As we begin a new year, I want to talk to you a little bit about the importance of setting goals together as a couple. It’s always wonderful to dream together of what you would like your life to look like, but if you really want to see those dreams achieved, you must write them down, make a plan and get started.
About 12 years ago, Neva and I started thinking about our goals and dreams differently and began writing them down in a clear and specific manner. And then we made sure to keep them in front of us so that we would continually think on them. Neva would even write them on the bathroom mirror in dry erase marker. You will focus the most on what you think about the most. We had always had goals and dreams, but without writing them down, we would quickly lose sight of them and forget the reason we made the goals in the first place.
Numerous studies have shown that couples who take the time to write down their goals are much more likely to accomplish them. Which was immediately true in our case. We were able to look back at the 5 year plan that we made way back then and see that we had accomplished the vast majority of them within that 5 years, and the rest we accomplished within 7 years. We have now made a habit of setting goals for our life. We set short term goals (1-3 months), mid range goals (1-3 years) and long term goals (usually 5 or more years). We write them down, pray over them and then get started.
It is important to set some eazy goals for a quick sense of accomplishment, but also very important to set some scary goals, or what we like to call Big Hairy Audacious goals, that cause growth and stretching in your life. Neva is pretty good at setting goals that seem almost impossible to achieve at the time. But if those goals are in line with Gods will for your life, He will often make a way and provide the resources to accomplish them. One of the ways that we make time to do this is by going on a vision retreat.
At least once a year we will get away for 3 days for an intentional time of discussion about our life. It’s important to get out of your normal environment and away from everyday distractions, but if you are unable to do this that’s ok, just do your best to minimize interruptions. During this time we will take a close look at the major areas of our life and relationship to see how we are doing. This can look different for everybody, but for us, we generally break it down like this: Personal life, family, farm, business and ministry. Then we will break it down even further into subcategories such as marriage, spiritual health, mental health, physical health, financial health, sex life and fun. We will each rate these areas on a scale of 1-10, talk about the things we are doing well and also what areas may need some improvement. Then we take some time to dream a little bit about our future and write down some awesome goals. Being united in our dreams and goals is so powerful. It gives us focus. And when you are both focused on the same goal, anything is possible. Remember, if you shoot for the stars, you just might hit the moon.