Like many things, the New Year in 2010 brings new hope, new wishes and many unknowns.

This year's resolutions will be a little different from all others that we have had before. We (family) have decided to take a team focused approach, and even redefined the term "resolutions" to "Goals to Achieve".

This shift in paradigm is designed to integrate our changing lifestyle, past experience in goal setting and achievement, and also begins to shape how our children adapt to meeting life's challenges.

Combining our goals as a family unit gives us more opportunities to succeed, greater incentive to achieve, and perhaps more importantly -provides us with peer support and accountability.

Outline

In our Goal Setting session this year, each of us described personal goals to shoot for. Some goals were common to all of us, so we made those into family goals and modified them so that they were easy to meet. We also resolved to start tracking achievements and problem areas so we could later cheer ourselves on the successes, and re-align those goals that were not going so well. Instead of scoring individual "points", we will score family milestones to enhance the team focused approach.

Our common goals also focus on long-term benefits for each individual and the family as a whole.

Common Goals

• Make daily family prayer an integral part of our lifestyle

  This is an expansion of the 10-seconds prayers we normally have at dinner-time. We hope to dedicate 3-5 minutes every day just for prayer and bible study as a family. We think this amount of time is small enough to begin to nature our minds about the whole concept of (link: dedication).

• Healthier lifestyles for all of us

  Instead of the same old "we need to get into shape this year", we have set clear, specific milestones we each need to achieve. These milestones include maintaining healthy weights (privately specified), an exercise program, and signing up at our local community center weight-watchers support group.

  As part of our new healthy lifestyle goal, we are also planning in advance for healthier home-cooked meals and variety.

• Financial wellness

  Our family financial agenda is a continuation of what we started in 2008. We have made significant progress and reached every milestone ahead of schedule. The last stretch of our financial plan is within striking distance.

  This year, we included charitable giving and tithing as part of our financial responsibility.

• Read more books

  We as a family generally read a variety of books so this seems simple enough, but it really boils down to including more non-fiction books. We will add more titles to the list of books we have already ear-marked to read this year.

• Organize our house

  We've accumulated a lot of "stuff" around the house we no longer need, so this year we plan to reduce the stuff by giving away most of it, and selling some of it on ebay and craig's list. That oughta be a money minting goal!

Individual Goals

After going through most of the common goals, there weren't many individual goals left. There are however some personal goals that we articulated to each other, and that we will support each other on as part of our 2010 milestones.