Why You Need Couple’s “New Year’s Resolutions”
It’s January…a New Year…2023!
Let’s just start with a personal question:
How was your 2022?
Especially if you’re engulfed in the online culture, you’ll hear plenty of people saying phrases like, “I’m so glad 2022 is over” or “2022 was awful!” Maybe the person you’re hearing these phrases from is you. For us, however, 2022 was not too bad. One way to sum up our 2022 is in these four words… not what we expected. But sometimes, from the unexpected can come amazing things. For instance, we have now started a whole business! (Which you have probably already gathered if you are reading this blog.)
For Christmas, Noah’s Nana gave us an ornament that she’d made, and had us all write one word on it that described our past year. Our word was FOLLOW. We couldn’t keep up with all the unanticipated change, so we were left with only one option, to follow God and what he had for us in the moment.
Reminiscing on 2022 lead us to want to be more on top of 2023. So, we’re going to try something new this year and we want to encourage everyone to try it with us. We have decided that in this new year, we are going to make some New Year’s Resolutions. Sounds kinda cliché, right? The only problem is, we are not huge fans of the word “resolution.” The Mirriam Webster Dictionary defines a New Year’s Resolution as a promise to do something differently in the new year. Just making a promise of something to do doesn’t seem like it holds enough weight. It doesn’t imply much action and there’s no accountability aspect. So we’ve decided to use the word “goal” instead. (We also like the word “foundation,” but for the sake of consistency, we’re going to stick with “goal”). Instead of just making a bunch of promises and having no accountability, we want to have a goal that we’re aiming for.
The best way we’ve found to solidify these goals, is to set aside some uninterrupted time, just you and your spouse, to discuss some goals you want to set as a family for the year, as well as some individual goals. So, why is it important to also set individual goals? Because a marriage consists of two individuals, so it’s important to continue to work on yourself so your marriage can be as strong as possible. The beauty of sharing your goals with another person is that they can help keep you accountable and let you know the practicality of your goals.
One other aspect we decided to include with our 2023 goals, is a word to describe our year. Instead of only looking back on the past year and agreeing on a word that describes what our past year was, we want to jump ahead and decide on a word that describes how we want this upcoming year to be. For the Root Family, our word for 2023 is INTENTIONAL. We want to be intentional with how we spend our time, the people we come in contact with, and the relationships in our lives.
If you are not sure where to begin with your family goals, we suggest outlining the Four “Fs”:
Faith
Family (you can break this one up into the two categories if you prefer. You two as a couple, and your family including your kids. We decided not to split it up because we do not currently have any children.)
Friends
Finances
For your individual goals, you can start by asking yourself a few questions like:
What is something I want to accomplish this year?
Is there some issue I’ve been wanting to solve?
What has my mindset been recently? Is there something I can do to make it better?
Here’s an example of the Root’s goals for the year:
Faith:
Pray together more
Family:
Spend more intentional time with the dogs and help Denali lose weight
1 date night a month (minimum), planned at the beginning of each month
Go camping more than 2 times this year
Take more pictures together
Build a business together
Friends:
Learn to lead our small group
Continue to grow the friendships God has given us
Be more intentional about reaching out to people at our church
Finances:
Have our business be self sustaining by the end of the year
Be in our own place (not living in our RV anymore)
Noah:
Be better about fitness/stretching
Get better at setting routines
Read more
More sex!
Cambria:
Eat better
Exercise more
Figure out what self-care means for me
Do my devotion more
Now, there’s four things we’d encourage y’all to do…
After writing your goals, get more specific with them so you have some action points to follow. For example, one of Cambria’s goals is to exercise more, so she decided to join an indoor soccer team.
Use this time to listen to your spouse, not to critique them! The whole point of this exercise is to grow in your marriage and learn how you can best be supporting your spouse. We need to be supporting each other as a couple in progressing forward in life. We don't want to be criticizing each other or pulling each other down. Push yourself and push your spouse to be better.
With that being said, tell your spouse how they can be supporting you in each individual goal. OUR SPOUSES CAN’T READ OUR MINDS, so they’re not going to know the best way to support you unless you tell them.
Post your goals somewhere in your home where you both will see them every day. You're both going to be able to see the family goals. You're both going to see each other's goals so you can remember how you are supposed to be supporting your spouse.
