Do you have any goals of your own for 2010?

How important are your goals to you?

Who can help you reach your goals?

I will try and answer these questions with my blog entry!

With the beginning of a New Year I always try and set goals for myself for the New Year. We should always have dreams and goals for our lives. And it is important that we own them or we will have a hard time reaching them.  

It is important that goals are what we want for our lives and not what others want for us. If they are not important to us than we are spinning our wheels and getting no where. We should set goals for every area of our lives - such as work, play, health and money.  

Some times because we have disabilities we don’t think about setting our own goals and reaching them because we are waiting on someone to give us permission to set goals and achieve them.  

There are some people we can talk to so that we can set goals and achieve them, such as our parents, other family members, case managers, direct support workers, other professionals, our co-workers, and people who we know and trust. 

In some of these areas I have not done so well, but 2010 is another year to set goals again and achieve them.

With work I am going to write more blogs and set goals so that I can help more people than this year.  

I hope you too set some goals, and wish you the best in achieving them! 
Wishing you a very Happy New Year!

Betty Williams
The Arc of Indiana, Consumer Education and Training Coordinator
President, Self-Advocates of Indiana

Welcome to The Arc of Indiana’s new web site and blog. We are glad you have found us! 

So, blogging and such. The Arc is excited to find new ways to connect with families, self-advocates and professionals through this new world of “social networking.”

A little over a year ago we took our first step into this new medium by creating The Arc of Indiana’s Facebook page. To do this, I needed to create my own page on Facebook - much to my teenage daughter’s chagrin. While I was skeptical at first, I have found Facebook to be a way not only to connect with old friends, but also a new way to connect with people I know through work. I have particularly enjoyed “Facebooking” with our Arc Network family advocates and self-advocates. Because they work for The Arc throughout the state, I do not have many opportunities to get to know them. Through Facebook I have enjoyed learning more about them and a little more about what goes on in their day to day lives - Renee’s tears of joy when her daughter said, “Mama, mama, mama” for the first time; Jennifer’s adventures in teaching and learning along with her daughter, Gracie; and Jill’s pride when her boys were honored by Junior Achievement - all dressed up and looking fine in their tuxes.

Read the rest of this entry »