The New Year is nearing and it’s time to start making your annual resolutions (actually, stop calling them "resolutions" and start calling them "goals"). If you’ll spend the next 365 days working on your goals, shouldn’t you put some thought into them within the next 5 days? Here are the top five categories for New Year’s goals and some tips for putting together an action plan to achieve them. With goal-setting, begin with the end in mind. That means, focus on the end result of what you want to achieve with each category, then come up with an action plan to achieve it.

Make small, attainable goals and celebrate when you achieve them. For example, it can be very discouraging to have a goal of, say, losing 50 pounds this year. Why not make a goal of losing 5 pounds in the next 2 months. When you achieve this small goal, then you set the next one. Do this for all of you areas of improvement and see what happens!

1. Relationships: Spend more time with family, rekindle friendships. Make this a priority.
Relationships have two sides—the side you control, the side you don’t control. How do you communicate? Take careful note and improve it. If you’ve drifted from your family and friends, take the first step and find out how they are without shifting focus back to you. You can improve relationships as much as you improve yourself.

2. Wealth: Save money for an emergency fund, start saving for retirement, pay down credit card debt.
TIP: Make your wealth goals attainable by making it automatic. Just as you get paid on a regular schedule, put your savings on a schedule, too. Eliminate the temptation of spending your intended savings by having money deducted from your paycheck or running up your credit card debt by destroying your credit cards.

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3. Well-Being: Get chiropractic adjustments on regular basis! Get more sleep, quit smoking, lose weight, start exercising, find time for yourself. TIP: Be specific in your health goals. Help encourage others in their quest for better health. If you want to lose weight, decide your goal weight and make small incremental goals so you can build momentum. Keeping yourself accountable with deadlines is the key ...to achieving your well-being resolutions. I would be happy to be a resource in helping you set your health goals and putting together an action plan to achieve them.

4. Giving Back: Contribute to charities, volunteer more often, tithe regularly to your church.
TIP: It’s easy to push charitable contributions down to the bottom of your to-do list. With your family, job and other obligations to serve, giving back can take a backseat. Just do it!

5. Spiritual: No matter what your faith or denomination, make it a goal for this year to get more connected with God. The best way is to set aside the first part of your day and make it a designated time of prayer and scripture study. Give the first fruits of the day to God and see what happens. If you don't attend church regularly, start. Also, there are some great resources locally and on the internet to help your spiritual growth.

So whatever you do, make sure you write down your goals for 2011, then break them down into bite-sized goals that you can attain. Get creative: make a "dreams list" for your long-term goals, you can even take pictures of your ultimate goals and put them in a book to refer to on a regular basis. I will be writing more articles about goal-setting and mindset regularly in my column, so make sure to look for future articles. Happy New Year from Dr. Mike and Foothills Chiropractic!