Get At It

“Don’t stop when you’re tired, stop when you’re done.”

– David Goggins

Oh, we’re a few days from 2023. You know that. Another year is staring you in the face. It’s staring me down too. I can feel it with anticipation and I’m ready to leave 2022 behind. Not because I want to forget it, I won’t. But because we have places to be.

I wrote an edition at the beginning of the quarter on sketching out the coming year in advance, you can read that here if you’re interested in some planning. I want to focus on the anticipation of a new year today. That feeling of charging up. Perhaps you can relate to slogging it out lately. A lot of people I’ve talked to recently have been hitting the sand and it can be discouraging. But here’s the thing, we take what we’ve learned and move out of it. We don’t need to stay there. It’s part of the growing process and if you aren’t growing, you’re dying.

I like taking the start of each year as the next round, like the ring of a boxing bell. We only get one go in life. For the young: it’s easy to waste time and let it slip by thinking we have time to kill. For the old: another day is a day we don’t have to lose. I’m walking the line between each. The bell is about to ring for 2023, are you ready for the next round or are you going to let 2023 get the first hit?

Let’s put our shoulders into this year and do great things. Wherever you’re at, start or continue but don’t sit. Get it. Get at it. Apply yourself hard in a direction worth going. If you find resistance, mow it down. If you fall, get up. Knock something out.

What is that going to be for you? How is this year going to be different?

Let’s do this year hard. Come Holy Spirit.

— Adam Jarosz

Founder/Leadership Coach

Righteous Co.

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I love sharing insights and reflections for the faithfully productive – this article is from Righteous Co.’s weekly newsletter, The Climb. If you want to see content like this and more, subscribe here to get The Climb right in your email box, every Righteous Wednesday. You can also follow along on Instagram @righteousco.

Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda – SMART Goals

“Our life is frittered away by detail… simplify, simplify.”

Henry David Thoreau

One of the best layups I’ve come across for dealing with goals is the acronym SMART. Maybe you’ve heard of it. It’s a way of measuring up if the goal is actually feasible and grounded instead of being “pie in the sky”. Seriously, if you want to move the needle on something you’re working on, dig in and sketch it out.

S – Specific – is the goal foggy and nebulous or is it clear and concise?

M – Measurable – Can you measure it with numbers or scale? How can you know if you got there?

A – Achievable – Is it actually possible? Or what steps need to come first?

R – Relevant – Is this a part of your bigger plan or is it a distraction?

T – Time-based – Can you put a time on it or will it always be “later”?

This is where the dreaming and doing of RCO comes into play. Take the dream and vision that’s being built on your heart and get real with it. Whether this is the first time you’re hearing about SMART goals or the thousandth; take dream/vision/goal “x”, and apply each step. No really, just give it a sketch with a pencil and paper (or my favorite, an Evernote) and try it out. Play with it, see if it makes sense or if something else comes out of it. 

You can either square up with what’s been sitting on the heart or confirm that it’s not something you’re going to do — which frees up cap space for the things you do want to do. But as my dad raised us on… “the worst things in life are the woulda, coulda, shouldas.”

— Adam Jarosz

Founder/Leadership Coach

Righteous Co.

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This article is from Righteous Co.’s weekly newsletter, The Climb. If you want to see content like this and more, subscribe here to get The Climb right in your email box, every Righteous Wednesday. You can also follow along on Instagram @righteousco.