.  Come last September I decided I would go get a PT evaluation to get an idea of what point I was in my recovery.  My surgeon told me I could go back to usual activities at my year mark.  Unfortunately, my recovery wasn’t all that great.  When I had a strength evaluation both legs were weak and my surgery leg was not even 50% of where it was supposed to be.  Talk about a disappointment.

This year I want to get my leg strength back and I am going to do it by strength training three times per week and then doing cardio or another workout the other three days and take one day off.

Exercising will be tough because we are on the road but I will find either a gym or use our ‘home’ workout equipment to accomplish my goal.

Another way I am going to help strengthen my legs is to eat healthy.  Focusing on good food to eat will help me get the nutrition I need so I will not crave sugar.  I signed up for a Six-Sisters meal plan to help me prepare healthy food while we are on the road.

Spiritual

Just as important as physical health is spiritual health.  This year I am going to do more home study and become more knowledgeable about the scriptures.

Fortunately the LDS church has many resources to help learn scriptures.  The main resource that I am going to use this year will the teacher study guide for the Old Testament.  I will learn by studying the material like I would be teaching the class.

This study will be on a daily basis with a weekly ‘lesson.’

Family

If I were not on the road this year, my goal would be to spend more quality time with my family but we are going to have a blast exploring the United States.  I am usually very caught up in doing ‘other’ things like cleaning the house, doing laundry, taking care of our businesses, working as a pharmacist and doing fun things like playing volleyball.

Since we are traveling all 50 states this year, I get to spend about every day, every hour with my family.  So I am not worried about giving my kids attention, because they will most likely get a lot more than they are used to.  My focus this year is to be a happier mom and say no less.

I have wanted to do a course called positive parenting solutions to help me be a happier mom.  They have a free webinar and then a paid course.  I signed up for one webinar but missed the time and just have not taken the time to re-register.  I will register and watch the webinar in February (I am putting that on my calendar now.)

One way I am going to be a happier mom is to first give my kids expectations.  Usually, I just jump to saying no.  By giving them expectations I verbalize how I would like them to act.  This expectation gives them a chance to make it right and they know how it is they are supposed to act.

I totally could write pages and pages of things I would like to change in my life but that would be unrealistic to accomplish.  So if you have lists of resolutions, back up and pick the most important goal in each category.  Better yet, just pick your most important goal, then write specific actions you can do today to get you there!