There are 98 days until the end of the year. How does this fact make you feel? Desperate? Happy? Relieved? Blah? Today I want to give you a practical plan to accomplish your goals in 98 days.

I love countdowns. I feel empowered when I know how much time I have to accomplish a tast. Even if the task takes more than 98 days, I can be assured that my efforts will add up to successfully achieving my goals.

What can you accomplish?

Think possibilities. Think big. Think brave. Do not shrink in fear. Condition yourself to be confident in the grandeur of your goals.

Think with pen and paper

Digitally writing things down may work for you. For me, pen and paper have a finality that the digital screen cannot replicate. I find joy in looking back at my journals and finding goals that are now a reality. I encourage you to go through this exercise with pen and paper.

Start at the end

Answer the question: "What do I want to see, feel, and experience by the end of the year?"

Do you want to diminish your debt?

How about establish an exercise habit?

How about organize your home?

You are allowed to be very specific.

If you want to start running, you may want to say: I want to run three days a week for 30 minutes in 98 days.

I want to pay off the following debts in 98 days...

I want to declutter and organize my linen closet in 98 days.

Your current steps can lead you to your goal. You have to create a path forward.

If the goal is to start running, a path forward looks like:

Downloading a couch to 5K App.
Plugging the daily mileage to your calendar.
Having tennis shoes and clothes ready to go the night before your run.
Take your clothes to work so you can stop by the gym on your way home.
Commit to recapping the week to learn, celebrate and tweak anything for the following week

A path forward to organizing a linen closet may look like:

Committing to a day and time to start working on the closet
Doing laundry
Creating a system for how the closet works
Keeping up with the system when things start to get out of place

A path forward to paying off three debts may be:

Finding out the total amounts of the debts
Starting with the lowest debt and moving on to the others
Finding a system to continue to practice good financial stewardship
Sign up for a class to learn the next set of skills in money management.

I hope you are ready to think about all you will accomplish in 98 days. No step is too small when you are walking in the direction of your goals.

Learning from the Holiday Season