It’s the dawn of a new year, you are supposed to change everything, but instead all you want to do is sleep. You had planned on starting your diet, fitness routine, new business, and that blog you have been putting off. Instead you can’t even drag yourself out of bed. You decided to ring in the new year in style and now you are paying for it. You will be lucky to get out of bed let alone start your plan of reaching all your hopes and dreams. Last night was a rough night and 2020 is starting out with a rough morning.

This is not an uncommon situation where we do something knowingly detrimental to our goals and we take full responsibility for those outcomes. We look back and say, “Man that was a bad decision last night, and now I’m paying for it.” Why then do we not take responsibility for other actions that impact our lives?

How many times to you say “I was going to …………., but I didn’t because ……………. (fill in with whatever external excuse you chose to blame)? There is always some outside influence that prevents us from taking actions that would help us reach our goals. It isn’t our fault that we didn’t start investing. It isn’t our fault that we didn’t ask for that promotion. It isn’t our fault we didn’t go to the gym. We have a million excuses and they are almost always passing the responsibility from ourselves.

Why is it that when we do something obvious like have too much fun on New Year’s Eve, we take responsibility for our actions but when it is something that will truly impact our life, we place the blame elsewhere? In 2020 own up to your actions. Know that your decisions are your decisions and you decide what you accomplish and what you don’t. It is fine to decide to have a rough night knowing that the next day will be a rough day. The lasting impacts will be when you make the decisions that prevent you from reaching your goals. Those decisions don’t result in a rough night but in a rough life.

This year put those excuses aside and do those things you have been putting off, the actions that will get you where you want to go. I’m excited to hear about your accomplishments this year! Happy New Year!