"What Gets Measured Gets Done"

How has your January been going? Can you believe we are almost 1 month into our new year, 2014.

Working in the accountant world, I'm still living a bit in the past as we complete financial reporting, schedules, etc for the 2013 year. It's fun to have January as a transition month…. 31 days to reconcile with the last year's accomplishments, mistakes, sadness, opportunities, friendships, moments…etc.

In December I read the book, Happiness Project, which inspired me to build upon my traditional annual goal setting in a new way, similar to what the author describes in the Happiness Project. It's relatively simple and you can extrapolate in any way which fits your needs…here are the basics.

• Annual: Choose a theme that resonates with you 

• Monthly: Pick a theme each month that will bring you closer to happiness
• My January Theme: Energy

• Daily: Identify a few activities/tasks/goals that correlate to your monthly theme that you can work towards doing daily
• A few of my daily tasks coinciding with my the theme of Energy:
• Hydrate
• Minimize alcohol intake to weekends only
• 3 gym visits & 2 yoga classes 
• Log food daily
• Get in bed by 10pm daily
• Vitamin
• Eat greens
• Tidy up a little bit at a time
• 10,000 steps a day
• Evening routine to soothe (wash face, restorative yoga, read)
• Journal
• Less than 2000 calories a day
• Move every day

• Measure: Measure your activities! "What gets measured gets done" This is definitely one of those quotes that I absolutely believe in. It is quite astonishing what you can accomplish not only when you put your mind to it, but when you also hold yourself accountable. Track your success in each of your daily tasks. You will learn very quickly what can be accomplished, whether your goals were SMART and realistic. 
• I chose a simple check mark/X method
• I've learned that I had too many daily tasks….and although on a few rare days I was actually able to have a check mark next to everything….in order to be successful in future months, I will need to narrow my focus a bit. Sometimes good intentions are only that. I will narrow my focus in future months to 5-ish daily items

It seems what I was most successful at this month are items I've made easy to incorporate into my schedule via using tools such as my smart phone or realistic within my work schedule:

• Tracking my food intake with a mobile-phone app
• Daily movement: exercising at my work gym or taking a yoga class
• Hydrating with at least 3 16oz of water
• Journaling
• Minimizing my alcohol intake 
• Eating something green everyday
• Reading daily 
• Clearing clutter a little bit everyday

Have you noticed when you measure your actions, slowly success appears? What tools can you share with the community that help you? Looking forward to hearing tips from you throughout the year on this happiness journey!