WOW!  Last week you had some great comments and questions!  A couple of you privately asked what the point was.  If you were wondering what the point of all that was – or if there even was a point, you’re about to find out!

I don’t know about you, but I try really hard to not make resolutions at the New Year.  If I do make a resolution, it’s usually at an equinox or solstice. Why then?  Why not?  There’s nothing about 1 January that makes it more special than any other day, although it does feel momentous and there’s great fanfare to its arrival, but any day is a good a starting point.

However, the New Year is the beginning of a year and one could argue that at the beginning is an excellent place to start something.  It provides an opportunity to focus on the action needed and to set goals.

So PROCESS? PRODUCT? So what?

Well, goals work best if they are actually aligned with what you want.  Goals work worst when they are really good….for someone else!  If you’re primarily a process person, you will be better served to have goals that align with you and are more process driven.  If, on the other hand, you’re a product person, then setting process goals will likely just result in failure and self-recrimination.

And who wants that?

Since you’ve had the opportunity to think about how Process or Product you are, now you can craft goals for yourself that build on your strengths.  By starting with your strengths, you’re much more likely to be successful.

If you’re more Process, you might define goals for the coming year that focus on the journey.  These might be longer term, stretching throughout the year (or even across years).  Because you’re process oriented, you will do fine with these goals. And you have the flexibility to have any “products” happen when they happen rather than adhering to a schedule.   And if there are no products, so what?

If you found you are more Product focused, your goals might look really different.  Products are likely to be shorter term, and each of them might be very finite.  You can schedule them and then adhere to the schedule as part of the goal.  And if you don’t reflect on how you got there, so what?

The lovely thing is that you can use either Process or Product for any goal!  If the goal is to play all of the Carolan compositions (since those seem to be all the rage just now with multiple approaches to collecting and arranging them) it’s more how you state the goal and then work it, rather than the goal itself.  For a process person, stating the goal that look like this: “I will play through all the Carolans by the end of the year”.  For the product person that might be too nebulous, so it might be stated, “I will play one Carolan tune each day for the next 261 days.”  Same goal, different approaches.  The process person would probably chafe under the product approach and the product person might get nowhere with the process statement – but stated in their own best way, they can each have a great year and achieve that goal!

By focusing on your strengths, you can also develop goals that are less “should” and more “will“.   For instance, your goal could be, “I should organize all my sheet music” (can you hear the sneer of that “should”?  That sneer is what makes me think, “I should but I won’t”).  But what if we shifted it around and removed the “should”? Then it could be stated, “Alphabetize and arrange my music library” (more product) or “Read through and bring some order to my music” (more process).

Of course, this is also the opportunity to set a goal to practice things that don’t come as naturally to you or are uncomfortable for you.  This is an opportunity to strengthen your weaker Process or Product side.  Do you see how that subtle wording shift above makes the goals more approachable?  Also notice that they’re the same goal?  Of course in this example, many of us might smush it all together and enjoy a ramble through all the music we want to get to but might not (on the line between Process and Product), but we’ll enjoy the time we spend.

No matter what your goals might be this year, putting them in the context of your strengths will certainly make them more appealing.  And more accomplishable.  And more enjoyable.  Avoiding “shoulds” will also give you the opportunity to shake off the shackles of expectations that don’t fit you.

What are your goals this year?  I’d love to hear them – share in the comments!

PS, you may have seen that sometimes I post a comment in which I reference an email rather than a previous comment.  I know that not all of you are interested in sharing every thought you ever had with everyone on the planet.  You are always welcome to send me an email sharing your thoughts.  Usually you have excellent thoughts that I might edit and share your thinking with the group but know that if you send me an email comment and I post it in the comments, I will strip it of all attribution to protect your privacy.  I really do like hearing from you so please don’t hide your light!