I promise.

I promise you

I’ve said those words to myself so many times - especially at the start of new years.

I promise I’ll get back on track (whatever that means).

I promise I’ll read my bible more.

I promise I’ll stick to a cleaning schedule.

I promise I’ll  do more meal planning.

I promise I’ll workout.

I promise.

I promise.

I promise.

Every single one of those promises was made with the best intentions, but the worst follow through.

You’re probably wondering, “Whitney, where are you going with this?”

I’ll tell you what’s tricky about making promises to ourselves and not following through:

• we lose trust in our own ability to achieve something

• we get caught between the “be kind to yourself” and “challenge yourself” perspectives

• we forget that we’re modeling follow through to those around us

• we lessen the power and significance of a promise

At the beginning of every year, I fall into a “promise making, promise breaking” cycle and end up feeling bitter and disappointed when it comes to an end.

It matters what we promise ourselves. If we want to grow and excel, we have to be able to establish goals (or intentions) and pursue them.

But there’s still room for self compassion in our pursuit of those promises.

Maybe the reason you’re not following through with a goal is because there are too many of them.

Maybe they’re unrealistic.

Maybe you need help with them.

Maybe you need to start smaller.

Maybe you need to work on your motivation in general before you start pursuing any goals.

I can honestly say that all of those reasons, at one time or another, contributed to my lack of follow through. There have been years when I’ve had ten different goals on my agenda and (maybe) achieved one of them.

Here’s the thing - it’s time we started keeping promises we make to ourselves AND making promises we can keep.

This year I decided to try something new - a way to balance self compassion and challenging myself.

I created a couple of resources to help with this:

1. A list of 10 tips centered around setting goals

(located below!)

2. A guide that will help to simplify and clarify your vision and hopes for the upcoming year.

(available on our website to download! I included a few pages of the guide below - that I recently filled out - so you can see what it looks like! )

Pages from my own Vision Planner for this year

(it’s really simple to use!)  

tap/click here and you’ll be taken to our Vision Planner!