Hopes or Plans?

Likewise with my children, I have hopes for things I wish to see growing in their hearts, yet it is concrete plans that will greatly aid this process.

When they were toddlers, I would keep the goals very simple - aiming for one goal in each area (spiritual, physical, emotional, social and intellectual) - partly not to ovewrwhelm my child by wanting too much too soon, but mostly so I could keep track of where I was with each child!

For example, when Emily was 3 years old, my goals looked like this;

spiritual - memorising passages of scripture over morning tea each day (eg Lords Prayer, 10 commanments, Psalm 121)

physical - dance class once a week

emotional - focus on sibling friendships and conflict resolution with sibling play time each day

social - have one friendship visit each week (at our house, their house or a park)

intellectual - work through a series of pre-school workbooks in one-on-one time each morning


Proverbs 22:6 encourages us to "Train up a child in the way he should go . . . " and 'training' requires intentional, deliberate and purposeful steps.

Wishes or Goals?

One of the things I love about the January holidays is long lunches with good friends.

Thinking about the year ahead was just one topic of conversation.

Wanting some things to be different is one thing.
Planning for some things to be different is another.

I try to set goals to work towards over the year
in each area of my life - spiritual, social, physical, emotional and intellectual.

Keeping the goals realistic keeps them managable and I tend to only have 1 - 3 goals per area.

For example, one of each of my goals this year will be:

Intellectual - complete a counselling course (this can be part of my PD for school so should be doable)

Physical - add competitive tennis to my social tennis and basketball each week

Spiritual - finish reading the entire bible (2 year cycle) and read an Elisabeth Elliot book

Emotional - take the last half hour of each day to renew and replenish

Social - aim for a balance of people and home days in school holidays

Enjoy the planning, the journey and the results!