One month in

I’ve been working on my Year 2 Change for a little over a month now. (Okay, 36 days, to be exact.)

My progress

My goal has been to get up at 6:00am, only hitting the snooze button twice. Out of those 36 days, I hit my goal on 19 of them. I had another 6 days where I hit snooze three times before I got up. Frankly, I count those days as successes, too! So I’m 25/36.

For me, that’s pretty darn good! Most of the time I’m getting up to times like this…

Year 2 Change

I am setting a BHAG this year.

That’s right, a Big Hairy Audacious Goal.

And it all has to do with this…


My favorite thing. Or not. (As you can probably tell by the title of this blog!)

I have never been a morning person. But I’ve been thinking a lot (especially lately) that this would be a good change for me to make. On the rare occasions when I do get up and get moving early, I tend to be more productive and have more energy for the entire day.

Let me say… sleeping in has been hard-wired in me for a very long time. My mother and my grandmother are both night owls, and I think I have a genetic predisposition. I also had some big-time positive reinforcement for sleeping in when I was growing up.


If I slept too late and missed the bus, my dad would drive me to school. No questions, no trouble. Who wants to be on the bus for 30 minutes when you live 5 minutes from school? Not me!

This became my habit.


Snuggled under the covers, often with a warm, purring cat. What better way to spend the morning?!

And the snooze button… oh, you are my favorite disaster… we have such a love-hate relationship…

But you know what? When I hit snooze for an hour, I’m not really getting an extra hour of sleep. And I’m actually more tired when I do finally get up.

I’ve had three recent motivations and inspirations.

First, I read a blog post and listened to a podcast by Michael Hyatt about being a morning person, and the timing was just right for me.

Second, my friend Cris is making some amazing lifestyle changes with her family. And she is helping to share her motivation with her Year 2 Change challenge.


Third, I just found out that I’m going to be giving 2 talks at a national veterinary conference in June. The first talk is at 6:00. In the morning. This is not just be up by 6:00, and it’s not just be there by 6:00. This is serious – be up, be awake, be professional, and be ready to teach by 6:00. In the morning.

I need to get a head start on this if I’m going to be ready for this conference in June. (The plus side is that it’s in Seattle. So 6:00am is really 8:00am my time. But that’s still stinking early to be teaching. At least for me.)

So here I go.

I’m on a mission to get up at 6:00am without using my snooze button. I’m easing into it with baby steps – 30 days of only 2 snooze hits, followed by 30 days of only one snooze hit, and then 30 days of no snoozes. Then I’ll start making my get-up time a bit earlier.

I’m using my NeuYear calendar to help me Punch 2013 in the Throat and make this my Year 2 Change. In addition to tracking all our travel, meetings, and my deadlines, I’m using my calendar to keep track of my goal.


I started this adventure on January 7. A star is for a day I hit my goal (6:00am, 2 snoozes). A “3” means I hit snooze 3 times. A blank day means I missed – either I didn’t hit my goal (2 days, usually because I stayed up too late, or because I drank too much wine), or I intentionally didn’t set my alarm. (2 days – a girl needs a little break every now and then!)

I’m two weeks in, and I’m doing pretty well. Especially considering where I started.

Do you want to make 2013 your Year 2 Change? Join the challenge, and let’s do it together!

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Miller Mondays: What do I want to be when I grow up?

Welcome back for Section 2 of 48 Days to the Work You Love!

The three main points from this section are:

1.  The focus of this program is to learn how to plan your work around the life you want.

2.  You must strive for balance in your life.  Extreme success in one area often is at the detriment to another area of your life.  You want to build toward success in seven areas of your life (I'll tell you what they all are in a bit).

3.  Goals are essential - written correctly they are not restrictions, rather they are road maps and guides so we can achieve freedom and accomplishment.

Dan begins this section by discussing the difference between vocation, career, and job.  A vocation incorporates calling, purpose, mission, and destiny.  I am used to hearing this word in relation to ministry, but Dan takes it out of that context.  Everyone has a vocation - it is up to you to learn a bit more about yourself, listen, and figure out what that is.

A career is a line of work, and it may (or may not) contribute to fulfilling your calling.  Many different careers can support the same vocation.  For example, the vocation to "help reduce pain and suffering in the world" may be fulfilled by many different careers:  doctor, nurse, counselor, pastor, teacher, scientist, politician, writer, and the list can go on from here.  Which career you choose should depend on your unique skills and abilities, personal tendencies, and values, dreams and passions.

Finally, a job consists of the daily activities you perform in order to produce income.  This may be part of your vocation, or it may be simply something to pull in a paycheck.  Obviously, the goal here is to get your job to be yourcareer which furthers your vocation in life.

Most people are used to looking at life within this framework



where work is the center of our lives, and the rest fits in around it, when and where there is space.  (Replace "church" with "spiritual growth," or whatever word/phrase best suits your beliefs.)  Dan challenges us to a paradigm shift, where we look at life like this:



Now work has an equal emphasis as the other aspects of our lives.  This is balance, when all aspects of your life get (approximately) equal attention, and none is significantly overpowering the others.

Granted, not every day is going to have equal effort into each of these areas.  Got a big deadline coming up?  Chances are "work" is going to get a lot bigger for a couple of weeks, while perhaps "recreation" and "family" shrink a bit.  The trick is, this should only be temporary.  Once that deadline is past, make an effort to invest some time and energy into those areas that slipped a little during the mad dash to the finish.  You won't be balanced every day, probably not every week, maybe not even every month.  What you're really going for is an overall sense of balance in your life.

Finally, goal setting.  Dan tells us that only about 8% of the population has clear goals.  Only about 3% of the population actually write their goals down.  Supposedly, the 3% of the population with written goals accomplish more than all of the other 97%, although I'm not sure how you can assess this.  We are setting goals in seven main areas of life:  Financial, Physical, Personal Development, Family, Spiritual, Social, Career.  It is no accident that Career is listed last.  Remember what we are learning how to do?  Find the LIFE you want, and plan your work around that.

Dan encourages you to start with five-year goals, work back from there to one-year goals, and finally to something you can do today to kick-start your progress.  Where do you want to be in five years?  What salary do you want to make?  What car do you want to drive?  Where do you want to live?  What kind of house do you want?  How big is your family?  What is your involvement in church and other community organizations?  How often do you exercise, and what do you do?  What books have you read?  Who are you mentoring?

To borrow from another of my favorite authors, Dave Ramsey also has some ideas on goal setting.  Goals need to be specific ("I want to lose 20 pounds," not "I want to lose some weight"), measurable, yours ("I want to be a lawyer," not "my parents want me to go to law school"), time-sensitive (give yourself a deadline), and written.

Keeping these guidelines in mind, set yourself some goals in the seven main areas of life!  Remember, these are not set in stone.  They can, and should, change and evolve as you do.  You should revisit your goals at least once a year (preferably more often) to check in, see how you are doing, and re-evaluate what your goals are and where you are heading.

Feel overwhelmed?  Think of it this way, "A goal is a dream with a timeframe on it."

Happy goal setting!  Come back next week for Section 3:  Planning my work around the life I want!