I am a huge planner. I love making lists, to-do's, planning out my time and setting priorities for my week. It has become a lot of what I share here in my ministry because intentionally planning can have such a profound impact on how you run and manage your home. 

The funny thing is - whenever I share anything on planning - I always get compliments on how organized and efficient I am. People assume that I am a natural born organizer and that things must just fall into place for me. 

When I hear these comments - I laugh! 

Because the truth is, that is SO not me. I am not naturally an organized, neat,  or tidy person. The current state of my home would attest to that. I am a classic right brain creative type of gal who tends to be all over the place. But I think because of that, I've had to learn how to implement systems into my home and my business...and it makes it all the difference in the world. 

Listen to the Podcast:

I also recorded this blog post as an audio podcast. If you want to listen in instead of reading, click play below or do a combination of both  

And don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast in iTunes. 

Right click here and save-as to download this episode to your computer.

If I just always go with the flow and function the way that my brain wants to work - then I end up living in disaster and chaos and end up square in the middle of survival mode. Seriously, my home would be a wreck and this ministry certainly wouldn't exist. 

So for me, I've had to learn how to adapt some more left-brained tendencies of being more organized and analytical. I've had to intentionally work on my weaknesses to create a more balanced approach to my home. And surprisingly, I've fallen in love with systems, planning, and home management because it makes my home flow and function so much better. 

Learn your personality 

You might be the opposite of me. Maybe you are hyper organized, neat, and tidy...but maybe sometimes its to a fault. Where if things don't go the way you want or something is out of place, it devastates you and your day. In your case, you might need to learn to go with the flow a little more some days.

So that's my first advice: take a look at your strengths and build on those, but also recognize those areas you are weak in and might need to improve. 

For me, for my personality, and for the fact that I run a busy household of seven people...I need and CRAVE more organization in my day. If I'm not intentionally planning, then my day falls apart. 

(As a side note: If you want to get laser focused and intentional this year, then I HIGHLY suggest you pick a word for your year. You can see my word for this year and some tips and suggestions on how to pick your own.)

Defining Success

So how do we plan for a year of success? The first thing we need to address is what does "success" even mean? What does "success" look like?

Ask 10 women what success means, and you will get 10 widely different answers. And this gap becomes even bigger when we ask what success means to a Christian or a non-Christian. 

Our identity in Christ changes everything. Especially what success means in our daily life.

But before we really get into the meat of this stuff, I want to share that I have a FREE PDF guide and video for you called 5 Keys to Planning a Successful Day. It covers a lot of what we are talking about today in depth and gives you a great PDF guide for implementing it. 

Back in episode #47 of my podcast, we covered this topic of defining success in more detail. You can hop on over and read that or listen to it. 

But essentially having a successful day, year, or life doesn't necessarily mean you have a certain amount of money ...