Spring Newsletter 2024 🌷

Growth Opportunity:

Watching the Olympics has rapidly pulled me out from my winter slumber. I’m refreshed and ready to go. Talk about perfect timing for Spring!!

 Spring is the time for momentum.

It’s the time to start new things. New projects. New goals.

It’s the time to get things done.

 As we shrug off the Winter Slowdown, let’s intentionally shift our mindset to looking forward and focus on what we want to achieve. Recognize that ‘wanting’ and ‘doing’ are vastly different. However, the only way to get from one to the other is by taking action! Plan for what you want to do, then follow that up by doing it.

 To build momentum, we have to start somewhere and move in the right direction.

Tips:

Benefit from Spring’s Growth with these five simple tips for gaining momentum:

What ever our goal may be, start with one thing and build on it.

1. Set yourself a measurable goal. Goals are excellent for getting a sense of direction and clarity for what you want. By making it measurable you can gauge your progress and success.

2. Choose the actions required to achieve the goal. The action you’re taking now is what’s delivering your current results. Want a different result? Introduce a new action to form a new habit. There’s a huge difference between doing nothing and doing one thing.

3. Break the action down into a checklist of miniscule tasks. Whilst this seems basic, your brain may get overwhelmed with the thought of an entirely new habit. But it will easily accept doing one new little thing. A checklist provides flexibility to move through it, with discipline.

4. Add it to something you already do. If you wait to ‘be in the mood’ you’ll never start! The hardest part is starting. Be gentle on yourself and add your new action onto a regular task. Daily is great for some things but three times a week is still a habit that counts in your life.  When your new habit becomes the ‘new normal’ it can then be improved.

5. Celebrate showing up. Acknowledge you’re becoming the person who shows up consistently. If you’re making progress, even if it’s not as much as you’d like, you have every reason to continue and keep going. Gain momentum and get the “positive feedback” thought loop started. Take that energy and pour it into the next action on the check list.

Recommendations:

Book Recommendation:

Atomic Habits: James Clear

This fabulous International Best Seller shows you how minuscule changes can grow into life-altering outcomes. It has very practical, easy to follow ‘Laws’ for building habits.

Podcast Recommendation:

Dare to Lead – Brene Brown

 This is one heck of a listen to Brene’s ‘Double Episode’ interview with James Clear.

They talk about building systems to create habits, and how to build or break a habit. They also speak about our environments and how we create habits in teams and in organizations.

(Tip – I listen on 1.5 speed to lessen her glorious Texan drawl)

Social Media - who to follow

James Clear (Author of Atomic Habits recommended above) is an expert author on building better habits. Given this newsletter focuses on building momentum, I love this quote from James: “The first minute of action is worth more than a year of perfect planning”

Every day you get to choose how to spend your time.

In what ways can you be more effective?