It is the beginning of the year, and if you want to see great things happen in your life and family like never before, you have to be willing to set new goals for your family. There are times you wake up and think to yourself that your family life is not exactly where you would like it to be. It is extremely easy to grow out of touch with your family, otherwise you have your relationships turn into something less than extraordinary, as relationships can falter over one small disagreement or another. Therefore, if you feel that your family life is stagnant, then you should immediately start to set goals and give your family life the shot in the arm that it needs. Your goals will depend on what exactly is troubling you, but you can almost always take action to cure your family of whatever problem you feel is riddling it.
There is an acronym popularly used to describe any goal. That is “SMART”. And if you follow this acronym, even with family goals, you will be able to succeed.
-Specific goals: Narrow your desires down, instead of simply throwing out a blanket statement.
-Measurable goals are always obviously accomplished when you reach them.
-Action-oriented goals mean you can do something about them right away rather than procrastinate.
-Realistic goals are useful in your life and leave you something to be accomplished.
-Tangible goals are ultimately achievable, and won’t just leave you frustrated and worn out.
One of the most common family problems is that the members feel distant from each other. If you are feeling this way about your family, then you should immediately set a goal to spend more time together.
What are the goals that you can set as a family?
A) You can resolve to eat one meal per day/week with each other.
B) You can create a “family worship/prayer time” every night, or “family reading time”.
C) You may also go on “family eat out dates”.
You may let your imaginations run in different ways; you can spend time together and it doesn’t matter what exactly you do, as long as you are enjoying each other’s company and becoming closer to each other. This is good for spousal relationships as well as relationships with your children. Altogether, you can’t go wrong with spending more time together, and this is a great place to start.
Second, you can aim to improve communication with your spouse or kids. If you talk to your kids every day about what is going on in school, you can develop much closer relationships, and make them know that you are interested in what goes on in their lives. The exact same thing goes with spouses. It may seem cliche, but you should always ask about work. When you talk to your kids or spouse about their day-to-day lives, make mental notes of things that are going on, and be sure to ask about them at later dates. This will give them assurance that you are actually listening, and they will be much more open to you later.
Maybe your goals are nothing like these, and your family needs something much different to become ideal. Well, whatever it takes, you should work hard to achieve it. Nothing should hold you back from creating a great family life. Family life is one of the most important things in the world to anyone, and therefore you should place no small value in it. If you need others’ help to achieve the goals that you have with your family, you can talk to a family counsellor who can give you great advice related to you and how you interact with the members of your family.
Have a great family life in 2015.
No progress without change
“Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything” (George Bernard Shaw)
It is that time of the year that we look back and take stock of our successes and/or shortcomings of the year. Where there are successes, we thank the Lord; and where we had shortcomings, we believe God for a better next year and profess it too.
To further engrain this in our minds, a lot of churches come up with slogan for the year “our year of jubilee”, “my year of supernatural increase”, “my year of great deliverance” etc.
These slogans believers chant throughout the year, hoping that this will manifest in their lives. However, as it has been proven year after year, these slogans don’t just work because they have been spoken; they need to be backed up with action.
It is impossible to get a different result if we keep doing things the same way. The question then is: are you willing to change? Change comes in different ways, and this ultimately affects our individual lives and those of people connected to us.
There are different ways of changing. Change of attitude, mind, perspective, mission, vision, association, relationship, looks etc. We must realise that it is until we make up our minds to change our ways, we begin to experience progress in our lives and homes.
Let us determine to change for good in the coming year and it starts from the heart. I wish you a fantastic, testimony-filled 2015.