Why I Start My New Year Resolutions in November

Welcome to episode 110 of Dawn of a New Era, the podcast that talks all things marketing, motivation and mindset with myself, Dawn McGruer, the Business Growth Coach. This episode is entitled, Why I Start My New Year Resolutions and Goals in November. Starting your New Year's resolutions and goals so early can provide lots and lots of benefits, and I'm going to share with you today a few reasons why beginning early can be a real advantage to you. Number one, I feel that it gives momentum.

So by starting my resolutions and goals so early in November, I can really build momentum and get a head start. This allows me to establish good habits and make progress towards my goals before the new year has even begun. So I start to get into a positive mindset and motivated to continue my journey before we've even started the new year. So it means that in January, January is my month of relaxation, rejuvenation, planning, and it gives me the headspace because it feels like I have got everything in control because I've started working two months before the new year.

Sometimes when we reflect on our year, there's certain things that we think we've done really well, we'd like to improve, etc. And what I do is just a quick SWOT analysis. Now this sounds all very technical, but I literally get a piece of paper, draw a line down the middle and then a line from left to right, so I have a little cross. So in this grid, I fill in all of my strengths.

So I fill in everything that I feel from a business and a personal point of view that went well, things that were really strong, that really aided my journey, things that carried me towards achieving my goals, my dreams, things that allowed me to operate in ease and flow. The next grid is basically where I look at weaknesses. So things that we're currently doing for me in my personal life and also across our businesses, and looking at what we can improve. So really kind of being honest with what's working well.

Could we maybe enhance this? Could we shift this or try these different ways? And by doing this, I start to get a really good analysis of what my year actually looked like, because sometimes we have a perception that it's not actually reality. And what I mean by this is that by looking at my strengths, I start to think about all of the gratitude that I've had for what we've achieved, and I start to really reconnect.

Connect with all of the big milestones, all of the huge projects that we've done, all of the amazing clients that we've worked with, and the results that we've got. And then I move on to my opportunities and threats. Now, opportunities are things that are on my wish list, things that I really want to do for the next year. So for 2024, I've made a wish list, things that I absolutely think, right, these are the things that I want to do.

These are the opportunities for my personal life and also for business. And then on the threat side of things, these are things that really need immediate attention. The reason I put them here is that I like to deal with all of them by the time the year is gone, so that I literally conclude the year knowing that we've got everything that wasn't working or anything that was a danger or a threat to the business or to me actually in flow. When you start to implement these by the end of the year, instead of walking into January, one of the things that I found is that if I did this in January, the first working week back after having a lovely time off of Christmas, it just felt really quite depressing because even if I was reconnecting to the strengths, I was starting to think, Oh my goodness, how much work have we got to do?

Oh my goodness, I can't believe that we hadn't fixed this last year. So now, when I go into January, I'm purely focused on everything that is in flow, everything that's being implemented, everything that's going to be happening in 2024. And we've cleared the decks, ready for a clean slate. It also helps avoiding the New Year's resolution pressure because it's something that I really haven't bought into.

And you can't help but start a new year and start new year, new beginning, you know, new things. But many people wait until January to set these resolutions, and they're not very well thought through. They always fall into the kind of category of, right, well, I'm either going to focus on sort of could be health and fitness. But what happens is, is because Because we've put this pressure there and they've not been thought through, they tend to be quite unrealistic, but quite big.

And when you step into the year, you've got this added pressure of expectation, and we don't want to put pressure on ourselves. We want to kind of go into the new year feeling kind of easy and breezy, that we've got some exciting things to look after or look into. And if I start in November, I absolutely avoid this pressure and approach goals with a much calmer mindset and much more considered mindset. So I start to implement, like, bit by bit.

So instead of thinking, Oh my goodness, I'm going to be in the best physical shape ever, and I'm going to lose this weight or do this run or stop eating this, I just do bit by bit, and I take one little micro section or action of it, and I implement it in my week, and then the week after I add another little bit. So if it was going to be like taking up a new sport, like doing yoga. So for me, I really wanted to get into hot yoga in 2024, so I started in November. So I started thinking about, okay, well, instead of trying to, you know, do three times a week, I'll just go once every two weeks and then see how that kind of feels in my schedule and calendar.

Is that the right time of day? And then just work it up gradually. Again, for me, running was a big thing. I decided that at the end of October, beginning of November, that I would start running.

I've never run in my life, and I'm doing my first 5K on December the 16th. And the thing is there is that it's like one big milestone achieved. And then I walk into 2024 thinking, I've already broken the back of it. I can run.

I can do a 5K. Opportunity is there to continue running or do a 10K. And I'm not starting from scratch because that's quite hard. And I remember even going back a few weeks how hard it was to run sort of 25 minutes in one go.

I was struggling at like five in the beginning. So think about how if you plan now, it increases your focus and also your commitment. So start. Starting a resolution and goal earlier gives us this longer period to work on them.

It feels like you've got space to think, and it allows you to dedicate more time and effort towards your aspirations and increasing your focus and commitment. So as a result, you're going to be more likely to actually achieve your goals and maintain long-lasting positive changes. So setting a positive tone for the new year, this is one of my absolute favorites because by taking the action now and taking the action towards the goals in November, you set a positive tone for the upcoming year, and it just automatically happens because you enter the new year with a sense of accomplishment and progress, and setting the stage for this continued success and growth, which kind of goes full circle back to the momentum. And overcoming obstacles and adjusting your approach.

This is probably the biggest catalyst and reason behind it because starting early gives me and you time to anticipate any challenges or overcome obstacles that may arise. And often when we set these goals for January, we start and then we get so busy, and then a challenge comes up and we think, Oh, I haven't got time for this. We stop. So if we're looking at the obstacles that may arise now, we start to kind of like look into that.

So it could be that you're implementing something in your calendar, or you're trying a new approach. If you have some of the challenges now and you get bigger learnings from these, you start to adapt and optimize quicker. So it allows you to evaluate the progress, adjust your strategies, and make any necessary changes before the new year even starts. So again, you're going in, and it means that you're going to get faster results.

You're going to get traction, and we're going to see things happen quicker than January because a lot of people will do launches in January, they'll put offers in, and there's just so much work that literally they start on the first and they're like, Right, oh, I've decided to do this. So even from day one, there is so much work to do. If you started now, planned everything out, or even pushed everything back to February. Then you know exactly where you're at.

So you're not going to walk in thinking, Oh my goodness, I have got the week from hell. I've got all of this to do. You want to walk into your first week, like, as clear as possible, so that everything feels very easy. You're quite excited about going back because everything's already there and working.

You're just going to be seeing the results quicker. This approach and proactive approach increases your chances absolutely of success and definitely helps you stay on track. And this is in life and business. So my advice to you is to start your New Year's resolutions and goals as soon as you can, and you can lay a solid foundation for success.

You can maintain your momentum, and you set yourself up for a fulfilling and very transformative year ahead. So don't wait for the calendar to change. Begin your journey towards your aspirations now, and start thinking about what those goals look like. Start thinking about doing your SWOT analysis.

Grab a piece of paper. Remember the gratitude around all of the successes and strengths you've had this year, both in life, in your personal side, and in business.

And remember to really look at all of the exciting opportunities, things that you really, really want, and push the boundaries on these. Don't just have kind of really low goals. Really think, right, why can I not have this? If you want 2024 to be a massive year of impact, then make sure that you push your goals and dreams as far as you can, and get really into this and think about what your ideal would look like, and get some inspiration by taking a walk, looking at the things that you really, really love doing this year and the things that you really hated, and start delegating and decluttering those now so that you can start to bring joy as soon as next week, tomorrow, today.

And anything that is bringing you down, try and release that as soon as you can, and think about if there was someone you could empower to take on a task, or a way you could switch it up, or even if you don't feel it's serving you. A client of mine the other week said they had a Facebook group and it just literally dragged them down. They were so tired of it. They needed something fresh, and they just were hanging on to it.

And then as soon as they let go, the feeling changed and the creativity came back. So don't be afraid to change something, or let go, or move on, because this is what the future holds. So I hope you enjoyed this week's podcast, and remember to give us a rate and review if you enjoyed the episode, because this only helps us bring our message to more and more listeners. Thank you for listening to Dawn of a New Era podcast, and for your free checklist to find out how to boost your business for growth, profit, and success, and join our community, go to dawnmcgruer.

com.