Need to remember!!

I really liked this post from Stuff Christians Like... exactly what I needed to hear! Don’t overkill your resolutions. 

When I was a kid, my grandmother had a simple rule about taking us out to dinner: She’d pay for your meal if you ate the whole thing.

What I learned early on was that my eyes were often bigger than my stomach. Especially at cafeteria-style restaurants where I could grab plates of food as I walked down the aisle. Spaghetti? Yes. Hamburger? Yes. Bread sticks? Yes. Cake? Yes. Pie? Yes. I grabbed and grabbed and grabbed until I could barely carry my tray. It was too much, and trying to eat everything I had access to just to finish it usually made me sick.

The same thing happens with our goals. We brainstorm crazy lists of resolutions and then try to accomplish all of them. We don’t come up with a collection of five great goals. Instead, we come up with a collection of 50 good goals. And then, they all clamor for our attention all at once, and we drop all of them.

This Friday, we’re all going to share on this blog what we’re going to work on for FinishYear. Instead of listing 25 things you’re going to knock out, I challenge you to be a surgeon with your list of resolutions.

Cut and edit and remove again and again. As you look at your short list of goals, you might even feel lazy. I did this week as I worked on my Finish List. One of my goals is to read one non-fiction book a month in 2012. That’s only 12 books! In 2011, I started at least three times that amount. But, how many did I actually finish? Probably less than 12. I know it sounds crazy, but the voice of laziness is going to pipe up as you get ready for FinishYear. Fear hates the idea of you finishing something that matters to you, and fear will use any distraction to knock you off course. Ignore that voice. Having only a few goals doesn’t make you lazy. It makes you focused.

And if you only remember one thing from this post, remember this:

The worst thing that happens if you start with too few goals is that, mid-year, you realize you completed them all and you get to add more.

The worst thing that happens if you start with too many goals is you get overwhelmed and quit working on all of them.

Question:Have you ever tried to accomplish too many things all at once?