I agree with Peter that everyone seems to be making New Year's resolutions--all with great intentions that they will be accomplished.  But, really, how many of you have actually achieved those goals?  I want to suggest a contrarian point of view, which will be strange coming from me, since I have spent my life setting goals and achieving them.  But give me a chance to explain.  We all know the positives of setting goals (you actually might know where you're going, for example), but there are some serious negatives to goal setting as well which don't usually get talked about (and this should please those of you who never had goals).  Here they are:

• You don't know what you don't know. You might actually set the wrong goal for you.  It's the be-careful-what-you-wish-for syndrome.  The result is frustration that what you thought you wanted is not really what you want and what you've accomplished no longer matters to you.
• A carefully crafted and detailed goal (you know the kind--with steps along the way to the goal) will make you very focused, so focused that you miss great opportunities to deviate from your original plan.  How about the entrepreneur that was so focused on starting her own media business that she passed up an opportunity to be an executive at the major marketing firm where she could have make some terrific contacts that would have helped her in her business.  Today her business is limping along while the marketing opportunity has passed her by. She achieved her goal of starting a business, but at what price?
• Setting a goal can often insure that you don't achieve it.  That may sound weird, but for some people it's true.  For example, you decided that this is the year you will start that business.  That's a BIG goal--in fact, it's an overwhelming goal if you think about all the things you will have to do to get that business going.  Just thinking about the goal makes you tired--you don't know where to begin, there are so many unanswered questions.  I think I'll think about it tomorrow....you know how it goes.

And there you have it.  For many people setting goals is not what it's cracked up to be.  So what's the alternative?  Let's say you THINK you want to start a business this year.  Rather than make that your firm goal, on January 1 wake up and ask yourself, "what can I do TODAY to move me toward starting a business?"  Maybe that voice in your head will say, "you're doing nothing today because you're too hungover from that New Year's party to think about it."  That's OK!  So on January 2 you'll ask yourself the same question and, assuming you made it through New Year's day intact, you may decide that today you will do some brainstorming about what kind of business you'd like to have.  It really doesn't matter what you do.  What matters is that you DO IT!

Bottom line: don't set a big goal.  Instead, do something every day that takes you closer to what you think you want.  And recognize that what you think you want may change as you go, and that's OK.  Happy New Year!