You Don't Have to Do This Alone

Today is the day.

It’s the last day of August and we’re crossing into September, getting closer to fall, one month left in this quarter, and just getting settled or starting a new school year. I’ve been circling this threshold with you all month. In the first week it was expectation and reality. We looked at celebration and ritual in the second week, the quiet question of “are these still relevant goals” in the third, and finding our people in the fourth. Today, all of that lands here.

A Structure for What We’ve Been Circling

I’ve spent four weeks describing pieces of a practice: noticing the gap between expectation and reality, pausing to celebrate before moving on, and asking whether a goal is still relevant. What I haven’t given you yet is a container to actually do this work, start to finish, on your own goals.

That’s what the September Reset Challenge is.

It’s five short days, about 30 minutes each, and each day walks through a different stage of resetting a goal:

• Day 1 is checking in—where your goals actually stand, not where you want them to be.
• Day 2 is examining—what’s really tied to these goals, and where they came from in the first place.
• Day 3 is celebrating and releasing—a ritual of celebrating what we’ve accomplished and releasing the goals that no longer fit.
• Day 4 is revising and recommitting—a ritual for updating goals to fit what we know now and recommitting to those that still resonate.
• Day 5 is maintaining—building a simple practice of your own to keep your goals fresh.

How It Works

Day 1 unlocks tomorrow, September 1. Enrollment is open now and stays open through September 30, so there’s no rush to start today. Join whenever works for you, and move through the five days at your own pace. Each day unlocks once you’ve completed the one before it.

This challenge is free and only requires signing up with your email address in the Fosgail Community. There’s no obligation to anything beyond the challenge itself. The challenge invites low-pressure comments to interact with others who are doing the challenge, but participation in that aspect is entirely optional.

Why This Offer

This challenge comes out of Fosgail’s values and our commitment to show up as companions and stewards for librarians, leaders, and institutions seeking to navigate complexity with curiosity, compassion, and foresight. Developing the Integrated Library Planning model taught me that good planning isn’t a once-and-done event. It’s a frequent, cyclical, inquiry-driven process. I believe that as much for our personal and professional goals as I do for library strategic plans. We don’t set goals once and defend them forever. We check in, we ask questions, we adjust—again and again—because that’s what keeps a plan alive and useful.

I encouraged you last week to find your people. Consider me one of yours for these five days, if you’d like.

I hope to see you soon.

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