Happy New Year, parents! Welcome to 2008. One of the silliest notions this time of the year is to make a New Year Resolution! Why? Shouldn’t you be working to improve yourself on a daily basis? Instead of getting you or your teenager to make a resolution for the year, ask your child, "Why do you think people make resolutions for each New Year? Why wouldn’t everyone work on improving themselves each and every day?"
Share with your teenager the idea of setting aside a specific time slot each week to look ahead in their life. During this 15 minutes each week, they can ask themselves:
1. What do I NEED to work on? How am I moving ahead to guarantee I work on that need?
2. What do I WANT to accomplish? What am I doing to make that goal happen?
3. What systems of accountability will I use to help make all these priorities occur in a timely fashion?
For instance, what specific people will you share your goals with? You have to select individuals who will hold you accountable – who will call you and say, "Hey, how is that going?" When a time comes in which you haven’t achieved a goal (and that time will come – unless you always set too low of goals), you need the person who will hold you responsible by asking you, "What are you doing to get caught up?"
Make 2008 an amazing year by making each day and each week spectacular!!