Kari Hatfield: Living with Intention

Local mom creates a life she loves, one goal at a time

BY DANIELLE TEIGEN

We’ve all heard the stats: of all the people who make a New Year’s resolution, only 75% of them are still sticking to it within a week, and that number drops to 64% after one month. And less than half of the people who made resolutions keep it within six months, according to research.

Not very encouraging, right?

But take Kari Hatfield: she’s a pretty regular mom with three daughters who works full-time for Sanford and has been married for 14 years to the man she met on a golf course in high school. And for the past couple of years, Kari has been setting real, intentional goals to work on throughout the year, and she’s steadily been achieving them, one by one. Here’s how she does it, so you can too.

You have to start today

Kari is frank about her habit of setting goals. “I’ve always been a list person and very goal-oriented,” she said. “I would not necessarily refer to it as a New Year’s resolution list; it’s just what I want to complete in the year.”

Being intentional with her time has become much more of a priority as her children grow older and get more involved in activities. She and husband Rob have three daughters: Mackenzie, 11; Sydney, 9; and Madison, 4. These three go-getting girls keep the Hatfield family busy with cheerleading, hockey, dance and more, which means carving out time for herself is no easy task for Kari.

“Time just goes so fast, and if you don’t think about what you want to do or where you want to be, how will you ever go anywhere?” Kari said.

When best-selling author Rachel Hollis spoke to a sellout crowd of nearly 4,000 women at The Chamber’s annual Women Connect celebration in 2019, Kari was there. And she decided to purchase a Start Today Journal, a Rachel Hollis product that asks the user to decide what she wants her life to look like in 10 years, then determine the 10 dreams that will get you there and finally one goal to focus on.

For Kari, the first big goal she wanted to focus on was getting her Master’s of Business Administration. She knew putting that item on any list was just one step in the process; she’d have several other small steps along the way.

“It was something I had been thinking about for a while, and I realized the time would never be good because the kids will always be busy, so I decided to just register and go and figure out how to get it done,” she said. She enrolled with the University of Mary in the fall of 2019 and began working toward that big goal, one day at a time in January 2020.

Two months later, everything changed.

Kari and Rob met in high school on a golf course and married in 2007.

Photos courtesy of Jennifer Peters Photography

Adjusting but still moving forward

Kari, who is originally from Fargo, works full time for Sanford as an enterprise pharmacy business manager. She began working in the finance department six years ago as an analyst and moved into her current role in 2020. She earned a degree from MSUM in finance and accounting, so her goal of earning an MBA was a natural step in her career path.

However, starting a master’s program while still working full time and raising three children and then dealing with a global pandemic was not part of the plan.

But Kari was undeterred.

Working on a master’s degree while doing all of that was certainly not an easy task, but things did work out thanks to all of her children’s activities getting canceled in the spring of 2020 as well as into the summer, providing Kari with the time she needed to complete her work.

Kari even jumped on the pandemic pet bandwagon and adopted two kittens who have become cherished and beloved pets, even though Kari is allergic to them. Mocha and Jazzy were a surprise for the girls, Kari said, and gave them a welcome distraction.

Kari kept moving forward, working each day toward that MBA. And in April 2021 — after her kids went back to school and some activities resumed — she earned it.

And the hustle it took for her to do it was noticed, most especially by her younger sister, Rachel Corneliussen. When the sisters, who also happen to live just a few doors away from one another in their hometown of Fargo, sat down around Christmas a few years ago for lunch, talk turned to New Year’s resolutions.

“Most people have the same generic goal year after year, but Kari brought out a notebook with 10 things written down and bullet points for each of them for how to get that thing done,” Rachel shared. “She had put so much thought into it and was being completely intentional about what she wanted to do for the year.”

When Kari shared that she was going to go back to school to work on her MBA, Rachel was supportive. “I said, ‘Good for you,’” she said. “She just has an awesome drive to get it done.”

Kari’s daughters include Sydney, 9; Mackenzie, 11; and Madison, 4.

Photos courtesy of Jennifer Peters Photography

Purpose and priorities

Kari speaks humbly about her habit and insists she is not engaging in some ground-breaking activity. She said so many people are already thinking about things they want to accomplish, but the Start Today Journal forced her to think small as well as big.

“Everyone wants to lose weight, but making a plan about what is realistically going to make that happen is necessary,” she said. “I knew an MBA would span two years, so I had to start somewhere.”

The things on her list are not all as time-consuming or as big as working toward that MBA. “It doesn’t have to be earth-shattering; if you want to travel more with your family, start by making a list of places you want to go and pick one,” she shared. Her list has included things regarding self-care, seeing friends regularly, saving money, scheduling dates with her husband, etc. Once she’s identified the things that are important to her, she makes plans to accomplish the smaller steps needed for those things to happen, like signing up for gym classes, setting aside a specific amount of money or enlisting the help of nearby grandparents who can take the kids for a night.

“Not every item is a huge mountain to climb,” she said. While the Start Today Journal is meant to be used daily, Kari honestly shared that she doesn’t journal every day. “Life happens, you have to be flexible,” she said. That goes for her list too, which fluctuates throughout the year as priorities shift. “It’s about intentionality and picking out what is important to you,” she said.

Kari and her younger sister Rachel, left, grew up in Fargo and now live close to one another with their families. Special to On the Minds of Moms

Kari’s humility is noteworthy, as is her perseverance. Sharing her list made a lasting impression on her sister, who noted it’s just one of many qualities she admires about her sister, who is four years her senior. “She’s very good at giving advice, and I definitely look up to her as a mentor mom,” Rachel said. “She’s always been someone I’ve looked up to, and I know I can go to her for anything.”

Not only that, but Rachel said she’s glad to know her sister is getting some credit for all the wonderful things she does for her family and herself. “She does it all, and she’d do anything for her kids,” she said. “She’s a great mom, and I think it’s nice to be seen for everything you do as a mom.”

The other people who are seeing Kari accomplish her goals are her three daughters (as well as Rachel’s 2-year-old daughter Haylee). That fact is not lost on Kari. Even though her daughters don’t know exactly what’s on that list she creates, Kari knows that they are seeing her signing up for a race, going to the gym, planning a family vacation, or working toward a higher education degree. “Kids watch what you’re doing more than they listen to what you say,” she said.

The Hatfield family stays busy with activities and athletics their daughters participate in, but they also love to travel, go bowling, or enjoy a movie night whenever they have free time.

Photo courtesy of Jennifer Peters Photography