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Episode # 71: We are in the new year, and I believe that 2022 will be your best year to date. This will be a time to develop a plan of action for what’s important to you that includes your career AND your personal life. It can be the blueprint for setting your personal priorities and ensuring you don’t forget the important events in your life AND that you live, grow, and thrive with no regrets.
Episode outline:
Setting the right priorities for your life,
Adopt winning habits including a self-care routine,
Embrace a growth mindset,
Prepare for challenges,
Write out and continually update your goals, and
Synchronize your plan with the people in your life.
Stephen is an experienced Finance Professional and Leader who offers fractional CFO services and development opportunities. Please visit his LinkedIn profile or Finance Leader Academy for more information.
The views and information shared on The Finance Leader Podcast are intended solely for educational and informational purposes. They do not constitute financial, accounting, tax, legal, investment, or other professional advice. Always seek guidance from a qualified professional before making decisions related to your specific circumstances.
Stephen McLain:
We are in the new year and I believe that 2022 will be your best year to date. This will be a time to develop a plan of action for what's important to you. Then include your career, and your personal life. That can be the blueprint for setting your personal priorities, and ensuring you don't forget the important events in your life and that you live, grow and thrive with no regrets. Please enjoy the episode. Welcome to the finance leader podcast where leadership is bigger than the numbers. I am your host Stephen McLain. This is the podcast for developing leaders in finance and accounting. Please consider following me on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. My usernames and the links are in the episode's show notes. And also, please join the Facebook group that I have for this podcast community. Thank you. This is episode number 71. And I will be talking about making 2022 Your best year ever, and I will highlight the following topics. Number one, setting the right priorities for your life. Number two, adopt winning habits including a self care routine. Number three, embrace a growth mindset. Number four, prepare for challenges. Number five, write out and continually update your goals. And number six, synchronize your plan with the people in your life. Now I found a great quote from Buddha. No matter how hard the past, you can always begin again. Now this is the first episode of 2022. And we want to set the right tone for the rest of the year. This year can be your best year ever. But that doesn't mean we won't face challenges or obstacles to overcome. But it does mean we should examine our life and our priorities to ensure we are thriving in life. And not just going from one event to the next. But living and enjoying what we get to do and enjoy our family and friends to live. But also to thrive which means to flourish. We are building a blueprint to live a richer life, we will adopt winning habits. And we will believe in ourselves, we will develop confidence to overcome the challenges which will come we all face them. But when we adopt a growth mindset along with changing our habits, we can face these obstacles in a different way. I am excited for what 2022 will bring to you. And for me too. We need to examine our priorities and what events in life moments that we must commit to enjoying and sharing with the people around us. I sometimes forget this to in my own life, it's important to not let the important events and moments slip away from us. They are too important for that to happen. You have choices. A few weeks ago in bonus episode 31, I asked you to do some preliminary thinking and planning around your priorities, your important events and your current challenges. And I asked you to write down the vision for your life. What do you want to accomplish? What kind of life do you want? What lifestyle Do you want to live? There are many answers to this question. I have friends who are committed to serving others, and some who are blazing a trail of high personal achievement. And one who is seeking a continued career in academia, and one who I know will become a successful writer one day, there are many choices in life. And it's important to seek out friendships. And when you are ready your significant other who also shares a similar outlook on how to embrace life. The key to thriving in a relationship with your significant other is to communicate it really is and to embrace those special moments as finance and accounting professionals. Do we have monthly close every month? We do? I have asked you many times to improve monthly close. Why do I ask you to do this is for many reasons. But also because this is a significant event that can last for two weeks every month. That is a lot of time where life happens and important events happen when you finish work for the day. This is an important event. You are being reunited with your family. And how that event unfolds each day can predict how happy your relationship will be with your significant other and your children. It's important. Think about your process and finishing up work for the day. What do you need to do to transition from your work life to home and family life so that it adds happiness to those around you and not an unsettling reunion. I want you to think about that. This is the year that I will Want you to define who you are? And what's important to you? And what do you want to accomplish? I am asking you to write it down. So you see it, you live it, and you can better understand what you're committing yourself to. Not only do I want you to realize what is important, but who is important to you synchronize your events with your significant other. So you both share what is important. Last year was a challenge. And despite that, we get a lot done. I am asking you for this year that getting things done is not enough. We need to get the right things done. Being busy and accomplishing tasks seems like we are headed in the right direction. But now we need to examine our priorities and our focus, do our goals make sense? Does our plan make sense is where you are committing time to make sense, continue to ensure you are getting the right things done and not just being busy. As a quick review. In season eight. Last year, I delivered to you a key series about becoming a CFO. These were episodes 64 through 70. I covered topics including the CFO mindset, the C suite dynamic, the CFO skill set, and career planning, plus a few others. If you missed those episodes, please go back and download them. They are very popular and you won't be disappointed. You are more than your work. You are more than your profession. You are meant to thrive in all parts of your world in your life, not just your job and career. A little each day, change your focus and change your habits. So you embrace a fuller life with the people who are important in your life and even by yourself if that is your choice. And sure that at the end of your life, you have no regrets for the choices you made no regrets. What are you leaving on the table that will give you regrets later in life. Now let's talk about a few key points about making 2022. Our best year ever. Number one, setting the right priorities for your life. First, there is more to life than just your work. And that is the key to a more fulfilling life a life that gives you back much more in return. You have to know and recognize what's important and then make it happen. But anything you do you should be doing it well. What are your priorities for 2022 is a finishing your advanced degree, a new role, maybe a wedding possibly, there are so many possibilities that fit your circumstances, your dreams, and what you can realistically get done. So list out your priorities, continue to assess and update as necessary. A more fulfilling richer life is one that goes beyond surviving every day that isn't living. This is just moving from sunrise to sunrise and doing tasks in between what will give you joy? What will help you live out your purpose and vision and aim for that number to adopt winning habits including a self care routine? Our habits and our mindset contribute greatly to how well we navigate our lives, our tasks or work challenges and obstacles and our success. Winning habits include time management, how will we prepare the night before work? How will we prepare at the beginning of the week? How prepared we are for key meetings? How will we communicate with our team and many other key habits. You have habits in your personal life too, that contribute to a happy or even an unhappy life? Don't forget those. Your habits may be holding you back from success. So what can you do? Be honest with yourself about what you need to change, you need to replace your bad habit behavior with a behavior that delivers a better outcome and hopefully more value and a reward. There is an entire scientific process of changing habits that I won't cover today. But you need to recognize what habits are holding you back and start altering that behavior. So you pick up better habits. And don't forget self care and your daily and weekly schedule of activities. You need time to renew, relax, and to become restored so you don't burn out. This is a non negotiable for me. What are your self care must haves? Maybe better sleep, drinking more water, exercise, maybe meditation or walks in the park? And sure you are doing a self care plan every day. Number three, embrace a growth mindset. Do you believe that you can grow? Do you believe you are stuck where you are regarding your development? A growth mindset is one where we believe we can continue to grow, to develop and to improve every day. Understanding this is key to your long term success. If you're listening to this podcast, and if you have a written plan then you probably already believe in it. Growth Mindset instead of a fixed one. If you change your mindset, you will change your outcome. Number four, prepare for challenges. No matter what you will face challenges, you will still need to overcome obstacles. This never goes away. It's how we approach, react and act to those challenges determines our progress and determines our potential. Don't let a challenge or obstacle sway your drive. As you pursue your goals, meet the challenge and overcome the obstacle as you move forward. Number five, write out and continually update your goals. Just like I said last year, you must resist the urge to make New Year's resolutions. It has been proven every year they don't work, you need a realistic, written down plan that is broken down into smaller, achievable pieces. Break up that goal into manageable pieces, track your progress, and update your goals as you complete them. Add more goals as you complete others towards your long term goal, continually be updating your plan. And sure you have a written plan when you can see what you need to do and what you have already accomplished. Because this will give you motivation to move forward. And you can celebrate your achievements along the way. Number six, and probably the most important, synchronize your plan with the people in your life, talk with your significant other and share with them what you hope to achieve. And that way you can both synchronize your life, your expectation and your key life events that are coming up along with future life events. I have said before that I recommend the long term calendar, where you put life events on it like school graduations and anniversaries and other events around child raising. So you see where possible challenges and conflicts might arise. And you have choices. We all have choices. Sometimes those choices got us to a place where we are not happy. Or where we are struggling with a variety of problems. We can also plan out realistic choices to improve those problems. And that may take time and patience. This comes back to our mindset, our resolve our willingness to take risk, and our willingness to change our habits and our approach. But it can be done. It can be done now for action today. How do you make 2022 your best year ever? It's recognizing what is important for you to achieve, celebrate and enjoy your life. This is more than only your career. Now a few weeks ago, I asked you to write down your life vision, I want you to review what you wrote. Or if you didn't listen to that episode. Write it out now. Review your vision and update it if you need to be specific. What kind of life do you want? How do you want to change the world? Where do you see yourself adding value? How can you be a positive influence for other people? As a habit, I want you to begin communicating with your significant other, your vision and your goals and really listen to what your significant other wants to accomplish. As a habit. I want you to begin communicating with your significant other your vision and your goals. And really listen to what your significant other wants to accomplish. Synchronize your effort, create a plan that supports and complements each other. Again, this doesn't mean you won't face challenges and hardship. None of us escape that. But I want you to move forwards towards a richer and more fulfilling life. And that of course means many different things to different people. Live with no regrets. Enjoy what enriches your life. That might be travel, food, photography, reading, model trains, woodworking projects, and many more things. Plan and continue to plan so that you identify and enjoy what's really important to you. One last action keep asking yourself, are you getting the right things done? Not just being productive to be busy, but the right actions so you move forward in your career and in your life. Today I talked about making 2022 Your best year ever and I highlighted the following points. Number one, setting the right priorities for your life. Number two, adopt winning habits including a self care routine. Number three, embrace a growth mindset. Number four, prepare for challenges. Number five, write out and continually update your goals. And number six, synchronize your plan with the people in your life. Our mindset is powerful. When it comes right down to it. Everything you want is determined by your mindset. You need to release what is haunting you. You need to let go what is stopping you? You need to let go what is preventing you from success. Free yourself of the mental blocks you create in your mind. Free yourself from your past and your failures, free yourself from your mistakes, and free yourself of what you think what others are thinking about you, because they are not place positive thoughts in your mind. You are strong, you're capable, you can achieve that difficult goal you have set. We set HARD goals because that is who we are. The goal that is just out of reach is what will drive you. If you change your mindset, you will change your outcome. Next week I will be sharing the benefits of keeping a journal and how it can help you be successful in your career. I hope you enjoyed the finance leader podcast is dedicated to helping you grow your leadership skills to change your mindset and to clarify your goals to seek to advance your career. You can find this episode wherever you listen to podcasts. Until next time, you can check out more resources at finance leader Academy comm and sign up for my weekly updates. Don't miss an episode of the show. And now we'll leave your team and I'll see you next time.
