Yesterday, a friend H invited me to dinner with his family. During dinner, he casually asked what I thought of this past year. While I was thinking back, he continued, “How many points would you give yourself this year?”
Part of me wanted to say 60, but upon further thought, I said 40.
It was an interesting year that looked up for me. Despite the low points I gave the year, if I had to choose between it having been a good or bad year, I would say it’s been a good year. However, the points isn’t really about how well the year has treated me, but more of how much I’ve done.
To that, I feel that I could’ve done better in many aspects. Regardless of the results, if I had given my best, I would’ve given myself at least 70 points, which is indication of what I can work on next year.
Let’s set achievable and measurable goals for ourselves in the new year. If you want to lose 10 kg the next year, look at it as losing about 833 grams a month. Not so daunting anymore, isn’t it? If you want to save $10,000 next year, just put away $833 a month and you’ll be almost there. If you want to exercise more frequently, decide on the frequency of say once a week or once fortnightly. Create a schedule for yourself and place that in priority.
Very often, when we have no time to do something, it’s only because of priority. If a friend says they have no time to meet you for lunch but you later see pictures of them having fun at the beach on their Facebook or Instagram accounts, don’t think they lied to you. They didn’t. They just placed priority on having fun at the beach over lunch with you. Likewise, If you say you have no time to do something, it’s because you placed something else in priority over that.
So, as long as you place priority on what you intend to do the following year, there is no reason for you to have no time to work on achieving them. Sure, you may not necessarily achieve them, but you definitely will have time to work on doing so. And if I can spend my next year doing them, I will give myself a good 70 points at least. And the remaining 30 points will be on how much effort I placed in them.
Looking forward to at least a 70-point year in 2018.
Happy New Year, everyone!
Happy new year (in advance) to you too! 来年もどうぞよろしくお願い致します! I have a feeling that I will have to rely extensively on your experience in Japan if I do go ahead with my plan to apply for the JET program next year ><
Happy new year! I’ll do my best to answer your questions but I’m sure a number of readers with JET experience could better help.
Nevertheless, wish you the best!