I trust that you have had a good Christmas.  Well maybe mine has been a little too good!  I’ve put on a few kilos from all the over-indulgence over the holidays, so I guess my January will have to include some trips to the gym.  Damn thats only going to get in the way of my poker playing!

For many, this is the time of year to look back, to reflect on what has happened and to think about what you want to happen in the new year.  In order to set our goals it is important to look inwardly at what we want to achieve, our experiences through the year, what we have learned, what we could have done better and perhaps what we would like to change.

It is also important to set achievable time limits to our goals, for example: by June I want to have finished in the top ten in a poker tournament… If we don’t put time limits, then we keep allowing more and more time to complete it, or we keep putting it off.  Perhaps that is why we put so much emphasis on goal setting at the beginning of a new year, because it is the start of a new calendar.  Or maybe its just a good time to wipe-off the old goals we didn’t get to…

And note, I said achievable goals.  All too often we set crazy ”new year’s resolutions” that we can’t achieve and by the end of January we have given up ever trying to accomplish the goal.  Know the feeling?

Break-up one big goal into many smaller goals.  By setting many smaller, achievable goals, you will feel much better achieving these goals and will become more focused on your goals.  By achieving all the small steps you will get to the big one.  Bite size chunks!

One of my goals for 2009 is to keep my blog up-to-date and to keep you informed.  So watch this space!