How to Set up Your 2023 Calendar for a Year of Success

03 Jan How to Set up Your 2023 Calendar for a Year of Success

January is an exciting and hopeful time — a time to make resolutions, set goals, and start planning for the next 12 months. Even though people tend to think of the start of a new year as a clean slate, the truth is that much of your schedule is already spoken for. You need to first see what time you have available before you can tackle those new goals, follow through on your resolutions, and plan this summer’s family vacation. Here is a quick guide to setting up your 2023 calendar for a year of success! 

Reflect, Gather, and Reset

The first step is to take a look back at how you spent the previous year. Reflect on what events and tasks you want to continue or do more of, and what are some of the things that you can drop or spend less time on this year. If last year’s calendar reveals that you and your partner only had two date nights or that your kids attended 27 birthday parties last year, it will help you to set priorities and make more intentional decisions on how your family spends its time.

Next, start gathering all of your information from outside sources that you will need to add to your calendar. These would be things like published calendars from groups like churches and clubs you belong to, your children’s school calendars, medical appointment reminder cards, your cousin’s save-the-date card, bills, and events that you already have tickets for. 

Before you start entering all of these events on your calendar take a look at what might already be on your calendar and see if all of the information is still relevant. Finally, take a look at your sub-calendar categories and decide if you need a reset. Are there some categories you never use anymore that can be deleted or hidden or would creating some new calendar categories help you to color code more effectively and stay better organized for the new year?

Record Recurring and Fixed Events

Now that you have done the prep work, it is time to start filling in the events and tasks that are already decided for you. Start with your recurring weekly, monthly, and annual events focusing on one area of your life at a time.

• Personal events, such as book club nights, piano lessons, birthdays, anniversaries, co-parenting schedules, and PTA meetings
• Work events, like weekly meetings, monthly reports, filing deadlines, and annual reviews
• Household events, could be pest control visits, oil changes, recycling day, and filter changes

Next, add the fixed events, appointments, and travel that have already been scheduled for the year. You can also include ‘tickler’ events to remind you to schedule appointments that need to be made. When you create each event decide whether you want to set push notification reminders for weeks, days, or hours in advance. 

• Personal events, like concerts, doctor visits, community events, weddings, salon appointments, and family coming to stay with you
• Work events, such as business trips, presentations, and project deadlines
• Household events, like paydays, bill due dates, termite inspections, and vet appointments

Analyze Your Time Available 

After all the events that have already been decided are entered, now you can see what time is available for the things that you want to do but have not been scheduled. Things like date nights, vacations, entertaining, exercise, and family game nights. Blocking out the time now will make it much more likely that those things will actually happen! This will also give you an overview of your year and help you to make a plan for how to break down each of your goals for the year into manageable chunks.  You can see what daily habits you need to start now to follow through on those new year’s resolutions!
Artful Agenda can help you set up your 2023 calendar for a year of success. If you haven’t yet experienced the fun and personalization of paper planning with the convenience of a digital calendar you take advantage of our FREE two-week trial and make this your best year ever!