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Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of I Heart Radio.

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Speaker 1: Good Morning, This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.

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Speaker 1: Today's tip is to prune your goals. You may be

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Speaker 1: holding onto goals or intentions that you don't actually intend

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Speaker 1: to do, or that no longer makes sense for your life.

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Speaker 1: Best to acknowledge that and let them go so you

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Speaker 1: can focus on the ones that do matter. Around this

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Speaker 1: time of year, late summer, my yard starts looking a

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Speaker 1: little overgrown. The bushes along the front walkway grows so

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Speaker 1: thick that it is almost impossible to walk through them.

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Speaker 1: They are lovely bushes, but not in that form. Time

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Speaker 1: to prune them back. The same thing happens in a

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Speaker 1: way with goals. Lots of people make New Year's resolutions

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Speaker 1: in late December or early January. Some people set a

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Speaker 1: lot of goals just in the course of life, like

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Speaker 1: let me read fifty books this year, or meditate for

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Speaker 1: thirty minutes a day, or pick up my watercolor paints again.

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Speaker 1: Whether people keep these goals is a different matter. Sometimes

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Speaker 1: we don't even think about them after a while, but

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Speaker 1: they're kind of there as expectations, lovely in some form,

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Speaker 1: but blocking up the sidewalk when there are too many

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Speaker 1: of them left untended. If that sounds familiar, the middle

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Speaker 1: of the year is a great time for a reckoning.

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Speaker 1: Not because I want anyone to feel bad about whether

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Speaker 1: they are harboring unmet expectations for themselves, but because it's

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Speaker 1: good to be honest about whether goals are actually goals

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Speaker 1: or not. Let's say that in Anuary, you decided to

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Speaker 1: read fifty books this year. You pull out your list

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Speaker 1: of resolutions and realize you can only remember finishing a

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Speaker 1: handful of books since winter. How do you feel about that?

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Speaker 1: If you feel somewhat oppressed by this resolution and start

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Speaker 1: explaining to yourself why it just hasn't been able to work, well,

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Speaker 1: how about deciding to prune this goal from your list.

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Speaker 1: You can decide that there are lots of ways to

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Speaker 1: spend your time. Maybe reading isn't a top priority right now.

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Speaker 1: It's fine. You don't have to walk around with the

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Speaker 1: expectation that you will read any more books this year.

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Speaker 1: If you read a book, it's just because you want

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Speaker 1: to read that particular book, not because you are aiming

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Speaker 1: for a particular number. On the other hand, if seeing

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Speaker 1: this resolution reminds you that there are a ton of

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Speaker 1: books you actually do want to read, including one that's

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Speaker 1: on your nightstand right now. Well, why not take that

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Speaker 1: as a nudge, set a revised goal of reading for

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Speaker 1: at least twenty minutes a day, four days per week.

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Speaker 1: It's not your original goal, but it might be more reasonable,

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Speaker 1: And then put the list down and go pick up

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Speaker 1: that book you thought looked good. A little progress is

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Speaker 1: often enough to get back in the habit. Fresh starts

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Speaker 1: are great, but they often make us think we are

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Speaker 1: going to change everything, And the truth is that we

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Speaker 1: aren't going to change everything. Indeed, we don't need to

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Speaker 1: change everything because I am guessing that your life is

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Speaker 1: pretty good. Taking a few minutes to consider which goals

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Speaker 1: still inspire you and which just don't can allow you

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Speaker 1: to focus your energy on the ones that you do

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Speaker 1: feel like going all in on. Prune your goals and

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Speaker 1: you'll make a beautiful garden. I will mention here that

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Speaker 1: revisiting your goals may also reveal that you're doing better

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Speaker 1: than you think you are. I recently did a Midsummer

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Speaker 1: check in on my Summer fun list. Every year, I

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Speaker 1: make a list of activities that makes summer feel like summer.

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Speaker 1: To me, I felt like maybe I wasn't making progress

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Speaker 1: on this list, but it turned out that I pretty

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Speaker 1: much was. There were only a few items on the

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Speaker 1: list that weren't on my calendar yet, so I can

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Speaker 1: choose to focus on those, and since there are only

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Speaker 1: a few of them, they will probably get done. So today,

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Speaker 1: check in with any goals that you are holding onto,

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Speaker 1: just like a gardener, see if a little pruning would

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Speaker 1: improve matters. If the list is overgrown and unwieldy, then

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Speaker 1: it won't serve you. But if it is well pruned,

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Speaker 1: you can see the flowers with enough space around them

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Speaker 1: to highlight them. In the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks

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Speaker 1: for listening, and here's to making the most of our time.

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Speaker 1: Hey everybody, I'd love to hear from you. You can

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Speaker 1: send me your tips, your questions, or anything else. Just

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Speaker 1: connect with me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at Before

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Speaker 1: Breakfast pod that's B the number four then Breakfast p

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Speaker 1: o D. You can also shoot me an email at

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Speaker 1: Before Breakfast podcast at i heeart media dot com that

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Speaker 1: Before Breakfast is spelled out with all the letters. Thanks

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Speaker 1: so much, I look forward to staying in touch. Before

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Speaker 1: Breakfast is a production of i heart Radio. For more

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