We are well into the groove of another year and I can't help but wonder how the last one truly went. I am a New Year baby so I spend almost every birthday reflecting on the last 365 days. How did I spend it? What did I accomplish? How did I serve others? What can I do with this brand New Year to make it even more productive; one in which I continue to grow without restriction and give more of myself than I've ever done before?

If we take the time to break down the year from a time perspective, there are 12 months and 52 weeks in a year. We have exactly 168 hours in a week and 8,736 hours in a year. Many of us work about 50 hours and sleep for 56 hours a week, but there are still 62 hours left to leverage! This also means we have about 3,596 hours to play with in a year. That is a considerable amount of "free" time.

So, what do we do with our "free" time? Have we created a framework to help us succeed with the time that we have? The ultimate quality of the life we have is totally dependent on how we manage our time. My mother always used to say, "Measure ten times and cut once." What she means is spend adequate time in strategic planning when it comes to your life. Think it through and put your thoughts down in writing. Take the time to decide exactly what you want your life to look like and then set the appropriate goals on how you are going to get there. Take each goal and break them into tasks and be disciplined as you decide how long you intend to spend on each task. Set realistic timelines that will keep you motivated and on course.

By setting clear and succinct goals, you give yourself a fighting chance of accomplishing them. It is a fact that success is always intentional and never by accident. Successful people are the ones who take the time to have clearly written goals and dedicate time to working on those goals every single day.

Life is so short and time tends to fly fast the older you become. It has been said that the average person lives for just about 28,000 days. By the time we hit the tail end of our 30's, half of that is pretty much over. Since we know that time is finite, what would be the value of 2020 to you? How will you invest this year in order to get maximum return?