Last year I wrote a blog on the word I had chosen to live by for the year. It was such a fun idea that I’ve decided to do it again this year.
My word for 2017 was a verb – embrace – and I feel that I did quite a bit of embracing over the past year! Looking back at the post I can proudly check off everything that I wanted to embrace. In the process I have learnt a great deal about myself, my business and my family.
This year I’ve decided on a noun – P R E S E N C E. It will be part of my vision board (which I’m looking forward to starting soon courtesy of a guide by Natalie Moore from Be Moore Workshops) and it will shape my actions and decisions for the year. Here is how I plan to embody presence this year.
Social Media
I belong to several Facebook Groups, all of which I love dearly as they are a different combination of personalities, posts and sizes. This year I will be choosing three of these groups to demonstrate my presence. This will mean I need to be a little more organised and set aside time during the week to post. Most importantly I’ll be aiming to add value and help other members, not just promote myself.
The other social media platform I use is Instagram. I’ve given myself a target of 500 followers by the end of the year. That means I will need to also engage more on this platform, thus increasing my presence (and if you don’t already follow me, jump on over and help me reach my target!).
Workshops and events
This one makes me sick just writing about it! I’m hopeless at any event where there might even be a remote chance of having to interact with other people. Nonetheless, if I’m going to increase my presence, then I must show my face and look people in the eye. The crazy thing is I feed off helping people – it’s my why – and these types of interactions are exactly what I need. So, if you see me at an event looking a little worried, come and say hi!
Video
I’ve been preaching about the importance of video for the past year, but haven’t been practicing it myself. I’ve put my face in front of my iPhone only once to share my biz story video for Mums & Co. This year it’s full speed ahead. YouTube stardom here we come!
With my clients
I am awesome at what I do, and any one of my clients would attest to this fact. However, when one of them goes a little cold (due to cashflow, downturn or change of biz direction) I’ve been known to shrink into the background. Presence with my clients will mean that if this happens, then I’ll be staying in constant contact (without being mega annoying of course) to let them know that I’m still around and ready when they need me! Presence will mean promoting myself, which is something that I’m not great at doing.
With my family
Most importantly I will be practicing presence with my family. I’m pretty good at this (I just checked with them, and they all agreed!) but I found that when life gets busy with work, appointments, activities, birthdays, parties and other commitments, my time with the kids becomes less about quality and more about quantity. And we all know how that ends up! Tears all round.
Presence with the loves of my life will mean making a distinct separation between work and them. It means I’ll always be available when they need me (the lost pair of socks can wait – tears over an argument with a friend can’t). It will be a continued presence at their schools volunteering where I can, and a stern presence when homework needs to be completed!
So that’s my intention with presence this year. It’s about promoting myself, helping, showing my face and loving my family.
What’s a word that you would like to live by this year? Choosing one word is much easier than writing a list of resolutions that you probably won’t keep, or a bunch of goals that you won’t refer to after January. Give it a try and let me know your word for 2018.
