We are on the eve of the final month of the year.  Yes, 2011 is almost over & done and one question remains: what will you do with your last month?  Most people are probably planning on coasting: taking it as easy as they can until the new year hits.  And it only makes sense to coast.  We’ve been burning ourselves out for an entire year; wrestling with the ups & downs that come with life.  That’s why I’m sure that most of us want nothing more than to do nothing.  And that’s cool.  But you should know there’s another alternative.  You could treat December like it is the preseason of what will be the best year of your life.  

What do I mean by preseason?  In sports, the “preseason” is the time prior to the season beginning when players learn the team system (plays, formats, etc), practice longs hours, take extra risks in exhibition games, and figure out whose on the team and who is not.  In other words, preseason is when you prepare so that you can ensure you are ready to have a winning year.  This type of preparation is necessary so that when the first game comes you aren’t starting from scratching but instead you hit the ground running.  The idea is to prepare ahead of time so that you can begin building momentum towards the championship the first day you step on the field and, hopefully, never ever look back.  The only way to do this successfully is to have a mini-season of preparation before the year even begins.

At the end of the day, you have a choice.  You can coast now and spend January (or maybe the entire first quarter) working out the kinks in what could be an amazing year.  Or you could take December to plan out your attack, figure out whose in and whose out (friends, lovers, business partners, employers, etc), and work hard so that you enter, what we hope to be, the best year of your life in full stride. Which one will you choose?