Roughly two weeks remain in this calendar year. Each June and December I select twelve initiatives for the six months to follow, doing my best to think in the manner of SMART Goals. Titles go on the Whiteboard to the left of my desk in My Space, within my direct line of sight. I did OK this cycle, not great, not poorly. And not very differently than other end of six month assessments. Yet the projects selected six months ago, even if not brought to completion in the time frame set, as SMART Goals require, were still the right initiatives.
So for the last week or two I've been filling out my twelve rectangle grid. Categories are the same each cycle, taken from a master template.
- Health
- Community
- Family
- Self
- Frontier
- Purchase
- Mental
- Travel
- Long Term
- Friends
- Financial
- Home
It's a useful template, though as a senior, empty nester, retired person, some categories matter a lot more than others. My Health comes less under my control. There is not a lot of future for Frontier. I don't need to save for any big purchases. Long term has a limited trajectory. My finances are what I've made them over a working lifetime, not subject to any serious enhancement, though their management will change as I enter a mandatory IRA withdrawal requirement. It may be better to have two, even three pursuits in a relevant category and drop one or two which my best efforts can no longer seriously influence. Yet the twelve block template offers focus. It makes my thinking orderly.
Each block in the grid has gotten five minutes on a timer. I can generate a lot of ideas in five minutes if the title of that section prompts the creative sections of my mind to its possibilities. For most categories my five minute sessions can generate about ten. Now all filled out. I need to select only one for each category, if I opt to keep or twelve. Some coffee at a coffee shop while I sort further.
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