Goal-Setting Activities: Make Them a Habit with a Family Summit
After a year filled with challenges, from a personal to a worldwide scale, we’re all looking forward to this bright new year: 2021.
Often the start of a new year comes with goal-setting activities. Many people engage in New Years’ goal planning. Though turning over a new leaf alongside a new year is a traditional time for change, I believe in wiping the slate clean at any time of the year.
Today, I want to share a concept with you: a family summit. Each summit is a day or two of fun goal-setting activities. You prepare on your own, taking time to reflect, and then ask questions like “Are we dreaming big enough?” and work through core categories of life together.
I hope that by sharing this, you can find an extra measure of calmness, intention, and focus inside yourself – and in your partnerships and families.
Inside our free downloadable guide, you’ll find a wealth of best practices and ideas to get you started:
A step-by-step process to prepare for – and facilitate – your summit
Example questions to work through the big picture and core topics
Sample of what a summit timeline could look like
Mel’s note-taking format (with a handy example)
How to set SMART goals
Tips to make your summit a success
Download the free Family Summit Guide now, or continue reading this sneak preview beforehand!
The Who & The Where
Whether you do a summit solo, or with a partner or family, it’s designed as a series of goal-setting activities for adults, teens, and older children. My husband, Flash, and I have held one at least 1x/year for the last 12 years, at any time of year.
Where’s the best place to hold a summit? Anywhere convenient for everyone involved, in a place where you can focus.
One year, we completed ours during a road trip. Another year, we were house-sitting and took advantage of that space from the distractions at our own home. We’ve also found that renting a cabin in a location you love is a great treat; you can spend time outdoors, as well as work on your goal setting.
The 7 Core Connectors
As we’ve kept holding summits, we’ve found consistent themes that come up. Our in-depth PDF guide walks you through the “7 Core Connectors,” as we call them. We find that when you discuss each of these, you get intentional about the interconnected facets of life. Here, we’ll briefly discuss 3 of those core connectors.
The guide also explains how to plan and prepare for your summit, a family SMART goal example and format, and more.
Faith
This is a highly personal topic for everyone. Each person in a family or partnership may have a different way of approaching faith, whether joining a religion or spending time in nature.
We’ll use ourselves as an example here. For us, it’s more so spiritual than religious, and we’ve observed and discussed our changes over time in the faith category. As a couple, we’ve had times where we wanted the same thing – and other times where we chose different activities to express our respective faiths.
An example of a question you can discuss for this core connector: What fills our souls, and are we ensuring we dedicate time to those things?
Fitness
Like physical fitness is for plenty of people, we’ve experienced a rollercoaster of habits. A busy work schedule and other activities tend to get in the way. However, over time, I feel that we’ve found certain ways to hack it and stay active.
To set a good goal, we learned to have “skin in the game.” For instance, signing up for a half or full marathon means you pay to sign up – and have a deadline to train by.
Other activities we revisit during our summits: Eating healthy and monitoring how our fitness continues to evolve.
Financials
Here’s the big one! Prepare financial statements and ideas in advance so your discussion can be as productive as possible. In this core connector, we see the greatest flux from year to year.
Finances also bring up more stress, and divvying up the conversation into parts over a 2-day summit can help.
Here are a couple of insights from our summits:
Budgeting is easier with an app. We used to track spending and savings with Mint, and now we use Personal Capital.
Putting aside small amounts of money (e.g., $25 a week) as an automated investment can empower you to achieve your financial goals. Figure out the goal, and then see how many weeks you’d like to set up, for how many dollars a week. As entrepreneurs, this setup allowed us to save for trips in small increments, even when it felt financially impossible.
Especially if one person in your partnership or family is an entrepreneur and the other is not, your summit is an opportunity to bring everyone in the loop. And, as is fitting for your situation, involve others in impactful decisions for the coming months.
A couple of example questions for financials:
We just sacrificed financially for a year. Are we going to do that again for a year, or does something need to change?
Where are we going to invest, and who decides where to invest?
Family Goal Setting, Made Simple
Remember: You and anyone else in your family can coordinate a summit anytime. It’s a handy tool for addressing important matters – whatever time of year, and wherever you can dive into a focused discussion.
Over the years, our summit has adapted to what suits us. We encourage you to discover which goal-setting activities work best for you and yours.
Looking over your notes from year to year is incredibly useful. This can affirm your ability to grow and inspire you to set motivating goals for the future. You can start your summit with the previous one’s notes, getting you oriented and revealing the progress you’ve already made.
Let’s get started on your summit! Use our complimentary – and comprehensive – guide to get your creative juices flowing, feel confident about holding your summit, and equip yourself with best practices.