The first day of January is a holiday full of celebration and setting goals. The new year portrays a fresh start that encourages many individuals to set new goals and make changes to better themselves. It is common for these goals to last temporarily and lose motivation as the year moves forward. Utilizing these skills, you can wrap up your goals from last year and get ready for a new year of success.
Reflect on Your Goals
It is essential to be aware of what your New Year’s resolutions were at the beginning of the year. Reflect on the goals you made and determine how well you did at achieving them. You may find that you were successful in accomplishing these goals. Alternatively, you may see that you quickly forgot your goals and lacked to complete any of them. You may also find that you are somewhere in between. Recognizing where you are on your goal-achieving process can help you set up your goals for the upcoming year.
When reflecting on your goals, focus on the goals that you did not fully achieve. Some questions you can ask include:
- What were your goals?
- What steps did you have in place to achieve them?
- What was your reasoning for not achieving this goal?
- Was it too far-fetched? Did you lose motivation?
- Was the goal not aligned with your long-term goals?
- What potential factors halted you from accomplishing these resolutions?
Reviewing these questions can help you determine why your goals were not accomplished. There may be other questions that come to mind when thinking about previous New Year’s resolutions. Allow yourself to answer any questions that come to mind.
This is a time to deeply reflect on these questions and observe what could have been done to improve your outcome in achieving these goals. This is an essential baseline to review to establish goals in the future and learn how you can grow throughout this next year.
Steps to Reflect on Your Goals
Reviewing these key components of your previous goals can help you access the validity of the goals you set. This review can help in the process of setting new goals and understanding why your goals may not have been accomplished.
Meaningful
How meaningful is the goal to you? Assess how much you care about the goal you set in place. Oftentimes, goals are not achieved because they are not meaningful to the individual. Set goals that mean something to you and are of significant importance to your core values and beliefs. Ensuring your goal is something meaningful to you, you can prioritize the completion of the goal.
Doable
Is your goal doable within the timeframe you had set to achieve it? You may find that your New Year’s resolutions consisted of long-term goals that are difficult to complete within a year. Ensuring your goals are realistic to fulfill in one year is essential. If you find that your goal may require more time to complete, try putting the goal into specific steps that can be achieved within this timeframe.
Concrete
A concrete goal is planned in detail and has a defined endpoint. You should have a picture of what achieving this goal looks like and what allows you to know that your goal has been completed. You may find that you failed to do this in your previous goal setting, therefore, you may be unsure of where the completion stage lies. This can be frustrating, as you may consistently ponder if your goal is even achievable.
Actionable
Actionable goals have clear steps in place to move forward to achievement. If your goals are lacking strategies and details that lead to the accomplishment of the goal, this aspect may be lacking. This is an essential step that ties in with the three previously stated concepts.
Importance of Reflection
Reflecting on your goals is vital no matter who you are and what stage of life you are in. If you are going to school, you may fail an exam, setting you back in getting your degree. It is essential to reflect on the exam in this scenario and learn what aspects can be improved before taking future exams.
The same thought processes are relevant in recovery. If you encounter a relapse or fail to achieve one of your goals, reflect upon why you failed to meet this self-requirement. Understanding what you can do better in the future allows you to truly grow as an individual. As stressful as it may be to not accomplish a goal you set, it happens to everyone. Use this as an opportunity to learn and grow.
Reflection allows you to get more out of the experience. If you consistently achieve the goals you have set, you will get used to things working out in your favor. You may lack hard work to achieve goals in the future and expect automatic success. By having the opportunity to reflect on your failures, you can gain further insight into what you need to improve and gain more from the goal-setting process itself.
Reward Yourself
If you find that some of all of your goals were accomplished, take a moment to congratulate yourself. Even if you only were successful in one out of ten goals, it is essential to acknowledge the success you did obtain. Rewarding yourself for the goals you accomplish reinforces the positive mindset of accomplishing goals in your future.
While it is necessary to address the goals you did not complete, you should not dwell on them. Filling yourself with regret on the aspects you failed to achieve will only hurt your self-confidence and ability to succeed in the future. Look at them enough to learn from them, but do not allow them to be your main focal point. Focus on the goals you did achieve and celebrate the success of those.
If you failed to complete any of your goals, focus on steps towards the goal that you engaged in. Reward yourself for your efforts, even if they were not as successful as you hoped. Focusing on what you did well creates a positive mentality for you to maintain success in achieving goals in your future. Your thought processes can have a great influence on your success forward if you allow positivity to be your guiding factor.
Address the Lessons
When you discover potential hardships that stopped you from achieving your goals, you may have the opportunity to learn from those hardships. Reflecting on them, determine what you could have done differently to better the situation. Upon this reflection, write down some of the key lessons you took away from these moments of hardship.
Addressing the lessons that you have learned through your previous failures is a great way to grow. The term “failures” is misleading, as it portrays that not accomplishing your goals is something to be ashamed of. Failure is used because it is a term that is commonly used and is recognized within society. When you encounter moments of failure, it does not have to have this negative light upon it. Failing at something allows you to learn from your mistakes and better yourself.
Keeping this in mind, use your prior hardships to recognize the lessons that you can gain from these experiences. With this knowledge, you can implement new strategies to approach your goals and create a successful outcome for their accomplishments in the future. There are many important lessons that you will learn through your recovery journey. Addressing these lessons, you can implement them into your recovery plan and help motivate your success.
How Does This Benefit My Recovery?
You may be wondering why assessing your New Year’s resolutions are important to reflect on in recovery. Throughout your recovery journey, goal setting is essential for your success. You are consistently required to create goals and reflect upon them through recovery. Many of your New Year’s resolutions may align with your goals in treatment.
Reflecting on these goals and addressing the lessons through the lack of achieving them can help set you up for success when setting goals in the future. As you will continue to set goals in recovery, these skills can be utilized to create goals in recovery and achieve the goals you have already set. Not only will this help you with accomplishing goals, but it will also help you with your confidence in your ability to achieve them.
Confidence is essential in goal achievement. If you believe you are unable to complete these goals, those thoughts will reinforce that inability. Ensuring you feel confident in your abilities allows you to create a state of mind that leads you to success. You may feel the need to rebuild your self-esteem after encountering these hardships. Establishing a sense of confidence in your abilities is a great step towards reestablishing your self-esteem.
Goal setting has been shown to significantly promote success in recovery from Substance Use Disorder. By setting goals and utilizing the reflection process, you can set yourself up to get back on your intended path. It is critical to utilize individuality in the goal-setting and goal-reflection process to ensure you are assessing goals on your terms. Your goals are in place for you. Therefore, you are the only one who can accurately reflect upon those goals.
Moving Forward
As you move forward from reflecting on your New Year’s resolution, you likely will gain insight into what you want your goals to be for the upcoming year. Using the knowledge you have gained from this reflection, you can set up appropriate goals that are attainable to accomplish. Use the skills you have gained in recovery to set up new goals that will contribute to your success.
Remember to use this reflection period as a moment of opportunity, rather than a moment of discouragement. It is okay to feel unsatisfied with a lack of accomplishing your goals, but evaluating the reasoning behind this can help you to set yourself up for success in the future. There are still more opportunities to complete these goals and set up new goals that align more with your desires moving forward.
As we approach the end of another year, the opportunity arises to reflect upon your previous New Year’s resolutions. Looking at the goals you previously set, you can determine how successful you were in accomplishing them. You may find that you failed to complete many of the goals you had set. Taking the opportunity to reflect on the reasons behind this lack of accomplishment can set you up for success when implementing goals in the future. This is a great learning opportunity for you to gain knowledge on what went wrong and what you can improve on in the future. To learn more about reflecting on your New Year’s resolutions, reach out to Real Recovery Sober Living at (727) 290-9156.
