Design Your Year in 30 Minutes: A simple annual planning framework for Goals, Focus and Productivity

Terence Shigg emphasizes the importance of setting achievable goals over New Year's resolutions, advocating for a structured plan backed by a system. He suggests starting with a list of accomplishments from the previous year to foster a positive mindset. Next, brainstorm all potential goals for the upcoming year, then narrow them down to the most important ones. Prioritize these goals month by month, breaking them into actionable steps. Shigg also recommends using a physical planner and writing goals with a blue pen on white paper for better retention. He concludes by encouraging listeners to believe in infinite possibilities and resources for success in 2026.

thebigasscalendar.com/TSHIGG

Elite Life Coaching Workbook: 

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This workbook is designed to help you create a life aligned with your deepest values, strongest identity, and highest purpose. Over the next three weeks, you will develop clarity, build powerful habits, strengthen relationships, elevate your mindset, and design a sustainable, meaningful legacy.

https://www.legacybd2025.com/elite-life-positive-growth-system-workbook

Transcript

Terence Shigg: 0:28

Hello. Today we're going to do a quick goal setting planning session. Figure it's the first of the year. This would be a perfect time to put something like this out there for you to start your year off. Right? I know a lot of people talk about New Year's resolutions. And if you've heard me, over the last couple of weeks, I've been really pushing that instead of setting resolutions, you should set goals, and you should and you should set goals that have a plan to back them up, and then you should have goals that have a plan, that have a system that backs up the plan, and all those things are just giving you the best opportunity for success. A lot of the times, we set these resolutions and then we put them in a drawer and they come out a year later, and we're like, Okay, did I do that? I was listening to. One of my favorite podcasts that I like to listen to is pod save America. So if you guys listen, it's a shout out to you guys. It's usually it's a political thing where they talk about different things, but whatever your political views are, it's entertaining. And one of the things they do every year is they they do resolutions, which, again, I don't agree with, but at the end of the year, they assess whether or not they accomplish or did those resolutions. And I was listening to them talk about it today, and they were saying how some of them they did, be it to be more president and less online that they didn't do, or to read more books that they did do, or read more nonfiction or more fiction books, because they're very into the political scene, and they have to read all that information. And it really got me thinking of the need to just give a blueprint, a template, how to get started. I think a lot of the times we suffer with trying to figure out how to get things started. And that's usually the hardest part in doing something, as I talked about in one of my previous podcasts, is setting a goal. Is part of it is doing something meaning, make a move. Make an action plan, do something towards that goal. And if nothing else, you'll be one step closer. One of my favorite people to listen to and think about how he does things is Jesse Eichler, and he talks about every year, planning out your year. And he even has a thing called the Big Ass calendar, and you'll there'll be a link in in the notes where you can go and check it out and put in the special code if you'd like it. So a shout out to him, too. But one of the things he talks about is how to break down your year and plan it out at the beginning of the year so that you're more likely to accomplish those things that you want. And one of the things he talks about on that calendar is a misogi and a misogy Is this one big, grand event that you do that is something that I guess people would akin it to a bucket list type of thing, be it running a marathon, or some people it could just be running a 5k something that would challenge you is the idea behind it, and you do one of those a year. Over a period of time, you've amassed a pretty good history of things, and you've also modeled that for your children and for your peers and for your friends that they can see that life is and can be

Unknown: 5:58

and the reason I want you to do that is because I want you to start the year off not regretting what you didn't do, but giving yourself credit for what you have done, and give yourself the little list of things I want you to take credit for, because those little things are significant. If it's just make your bed in the morning, get up a little bit earlier if you only did it once, write it on the list, go for a walk volunteer at the shelter. If you only did it a couple times, but you meant to do it on a regular basis, give yourself credit for it. Put it on your list. If you read the book, if you contacted a sibling or a family member that you haven't contacted in a while, if you read a book and learn something new, give yourself credit for if you did Duolingo for 25 days and you stopped but you started it, at least give yourself credit. So take five minutes go over your year and give yourself credit for the things that that you accomplished, that you did, that you were successful in. Now your next thing I want you to do is I want you to take nine minutes and brainstorm all of the things that you want to do for 2026 I don't care how crazy it is. I don't care what you think if you can do it, if you've ever been able to do it, if you know anybody that's ever done it, it doesn't matter nine minutes. I want you to brainstorm everything you can think of, if it's earning $5 million raising $500 million starting my own company, quitting my job, racing in the grand grand prix, whatever it is. Give yourself nine minutes, just flat out. Just write it pieces of paper, and I want you to write it, not on the computer, not on your little text thing or whatever Grammarly. I'm sorry I'm not. Don't want AI to do it for you, not. This isn't for chat. GPT, I want you human to write with your human hands on physical paper the goals that you want to achieve for 2026 so take nine minutes to do that. And as you listen to this, you can stop it, put on a timer, do the exercise, and then come back and we'll talk some more. So if you're going to do it right now, stop it. If not, you can listen to the whole thing. If you're driving. I don't expect you to write while you're driving. And this will be my my disclaimer. I'm sure my lawyers will be happy. Do not drive in the attempt to accomplish these tasks. Do not drive and attempt to accomplish these tasks. Is that good luck. Okay, all right, so take nine minutes and everything you want your goals for 226, and like I said, don't limit it. Write out everything you can think of. Once you get those nine minutes down, we're going to take that list that you wrote everything you could think of in nine minutes on, and we're going to set another time. This time, we're going to set it for six minutes, and you're going to go through that list, and you're going to write down everything from that list in the next six minutes. So you're going to shorten it, you're going to have a shortened amount of time. You don't have to think as much, but you got to eliminate, you might have to eliminate some things if you can't write as fast. So six minutes and you're going to do the same thing and whittle down that goal. If it was, if the increase in your income is important, make sure that's on there. If it's spending time with your family, make sure that's on there. If it's traveling, make sure that's on there. But you're going to whittle that list down so it's going to get smaller, but I want it to be more clear of what's important to you, the things that really matter, the things you really want to do this year. So whittle it down over six minutes. So you're going to have six minutes you're. Whittle it down to the things that you want. Okay, now that you've done it, you've gotten your list of things that you've accomplished last year, the things you want. You did nine minutes of all the things you want to accomplish this year. Then you did six minutes of all the things you want to accomplish this year. Now I want you to take that list of six minutes, and you're right. We're going to whittle it down a little bit more. So now I'm going to give you three minutes, and you're going to take that list that started at nine, started at six, and you're going to get three minutes to take all the things in there and whittle them down. What's the priority? Is it time with my family? Time with my kids? Is it traveling? Is it starting a business? Is it earning more income? And I want those lists and those things to really start to get clarified for you, and I want them to be some things that you really, really been wanting to do and just put on the back burner, put those things on the list, make sure that they're there. And if you start this, and you think of some other things, you can start the process over. It's totally up to you. You're in control of this. You have the time. Like I said, you can really just do this in 30 minutes, or you can take this and do it in blocks and do it over a couple of days. I'll show you my workbook. Well, once you figure everything out, you can start breaking it down by the week, but we'll get there. So for now, now we're at three minutes. So you got to take three minutes write down your goals for 2026, and really, really get down to the nitty gritty, which ones are really important to you, which ones that you must do, you've been really wanting to do, that you're passionate about, that fit with your purpose, that are in line with who you are. And you'll really be able to live out your joy, live out your passion in these things. We'll talk about all that also. But for now, whittle that list down. You got three minutes. Okay? So now, once you've done all that, you've done three minutes writing out what you did. You did nine minutes brainstorming, six minutes whittling down that list. Three minutes whittling down that list. So now, see, we've done, see 1221 minutes. That's all you've done. And you've already come up with major goals that you want to accomplish for 2026 now we're going to take it, and I want you to write out on a piece of paper all the 12 months. So January through December, write each one of them down. And I think, as you saw, if you're watching this, I have on my wall, they were blank at the beginning, and it had every month. And the reason why I want you to do that is once you have the three things that once you did the three minutes, you're going to take everything on that list from the three minutes, and now you're going to prioritize each one. So if you have 15 things on the list, you're going to prioritize them. The top one, second, most important. Third, most important. If earning extra income is a priority for you because you feel like you've been in debt your whole life, then okay, then that extra income is the priority. Put that at number one. If your relationship with your siblings and your family has been kind of shaky and you want that to improve and that's a priority to you. Write that down to number two. So go through that list of however many you have and put them in the list from top to bottom. You can combine some. So if some of them have to do with your job, you can have, you know, a, seven, A and B, meaning, do better at my job and learn more get a pay increase at my job. That would be like seven a, 7b i would put those under the same one. If I want to be 200 pounds and I want to eat better, I could put those under health and fitness, and one would be eat better, and one would be exercise, or one would be weigh 200 pounds. We get into the specifics of what you plan for those, because now we're just getting the goals. After we get the goals, we'll talk about how to back that up with a plan. So prioritize each one of those. Figure out which one's the most important, second important all the way down the list. Let me see. Let me write this on my list. If you're watching, you'll see it up here. So now you're going to prioritize, and I'm sure this video doesn't make for good audio, but if you want to see the audio, it'll be over on YouTube, all right. So once you prioritize, then you're going to go and take that list. That you wrote on the wall or on a piece of paper. I put it on the wall because I'm a visual person, and I like to see it all spread out. And again, if you buy the big, big ass calendar, like I was talking about, you'll be able to put it in that calendar like this too. Once you have all of your things prioritized and you have your months written down. Now I want you to go into each month and write down the things that need to be done in that month. If it's growing your business, how many clients do you need to grow in January? How much income, or gross. Do you need in January? Write that in there, if it's improving your relationship. What do you need to do in January? Do I need to contact or reach out to a family member? Do I need to schedule some quality time with my significant other or my my kids or that family member, my mom, my dad. If it's improving on my studies, because there may be some students watching, then what do I need to do in January? Okay, so I need to study a little bit more. So I need to block off some time for it. So this is where we start to start thinking about how we're going to plan these things out. So you put them in the month. If it's by the end of the year, you want your your business to grow by a certain month amount. Break it down by quarters. So that means in the first quarter, January, February, March, so March, we need to increase by 10% to get to that 30% by the end of the year starting to make sense. If it's better relationships, then okay, I need to do some things in January and build on that in February, if it's just connecting more in January to build the foundation, and then February, we're going to do a little bit more activities, and I'll schedule those in accordance with the information that I gathered back here about the things that my family likes to do, my spouse likes to do, my kids like to do. That's how you start to build on it. So you do that month by month. What are the things, if you are a nonprofit and you want to raise a certain amount of money, then quarter by quarter, how much do we need to? Need to raise in each quarter to get to that final amount? If you're an entrepreneur like me, and you need to raise money and build a clientele, and you have a goal for the end of the year, my certain goal is a certain number. Then I break it down by each quarter, how? How much do I need to do? How many more clients do I need to do? How much does my business need to increase? So that's the idea. So plan that out. Plan it out, month by month. What are those things? Is it so my, one of mine is a good example, is losing weight, but my specific goal is to be between 190 and 200 pounds. I'm currently at about 220 pounds. So I start off in January. By the end of January, I need to be down to 212 pounds, and then the next month, I need to be down to 208 pounds. And I give myself the time month to month to slowly get down to one night between 190 and 200 so you do it in increments, and then do all of your goals that way, January through December. Now, once you have all that down. Now you can start planning out how to do each one of these things, month by month, and each month will build on the next month. For instance, I have my calendar, so I have a planner, a coaching workbook. The link will be in the thing, but and in here it breaks it down day by day for three weeks. And what I did is I broke down all of those things that I wanted to do for January, and then I broke down how to do them day by how I am doing them day by day. So if one of my goals to read more, and Monday, okay, what did I read? I read 10 pages of this. What was it about? Or if it's to learn something, what did I learn? I learned this from watching this. So you get the idea. And this is, this is a good way to track what you're doing. So now we planned everything. We've got the months spread out. We've got our goals in mind. We broke down from a year to a month, and then you break down that month into weeks, and then you monitor it day by day, by putting it in a journal or putting it in a workbook. Terence, and that gives you what you're trying to do is build momentum and figure out what your system is for success. And you'll figure out as you go, Okay, if I want to be healthier, then there's some things I need to do. In order to be healthier, I have to eat better. In order for me to eat better, there's some things I have to do, which is plan my meals. In order to plan my meals, I have to go shopping. I have to pick a day that I can make those meals, either going to a kitchen that is public kitchen, where you can go and cook and prepare your meals. And some of that is doing the research to figure out what are the things that I need and what are the things that I have. One of the other things that I like to do is I like to write. What are the tools that I have and what do I need assistance with if I have tools already, such as a podcast. So this will give me the opportunity to learn storytelling, to learn how to communicate better, to expose my ideas to groups of people, so that I can get feedback. And another thing, please give me feedback. Let me know how this works for you. Let me know if it's confusing, if it makes sense how it works, and that way I can improve as well. Because this, this journey, isn't one that I assume that I am the resident expert in everything. I can just tell you with the information that I've learned over the years and what works for the people that I have worked with in the past, and what works for me. And so I welcome feedback, and that way I can improve, and the people that I work with can improve in you can improve. That's to me. That's how you learn. One of the things, like I said, I like to do is write down the list of tools that I have, things that I know how to do, or things that I already have access to, and then things that I need help with things I may need to learn. So I may need help with editing content or scheduling content, and then I find someone that I know, or someone I can hire to do that. I need someone to help me with some of the technical things, be it lighting or music or sound, and I find someone that can help me with that I need a personal assistant, someone that can help me with the scheduling, organizing, all of my things. So I go out and find those things. And one of the things just just like you read out, wrote out the things that you accomplished in 2025 I also want you to write down your skills and resources. So your skills and resources, those are the things that you are good at. Some people have a talent for communicating. Some people have a talent for storytelling. One of my good friends, Jerry J is a great storyteller. He has this boisterous voice and this amazing this infectious laugh that every time he tells a story, even if I don't even find the story interesting, I'm waiting for the laugh because the laugh just lights up a room. Those are skills. Those are gifts, and those are things that that's a to me, that's a skill that you have, and that's something that can be used to help you with your goals. Are you a writer? Are you a good communicator? Are you someone who's naturally empathetic and compassionate. Those are skills. Some people may not recognize them as hard skills, but those are skills. So write those down. And resources that you have? Do you have a computer access to the internet? Do you have a YouTube page? Do you have social media? All those things can be used in a positive way, instead of just looking on them as distractions, because the things that you want to learn are in these mediums. So if you're trying to learn how to earn extra income, how to network better, how to market or how to connect with your family more. If you tell these little pocket computer devices, that's what I like to call them phones to go get you information on those topics, it will bring you back the information you ask it to go get a lot of the times we assume that we just have to look at and scroll through the information that the algorithm tells us that we want. But remember, you can tell the algorithm what you want to go, and it will go, get it and bring it to you if you want positive information, if you want. Information that will uplift you, if you want information that will motivate you, if you want information that will teach you something, just type it into the little thing and say, Go find this for me and bring it back. And then you look through it. And if it's what something that helps you, you use it. If it's not, you ignore it and then go on to the next thing. I just want you to realize that you have a sense of a source of agency in this whole process. We're not just subject to the algorithm. The algorithm will do and learn from what we give it. So let's start giving it things that we want, rather than just being subject to it. Okay, so that was a quick, down and dirty goal setting workshop. I hope that it was beneficial to you. If you have any questions about anything, just let me know. And like I said, the workbook that I created is online, and I'll put the the link in here. You just need to. I just, you can just go in there, put in your your email address so that we can stay in touch. And then it'll shoot you over. And then you can, you can purchase it if you want one, or you can use a journal. Totally up to you. I just really, I encourage you to write it down with your human hands. Oh, and another thing which I didn't know, and I don't know the science behind it, so I'm just going to say it because I heard it, and we can look it up later. But one of the things that I have read and I've been doing is you write things down on white paper with a blue pen. And the theory behind that is that the blue pen on the contrasting white paper has a different impact on your neural pathways, on your brain, than just writing with a black pen. So the color does something different. So try it. What do you got to lose? It's just a blue pen and white piece of paper. So try writing down your goals. I love another fun fact tip. I have to give that a name, Legacy tips, Legacy fun facts. You guys give me some suggestions. So write it down with blue ink on white paper. Okay, that's it. Now, go out there in the next week. If you have to plan that, that's one of the things that's on your goal list. Is to write a goal list. Then let's do that. But let's go to work. Let's put it down on paper, and let's have the best year that we've ever had in 2026 because one of the things that I am going to push as hard as I can this year is the idea that scarcity is no longer a reality. You will no longer be able to believe that if you listen to me, if you pay attention to me if you work with me, because it's a lie. There's infinite resources out there infinite possibilities, and we, each one of us, are given a gift that makes us more than capable of attaining anything and everything that we need. And I believe that with all of my heart, and that's part of my mission, and that's part of this movement, is to make sure that you know that just as much and believe that just as much as I do, because it is a fact and it will change your life. So thank you for tuning in to legacy by design. This is Episode. What is this episode four? So we've already gotten four episodes in the can, if you would, I'd appreciate it if you'd subscribe and pass it along to somebody you think it might help, or pass it along to somebody that you don't like, and maybe it'll change them and help you. Just pass it along, is what I'm saying. Thank you very much. Happy New Year. Welcome into 2026 and this is going to be the best year yet. You you.