I went back to the goals I set for myself and my business for 2018 and (not surprisingly) I didn’t accomplish all of them. And that’s ok, I’m not going to beat myself up about it. I read more books, I accomplished some business goals, and really focused on serving more which was my first priority. So yay!

I think my biggest takeaway from 2018 was how easily I can overcomplicate the simplest things. Even goal setting! So my word for 2019 is Simplify. This past year has humbled me and brought me low. It has taught me so much about necessity and want. And to be truthful, I have all I need. However, I definitely want to focus on minimizing the clutter (literal and metaphorical) so I can be free to do what I am created for. So things like less screen time and more books. Less things, more experiences. Less distraction, more peace. Less commitments, more presence and intention. Less of me and more of Him.

So my first step in simplifying things was to only set two goals for my business and two goals for my personal life. Just TWO! Last year I had something like 14 goals total!! And while they are all things I still want to do, it was just not a realistic timeline to accomplish them all. I wanted to make sure I could set things that were achievable and didn’t overwhelm me. So here are my TWO personal goals!

1. Establish a more productive daily routine. This will be definitely be another blog for another day but one thing I’m really focusing on (thanks to stumbling on Phylicia Masonheimer’s blog!) is to make things simple and to focus and follow the same order of things instead of planning hourly deadlines. I’m focusing on simple and achievable tasks and it’s made things so much easier. I would start a task, get sidetracked into another task and continue this pattern and then realize at the end of the day I did so much work but never really accomplished or completed one task! I was running in circles and not focused. I would make a daily routine based on getting up at 6:30 AM, but then my kids would inevitably wake up at 6:00 and my whole routine would be thrown off. Following the same order and rhythm made room for more grace to get things accomplished and I have to say, so far it’s working wonderfully!! And now I set timers for specific tasks so that it helps me stay focused and on task. I’ll go more in depth about my daily schedule in another blog but if you are like me and struggle to stay on task and be more productive go check out Phylicia Masonheimer’s blog!

2. My second goal is to read the entire Bible chronologically and so far it’s been great! I’m using the Blue Letter Bible Chronological plan and what I love about it is that if I can’t carve out enough time to sit down and read (three kids who eat every 5 minutes make that difficult sometimes ;)) I can listen to it when I’m driving or when I’m folding laundry. And there is definitely something to be said for both reading and listening to the Bible. I will say that listening to it has definitely helped me retain more!

So that’s it! My intentions are to simplify things in every aspect of my life. I want to bring simplicity to my thoughts, my home, my routines, my commitments, my purchases, my priorities. It is so easy for me to overcomplicate this life but it really is so simple. Love God, and love others. 2019 is the year for running towards more things that bring joy and contentment and doing less of everything else.