Before You Set Goals: Start Here | Spacious Beginnings & Intentional Living
[00:00:00] Aneta: Most of us do not fail at our goals or our resolutions because we don't have enough discipline. We have discipline. We are really good at doing hard things. We fail because they're not building these goals, these resolutions, on top of a life that actually fits us any longer. We could be building goals that don't align with who we're becoming or where we want to go, or what we want our life to look like. So today we're not talking about setting better goals, we're gonna talk about the process that comes before the goals, before the plans. Before the commitments, before the resolutions, before the vision boards.
[00:00:44] We often hear people wishing us a long, happy, and healthy life, but what if the length isn't what matters most? What if instead, it's the breath depth and purpose of each day that matters most? Welcome to the Live the Width of Your Life podcast. My name is Aneta Ardelian Kuzm, and join me weekly as I interview guests who made changes in their own lives to live more fully with intention, gratitude, and joy. Be prepared to be inspired by their stories of how they shifted their mindset, took courageous action, and designed the life that they always wanted to live.
[00:01:18] Welcome back to Live The Width of Your Life Podcast. Happy New Year. This is the first episode of 2026, and it is a solo episode called Spacious Beginnings. And in today's solo episode, I talk a lot about this idea of creating more space, more awareness, more intention before we create our goals, our plans, our vision boards. It's the new year. It's a short episode and one that requires us to spend a little bit of time in reflection to land and to be fully present. So before you begin, grab your journal, a pen, and maybe a cup of tea. Make yourself comfortable, and let's participate together in this solo episode.
[00:02:11] Welcome back to Live the Width of Your Life podcast. This is Aneta, and I'm so glad that you are here with me. If this is your first time listening to this podcast, welcome. I'm excited that you are here for the very first podcast of 2026, and if you are a regular listener or you've come back before. I'm just so grateful that you are here.
[00:02:34] This space is about living from a place of alignment, more presence, more intention, and it's for people who look successful on the outside, but maybe inside you recognize that there's some more depth or meaning or spaciousness that is available to you. If you're new in 2026, I'll be sharing a solo episode on the first Wednesday of every month, and it'll be a different theme similar to this one, where I reflect, teach, and integrate what I'm personally living and also guiding others through.
[00:03:09] We also publish weekly on Wednesdays other episodes in which I have guests, and we share conversations and reflections to support you on living the full width of your life, not just the length of it, not just the busy, productive parts, but the good parts. Today's episode is intentionally slower. It's more reflective, it's more spacious.
[00:03:33] So wherever you are right now, whether you're walking or you're driving or you're just sitting with a cup of tea, I invite you to arrive here fully, to just be present. And before we go any further, let's just take a pause together. Let's take a deep, slow breath in through the nose.
[00:03:57] Exhaling through the mouth, allowing your shoulders to drop, your eyes to relax, your jaw to unclench. And just noticing if there's an opportunity to soften, to connect to your body, to land in this very present moment. You don't need to fix anything right now. You don't need to figure it out. This episode isn't about adding more to our lives.
[00:04:31] It's about creating space for the things that want to emerge. And today, as I'm recording this, it's Monday, January 5th, 2026, and my first real full day back to the office. And if you are like me, or like most people, maybe in the past in January, you've felt some pressure. Maybe you feel that today to set goals, to optimize, to plan, to do your vision boards, to get it all together, to strategize, and maybe you're scrolling through social media and you're watching people announce their vision boards or setting their intention, or you've been in communities or on calls where people are setting really big financial goals and talking about their 90 day plans.
[00:05:21] And maybe parts of you are struggling with thinking, I should be doing this too. And then maybe there's that inner part of you, the honest part, the quieter part that's really exhausted, just thinking about it. Or maybe you feel an inner resistance for some reason. If that's you, this episode is for you.
[00:05:45] Now, I spent the end of 2025 a little bit differently than I have in the past. Even going into Thanksgiving, I started to intentionally slow things down. I wanted to slow things down to close things and really spend more time asking myself deep questions, which is, what do I want to do differently in 2026? What is the identity that I'm stepping into, doing a really good inventory about what wasn't serving me any longer?
[00:06:19] Some unhealthy habits. Maybe I wasn't as disciplined around some of the routines that I know were healthy for me, drinking my water, making healthy choices, sleeping, and moving my body. I started to release things that weren't serving me any longer emotionally. The habits, stories, limiting beliefs, and physical.
[00:06:41] I started to do a little bit of purging and saying, what do I not wanna hold onto any longer? I call it a bless and release exercise. I really wanted to go into the holidays this year, not stressed. Not pressured, but satisfied, but present. And I wanted to start 2026 with more spaciousness and more intention.
[00:07:06] And here's what I've learned: most of us do not fail at our goals or our resolutions because we don't have enough discipline. We have discipline. We are really good at doing hard things. We fail because. They're not building these goals, these resolutions on top of a life that actually fits us any longer; we could be building goals that don't align with who we're becoming or where we want to go, or what we want our life to look like.
[00:07:39] So today we're not talking about setting better goals, we're gonna talk about the process that comes before the goals, before the plans. Before the commitments, before the resolutions, before the vision boards, which I love, and I will do this year. But we're talking about awareness, we're talking about honesty, we're talking about self-reflection.
[00:08:05] And as part of the live, the width of your life philosophy, we don't measure life only by what we accomplish, by what we achieve, by what we're able to get done, by how long our to-do list is. We measure it by how deeply we are living. And that's why the theme for January for me, and I hope for you as well, is about spacious beginnings.
[00:08:30] Because real beginnings don't require extra effort. They don't require force. They don't require more hustle. They require spaciousness. That could look like spaciousness in your calendar, spaciousness in your nervous system, really grounding yourself, creating a sense of safety, spaciousness, and how you define success.
[00:08:55] And in who you're allowing yourself to become in the process. And if your life feels tight, rushed, or heavy right now, that's not a motivation problem. It's not a discipline problem. Could be a capacity problem, and capacity begins with space. And I think back to my corporate days, and there was a season in my corporate career where things looked great.
[00:09:23] They looked great on paper. I was moving along. I wasn't really intentional about what came next, but I was reacting. And so I wanted more responsibility, more visibility, a wider impact. And the role that I wanted would provide me with this. But in my body, I felt contracted.
[00:09:46] I felt anxious, I felt disconnected with myself. Because I was thinking about it. And I got the job, and it was really big, and it felt really overwhelming. And I remember the tightness in my chest on Monday mornings and the way my shoulders would stay tense all weekend long, that dread that I felt, and the irritability that I really couldn't explain.
[00:10:12] And if you'd asked me back then if I was burned out. I probably would've told you no, because I didn't want to claim any weakness, and I saw a burnout as something that I couldn't handle. But I would've said maybe I needed better time management. I needed to be more productive. I needed to be more disciplined.
[00:10:30] But the burnout wasn't actually the problem; the misalignment was the problem. And burnout doesn't come from a lack of ambition. It comes from building on top of a life that no longer fits on top of a vision that is not yours, on top of goals that you've inherited. And here's the interesting thing.
[00:10:54] Misalignment usually shows up after success, not before it. You've done everything right, you've achieved the goals, and yet you feel that something is off. You're tired in a way that even sleep doesn't fix. And you look around, and you ask yourself, is this supposed to be it? Because it doesn't feel like it.
[00:11:20] And I see this with my clients all the time. They say things like, I feel guilty because I'm so blessed, and yet I still feel off or from the outside, I have everything I've ever wanted. So what's wrong with me? And I always tell them, nothing is wrong with you. You're not broken, you're not ungrateful. You don't need to fix yourself.
[00:11:44] You're just in a period of discernment. You're finally listening. Your body is asking you, your mind, and your life to pay attention. So before we rush into action this year, let's build some more awareness. And here's a question that I ask often. Where in your life are you operating on autopilot?
[00:12:10] Simply because it once worked. Where are you still optimizing for something that no longer matters, that no longer fits who you are becoming? Awareness isn't judgment, it's honesty. Honesty is the only place that aligned change can truly begin. And before we reflect, I want to name something important. The body must feel safe before life can expand.
[00:12:49] You can have the clearest vision and the best strategy in the world, but if your nervous system is exhausted. Clarity will feel impossible. Focus will feel impossible. And it's not failure, it's biology. That's how we are designed. So let's take another gentle moment together. Let's take another deep, slow breath through the nose, out through the mouth,
[00:13:21] and just close your eyes, noticing how your shoulders may have dropped. Notice your jaw, your chest. You don't need to do anything. Just notice
[00:13:35] your body registered that you listened. Expansion follows safety, not the other way around. So let's pull this together. I have a couple of questions that I would love for you, I invite you to journal on. So if you need to grab a journal. Just pause this recording right now. Go grab your journal. Go grab a pen, make yourself comfortable.
[00:14:02] And the first question is, where in my life do I feel compressed or rushed?
[00:14:17] The second question is, what am I ready to set down? Not because it's wrong, but because it no longer fits.
[00:14:29] And number three, if I created more space this year, what could naturally emerge in my life?
[00:14:45] Just notice what your body does as you ask yourself these questions as you journal on them. Your body knows the truth before your mind catches up. It just does.
[00:15:01] And I just want to share with you something that I hear repeatedly: I don't need more inspiration. I need support staying aligned in real life. I hear this from my clients, and I know that this is so true for me as well. So I created something for you. I want to create tools that are really important, free tools, that you can use in your daily life on this journey.
[00:15:26] So I've designed a monthly Alignment Guide. Also, an Aligned Daily Planner, not as an additional productivity tool, but more as a presence tool. They're here to help you stay anchored to what matters most. To check in with your energy, not just your to-do list, but to really create intentional days and weeks and months without burning yourself out.
[00:15:51] If you haven't done so already, I suggest you start with the free Live the width of Your Life Assessment. It's an assessment that I created that really gives you a baseline of how you feel in all different areas of your life. And then you can use the monthly guide and the daily template as your rhythm for the year, and I'll be creating these new monthly guides with new themes each month.
[00:16:15] You can also follow along with the Live the Width of Your Life book, which is actually a daily, and it provides some daily inspiration, journal prompts, and challenges for you as you continue on these themes. Really, to stay accountable in easy, short ways every single day. I still read the book every morning.
[00:16:35] My husband and I do it first thing in the morning when we wake up, and it's so nice to just start the day with a really positive, inspirational quote and an intention, and to be able to sit in reflection and journal on whatever that day's challenge and journal prompt us. Everything with these assessments and these tools is linked in the show notes, and this is my way of walking alongside you and not just doing it in an inspirational way from a distance, but really being a part of your journey every day.
[00:17:07] And as we close, I want to leave you with this: January doesn't ask you to reinvent yourself, it asks you to listen more honestly, to make room. To breathe. To trust that what's meant for you doesn't need force. And before you go, if this episode resonated, I'd love for you to subscribe so you don't miss future conversations.
[00:17:34] If you feel called, leave a comment or review. I read every single one, and they mean more to me than you can ever know. This podcast is a conversation, not a broadcast, and I'm so grateful that you are here today. Let's step into 2026. Not rushed, but grounded and rooted, and I just wish that you have the most amazing day.
[00:17:59] Thank you for listening to today's episode. If today's conversation inspired you to dream again, break out of your comfort zones or reflect on what it means to you to live more fully, then please follow this podcast because every week you'll hear more stories from people just like you who took imperfect action towards their goals, created more joy and are living the life that they always dreamt of living.