Making 2018 Better Than 2017

Making 2018 Better Than 2017 Part 3 of 4 2018 Calendar with Pen and Laptrop by Marco Verch on Flickr What does 2018 have in store? Some things may seem out of your control, but there is no good outcome that can occur by spending time thinking about them. Rather, invest time in creating a vision of your new year that inspires and empowers you to do what is in your power to do so, which is all you can do, and yet, is much more powerful than you might expect. Already the days are getting longer, and the dawn of a new era is always just a decision away. We will talk about 3 new categories this week, with 3 more remaining. These categories are all important to your overall happiness and fulfillment. We tend to think that we can compartmentalize our life, and even having such categories might imply that, but what we need to realize if we are ever to achieve mastery in our lives, is that each category impacts the others. Whether you have someone to kiss at midnight this year or not, we are going to start by recreating your vision of romance. 7. Love Life Who has a relationship that you envy and why?   Some may tell you that envy is unhealthy, but that’s only if your admiration of someone’s life makes you sad instead of inspired. What would your life be like if you were able to have the kind of love that you admire? If you have been in a long-term partnership, as I have (married 12 years, together for 17), you might feel as though it has already been as good as it will get. We can’t go back to the past, but we can infuse fresh life into relationships. I have seen miracles happen in this area. The magic comes from communication, compassion, and generosity.   Tony Robbins has some great videos of moments that he transformed relationships in minutes. It is possible! If you are unattached, but wish to be, I have some friends in your boat, too. I have no answers for you. You probably have gotten a lot of advice, and perhaps even been set up more times than you care to have been. Some may think your standards are too high, or perhaps even feel like you choose the wrong matches. It’s still worthwhile, in my opinion, to create a vision of your ideal mate â€" the qualities, physical features, etc. While you are doing so, be in the feeling of having this person, rather than the feeling of missing this person. The same method works for an established relationship:   it is the emotional component that activates the law of attraction. When American Indians did rain dances, they didn’t pray FOR rain, they prayed FROM rain â€" from the feeling of gratitude that rain was already coming. You may have a great relationship, in which case, enjoy making plans of how you can deepen your relationship in the New Year â€" adventures you can have, ways to test yourselves and grow in new ways. 8. Lifestyle From what I see, most of us start out our lives determined to live a certain lifestyle and then make decisions that we think will lead us to live that way. Sometimes, however, we want to live a different life than the one we were raised in, and may struggle to know what different decisions could be made that would help us transform our lifestyle. Do you know someone who has a lifestyle that you would like to attain? Are there biographies available? Are they accessible? Could you interview them? Perhaps they might even be willing to mentor you. In my experience with successful people, many of them enjoy their blessings even more when they are able to pay it forward and help others.   A willing student is like a brand new canvas they can paint. You may not need a full transformation of your lifestyle, but perhaps just a level-up in 2018.   Maybe you have been sacrificing travel for family obligations and next year’s level up is to travel more often. Where do you want to go? What are the costs of going? What are the landmarks you want to visit or adventures you want to experience? Other things you can look to level-up:   vehicle, technology, garden, kitchen, office décor, organization, automation. This category can seem superficial to some, and therefore unimportant. I want you to consider that while the true measure of a person is not what they possess; we often tend to measure ourselves this way anyway. We may even determine that we should deprive ourselves to be a good person, or that we are less than because we don’t possess what others do. I don’t condone this thinking, but it happens, and society supports it, even breeds it. Sometimes, things make us happy. Should we measure our lives by them? I’m not one to say “should” or “shouldn’t”. I do know that there are scientifically-proven benefits to feeling happy, and if something makes you happy, you would be doing yourself good to allow yourself to enjoy it. 9. Character How often have you thought about what kind of person you want to be, or how you want to be remembered? The classic movie and book, A Christmas Carol, always makes me think about what impression people have that I might not know they have about me. Did you ever picture yourself at your funeral? What do you think people would say? What would you want them to say? One exercise a coach brought me through years ago was making a list of the top 5 people I admired, and then listing their top 3 qualities. It was said by this coach that these qualities are actually your true self, and that is the reason these qualities appeal to you. We may not always operate in accordance with those qualities because what we learn and endure throughout our lives may take us out of alignment with those qualities, but they are intrinsically a part of us. To help these qualities manifest more often, we must first raise our self-awareness and notice when we are not exhibiting those qualities. Then, we keep recreating and reinforcing a vision of ourselves as someone who consistently exhibits those qualities, and soon we make more decisions from this place of being. Then we also start enjoying the outcomes of making those decisions in terms of our relationships, improved habits, and peace of mind. I know this makes it sound so simple. The truth is our brain defaults to make this type of change very challenging. It is possible, however, with a clear vision of the desired changes, resolve to stay self-aware, and commitment to sticking with it. Which of the 9 areas covered so far feel the hardest to you? Which do you want to dive into first, and which one do you want to avoid? We’ll cover the last 3 categories next week.   Have a memorable, safe, EPIC new year! Europe’s official music video for ‘The Final Countdown’. Click to listen to Europe on Spotify: http://smarturl.it/EuropeSpot?IQid=EuropeTFC As featured on 1982-1992.