Friday we talked a bit about trends and how they have changed our lives. 

We started with historic trends, such as Industrial Revolution kind-of stuff,  and then worked our way into the consumer trend world – what’s hot and what’s not – and then made a quick stop at creating our own personal trend in 2011.

Here’s a brief review:

Human beings . . . deep needs . . . “unlockers” . . . trends . . . patterns . . . changes.

We left-off by asking:

• What trends do we want to set for ourselves in 2011?
• What would make 2011 one of our best years ever?
• What deep needs, need to be met? 
• How will we unlock them?

Getting started.

Change in any form can be daunting and all New Year’s Resolutions are about change in one form or another.  I believe looking at the process as more than just a list is a great way to get started, after all, this is our lives we are talking about.  

Here’s what  I suggest.

Begin by listing all the changes you want to see for yourself in 2011.

Here are some popular New Year’s resolutions (in no particular order), I am sure some of them will match yours:

• Get in shape, exercise more, eat healthier.
• Drink less, stop smoking.
• Get a job, out of debt, or organized.
• Save money, start a budget.
• Find a job, man or woman.
• Take or save for a vacation.
• Spend more time with family and friends.
• Enjoy life more, do less, be happier.

Good, do you have yours down on paper?  Okay, now this is where it gets a bit tougher.  

We all tend to have long lists of ways we want to improve our lives, but I honestly think the best way to improve our lives is to pick one thing, and one thing only to concentrate on. I believe picking the “one thing” that when accomplished will positively impact the most areas of our lives, and then figuring out – unlocking – how were are going to do that, is the way to go. 

This isn’t my big idea, I am stealing it, with permission from life coach and author David Essel.  In his book “Slow Down: The Fastest Way to Get Everything You Want”, David makes an excellent case for changing the way we look at change.

His bottom line is to pick one thing, and one thing only that when accomplished would “radically change” our lives. 

So, I am suggesting as a New Year trend we each pick one thing to work on in 2011. Just one.

We can call this trend something really creative such as: “One Thing at a Time” or “First Things First”.  We can create new abbreviations and acronyms – OTAT and FTF,  maybe even get an entry in the Urban Dictionary. (Just checked FTF means a few other things, one is quite descriptive, but not very good for our purposes, so I am now going with OTAT, which shall forever more be pronounced “oh-tat”. )

I know, OTAT flies in the face of the beloved American habit of multi-tasking and our belief that having it all, all the time is what we should be striving for. But, multitasking has recently been taken to task for not being as efficient an approach as once thought, and I truly believe that believing we can have it all – all the time – undermines our belief in ourselves, and is stressing the heck out of us.

If you need more specific proof that making long lists of resolutions doesn’t work – pull out your list from last year, that is if you can find it, and begin checking off what you have accomplished.  (For those of you who are now yelling – “Hey wait, I did everything on my list!” – Honest and sincere congratulations, you are truly an exception to the rule and should be very proud of your accomplishments. Perhaps the rest of you, might want to keep reading, I know I will.) 

So what do you think, are you ready to start a new trend in the New Year? To adopt an OTAT approach? To focus on one thing at a time as you work toward creating the life of your dreams?  If so, next post, I will show you an easy and painless way to pick your one thing – the one wonderful thing that addressing will make your life oh, so much better. 

Until then, review your list and remember this is about  human beings . . . deep needs . . . “unlockers” . . . trends . . . patterns . . . changes.  This will be big.  I promise.  This time next year, or way sooner, you will be patting yourself on the back for a job well down!