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• Set New Year’s resolves not New Year’s resolutions. A resolution is like a promise; once broken it can’t be mended. Resolve allows the young person to make mistakes, but remain on the right track to grow and achieve positive goals.
• Don’t set more than one goal at a time. You only have a limited capacity to tackle things emotionally, spiritually and mentally.
• Make a habit of it. Good intentions for the year will go begging if you can’t build them into your natural lifestyle. Quick repetitions and the same accountability questions can help them become second nature.
THE FIVE-MINUTE MENTOR
Here’s a simple but potentially very powerful mentoring structure for the coming year:
Choose your word. Pray and ask God for help in choosing one word for the coming year. If you have too many goals you’ll achieve none of them. You could choose one from our C.H.A.R.A.C.T.E.R. acronym: courage, humility, action, responsibility, authenticity, compassion, trustworthiness, excellence and respect. Ensure the word doesn’t change without good reason and agreement from both of you.
Set your accountability question. Agree how regularly you will touch base about the word. Then just ask one question each time, such as, ‘Out of ten what’s your motivation like about [the word]?’ or ‘What have you invested into growing in regards to [the word] this month?’
HOLISTIC GOALS
Don’t forget that everything is potentially spiritual. Helping them reach a practical goal such as losing weight or learning to control their temper may well be of more use – and far more likely to draw them closer to knowing Jesus than if you prematurely push an overtly ‘Christian’ goal on them. (Don’t push any goal on them – it has to be their idea!)
QUICK WIN GOALS
It cannot be overstated how important ‘quick wins’ are to the confidence of young people. If they suggest an ambitious goal for 2015, help them break it down into manageable chunks.
