It may not always seem that you are in control of your life, but the truth of the matter is that you do have a startling amount of control over your life. You cannot always control what happens to you, but you can control how you respond to what happens to you.

Today is December 31st. (Happy New Years Eve!) Today is the last day of the year. It is wise to review this window of time called 2024 and reflect on what kind of a year you had. Whether you believe your year was positive and fruitful, or whether you deem your year was largely a train-wreck, your year was very likely a package of wins and losses.

Think about your year from the standpoint of these various dimensions:

• The physical (your health; the condition of that machine known as your body, etc).
• The mental (your knowledge, your intellect, things of the mind, etc).
• The spiritual (your values, your relationship with God, things of the transcendent, etc).
• The social (your social life, your relationships, the health of your friendships, how much fun did you have, etc).
• The financial (your financial assets, your debt, all things economic in nature, etc).

For me, most of these things were a mixed bag with some great successes and some unfortunate disappointments.

But one thing that made 2024 profoundly consequential to me was that I set one single goal for the year – To complete the writing of my first book – and I actually succeeded, writing the final page today, on December 31st. The writing of a book was a grueling, taxing grind. But I did it because I avoided distractions that come with having too many goals. I just had the one.

And I recommend you do likewise. After taking an inventory of the various dimensions of your life, reflect on what might be the one profoundly consequential goal you could commit yourself to achieving in 2025. Something that is huge, that is possible, and that could take you the better part of the year to complete with focused attention.  And resist the temptation to set more than one or two major goals because you will need every ounce of energy to be zeroed in on a very small number (1 to 2 is ideal; 3 would be the absolute maximum; 4 or more invites failure).

If it’s in the physical dimension, might you try a marathon, or a half-marathon? Maybe complete a 5K or 10K run in a certain time that you currently could not even come close to? Might you Bench Press a certain amount, perhaps 250 pounds, or deadlift 350 pounds? Perhaps compete (and win) in a martial arts tournament? Maybe lose a certain amount of weight? Maybe join a soccer team and complete the season?

What about the mental dimension: perhaps set a goal in learning a foreign language over the course of the year. Or, what about reading the Collected Works of William Shakespeare? Maybe you could learn 100 new vocabulary words, commit them to memory, and use them in writing or in speaking, words such as ennui, denizens, preternatural, maelstrom, veritable, ennoble, obsequious, or enshrined? Perhaps you could publish an essay in a scholarly journal.

In the spiritual dimension, there are so many possibilities, such as reading daily from the Holy Bible, or committing to daily prayer, or joining a church and attending services every week, or practicing fasting on a monthly basis, maybe even joining a church choir and singing in it. Perhaps you could engage in using your means to bless the lives or those less fortunate than you, and do it in a way that is anonymous.

If you choose to focus on the social dimension, perhaps you could schedule a social outing with a different friend each month; or perhaps you could make a list of your closest friends, ascertain their birthdays, and remember to acknowledge their birthdays. If you are married, perhaps your goal could be to set aside time to go on a date with your spouse anywhere from monthly to weekly.

In the financial dimension there are lots of possibilities. Perhaps getting out of debt, or perhaps buttressing your savings account so that you have a certain amount of cash saved up by year-end, or you’ve obtained a financial advisor, or you’ve begun setting up investment vehicles such as a Roth-IRA, an annuity, life insurance, a 401(k) account, gold, or a mutual fund. The options are many.

I urge you to look at your life the way you look at a future vacation. With a vacation, you chart everything out. Why not chart out your very life by setting a key goal, something profound that you can be proud of? I am thrilled I achieved my goal for 2024 and I am minutes away from finalizing a goal or two for 2025. And I will limit myself to those one or two goals for next year so that nothing distracts me from their achievement. And when 2025 comes to a close, I will feel both contentment and a sense of pride, just as I feel right now. Not everything in my life is perfect, but I achieved the one goal I set for myself, and no other problems I face can compare to the success I experienced attaining that goal!