It’s Your Time to Shine

I hope that you and your families are enjoying a great holiday season regardless of your background and whether you practice a particular faith, or if you’re just getting an end-of-the-year break. 

My troops enjoy a fun gathering with my wife’s family for a few days before traveling to see the rest of the Battista clan in Pittsburgh. We got our wish and enjoyed a white Christmas with just enough snow to make it an idyllic setting, but not enough to cause any travel issues. 

My sister-in-law Karen and brother-in-law Mike are such gracious hosts and their Cape Cod home, that sits on 4 acres surrounded by forest and farmland, is right out of a Norman Rockwell painting. The cookies, the soups, the entrees, the decorations and all the presents make for the perfect holiday setting for our families. We watch old movies, play Ping-Pong, board games, and cards, reminisce about family and have few glasses of wine and beer to add to our holiday spirit.

We get an hour and a half drive to catch our breath, get our second wind and head to MeeMaw and Pap-Pap Battista’s. There we get our fill of my mom’s Italian delicacies in the form of stuffed peppers, artichokes, breaded smelts, gnocchi’s, and her famous Italian cookies and meatballs. I can’t speak for all of my family, but after a few days of Aunt Karen and MeeMaw’s cooking, I need a good month at the YMCA to work off all the extra pounds.

We are so blessed and fortunate to be with family. It’s such a great time for all, a great way to bring 2017 to a close, and a good time to start dreaming and planning for terrific 2018.

It’s also that time to make your New Year’s resolutions. But before you start working on them, begin by taking stock of what you did (and didn’t do) this past year. This is the perfect time to sneak away by yourself, even if it’s just for an hour or two, with a warm cup of coffee, tea or hot chocolate, to reflect and perhaps dream a little.

If all is well in your life, terrific. It’s still worth the time to assess where you are, count your blessings, guard against complacency and to be reassured that your good fortune isn’t just serendipitous. Control what you can control after all. For those of you who feel like you need a reset or a new dream to chase, now is the perfect time for you to visualize growth in your personal and professional life. If you are going to take the time to visualize your future, then make that movie in your mind a great one, and make it your time to shine!

So sit down in a place of solitude, get out your pen and paper and get focused. It’s time to take an honest look at the past year and asking yourself some tough, but very important questions.

1. Describe your best personal and professional accomplishments in 2017.

2. What lessons were learned from the personal and professional mistakes you made last year?

3. Who mentored or coached you that helped you to grow personally? Professionally?

4. Who did you mentor or coach this past year? How can you be a bigger influence on them?

5. List a few projects or goals you have been putting off.

6. How can you make 2018 better?

A few suggestions for your consideration:

It’s time to have a “debrief” with yourself, and to be candid in your evaluation and self-assessment.

It’s time to stop fooling yourself with unrealistic goals and work with a mentor or a coach on pragmatic goals.

It’s time to stop talking about your dreams and act on the goals that really matter to you and your dream.

It’s time to write down what YOUR own 2018 mini-series looks like (and stop wasting time living vicariously through others, especially on social media).

It’s time to put a note in your calendar to review your script (goals) every three months to see how you did.

It’s almost 2018 and it’s time for you to shine. I hope you and your have a Happy New Year and will make 2018 your best year ever!

The Adventures of Barkley… Continued

For those of you who have enjoyed following the “Adventures of Barkley the Rescue Dog,” well he made it through his first holiday just fine. After being lost for a couple of days just before Halloween (and found thanks to so many helpful folks in town), he managed to escape again while on a hike on the Musser Gap trail.  

We won’t go into the details of how Barkley got away again. However, all the evidence points to the “prodigal son” returning home from California and taking the dog out on a hike (the day before hunting season no less) despite pleading from his parents and sister not to do so. Well, a jogger ran by, startled the dog, and Barkley broke free, just like his namesake busting out of a crowd of would be tacklers to score a touchdown.

This time we had Barkley tagged with a GPS device so no sweat, we’d have no problem tracking him down. Wrong. We were on a mountainside full of rocks, thorn bushes and thicket, trees, a creek, and deer ticks — hundreds of the little darlings. After chasing our own tails in circles because Barkley stayed one step ahead of the GPS — which “updated” every 30 seconds so the dog stayed a few steps ahead — three hours later the 5-month old puppy had enough and just lay down until we caught up with him.

A few days later he was off to the Digman Canine Academy for two weeks where trainer Claire Digman and her dog Goose, helped mold Barkley into one disciplined young pup. The improvement in Barkley was transformational.

So I am looking forward to spending quality time with the family, our new dog, getting my book finished, getting back on the road to speak and help others pursue their dreams.

It’s my time to shine; it’s your time to shine. Make it so.