My Four Words for 2016
Every year I write down four words that represent the themes and areas of focus for me in the coming year. These words emerge after reflecting on the year past and setting goals for the year forward. I certainly did not invent the concept, in fact, I originally got the idea from blogger/marketer, Chris Brogan. Chris does three words, but for me four just seems right.
I’ve done this exercise every year since 2010 and it’s truly one of the best things I do to plan for a new year. I post these words somewhere I will see them every day (bathroom mirror or on office desk) and they serve as my true north for the year. See an example of my 2015 words in action here.
Words from past years
- 2010: Focus. Awareness. Sharing. Personal.
- 2011: Deliver. Question. Value. Power-Up.
- 2012: Scale. Ask. Commit. Professional.
- 2013: Today. Systems. Sponge. Alignment.
- 2014: Transparency. Develop. Empower. Simple.
- 2015: People. Lifestyle. Finance. Outlier.
2016 Words
- Authentic
- Gratitude
- Communicate
- Decisive
What do these words mean to me?
Authentic — Authenticity can be a hard thing to find in people these days. Perhaps it is because we live in the era of social media and perfectly filtered Instagram photos, but I also think people are often afraid to speak their mind. I feel that way as a Midwest Nice South Dakotan. I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings. I’ll just say it looked good or that they did great or hopefully I’ll attend their event. I want to be authentic in 2016. This is who I am. This is what I believe. Take it or leave it.
Gratitude — If you’ve ever read my newsletter or follow me on Twitter or Instagram you know I’m a big thank you note person. Nothing beats a handwritten thank you note in my book, but to me there are thank you’s and there is gratitude. I want to take it to the next level in 2016. I want people to know that I am sincerely and genuinely grateful for who they are and what they do. I also want to be more grateful for the non-human aspects of life (ie. sunsets, a nice glass of wine, new car smell, etc) and acknowledge those things.
To go along with the keyword of gratitude I’m starting a little project in 2016 called The Dear Year. Check it out here.
Communicate — A big goal of mine this year is to create more. Create specifically through writing, videos, and photos. I want to tell stories and share my thoughts. Most of this will happen on the web, but hopefully a decent portion will be in person too. As any good storyteller will tell you, you can’t just talk you have to listen too. So I chose communicate as my word. Communicate means not just creating through written and spoken word, but also listening, asking, responding and engaging. This means asking for opinions, reading other people’s ideas, responding to comments, and replying to tweets. I was a Communications major in college, so let’s see if I can put that to good use this year.
Decisive — In business, in life, in conversation, and in deciding where to eat dinner — I want to be more decisive. I’ve lived on this earth for 30 years now. I know what I want and what I don’t want, so make a decision. The additional aspect of decisive for me is keeping things simple and delegating to others. I’ve preached simplicity at Lemonly and now that our company is at 20 people we need to be able to decisively make decisions and I need to delegate to others and empower them. Being decisive allows you to be fast. Speed kills.
These are my 2016 words that will guide and inspire me to what will hopefully be my best year ever.
If this letter inspired you to do this exercise or you already do this exercise I’d love to hear your words for 2016. Leave a comment or email me — john@lemonly.com.
