Creating goals for 2022 and reflecting on those from 2021:

December 28, 2021Leave a comment

A few posts ago I talked about starting my resolutions early, which I did, I’m just posting them now. It gave me a month to get them written out and it also allowed me to keep my format the same.

But wow, can you believe its already basically 2022? It sounds like such a futuristic year, not the present!

But before I get ahead of myself lets look back at 2021 and the goals I set for myself:

Read more than seventy books: Done, done, done. I actually surpassed this by far and made it into the triple digits this year. I’m proud of that. Audiobooks really boost your numbers!
Spend more time outside: I did great… for the most part. During my third trimester I hardly went outside. It was too hot and I was far to pregnant to find it enjoyable, but other than those three months I’ve done a really good job getting my time in.
Eat more balanced: lol, okay, I was pregnant and I had some unaddressed disordered eating to address as I talked about in my last post. I failed at this one, but this last month I’ve been starting to turn it around and since it was a 2021 goal I guess you could say I ended on a good note.
Be a more consistent blogger: For the most part I’ve done a lot better with this! As a hobby blogger I’d say I’m decently consistent.
Spend more time writing on my novels: Started strong, ended poorly. There’s not a lot more to say about this one.
Be better at reaching out to friends: I’ve done good at this one, especially during my pregnancy, now to keep it up with a baby!

Now for 2022, the goals I’ve soft started this past month:

Fix my disordered eating habits: I’m making a whole blog post about this, but I wat to address my relationship with food.
Read 100 books: I kept shooting low, both for 2020 and 2021. I thought 100 wasn’t realistic, but seeing how I broke 100 two years in a row, I think I can do it a third time!
Take more pictures: I take a ton of pictures on my cell phone, but I want to break out my big camera more and play with my photography, especially now that I have a little one capture!
Finish writing my current novel: Pretty self explanatory. It’s about one third done and I’d love to finish it!
Move more: I’m not going to sign up for a gym. I am going to try to be more active though! Rock climbing, skiing, horseback, bouncing the baby, walking the dogs. I just want to move more.

I’m going to try to keep it pretty simple this year because I know a lot of my focus will be on Oliver and my family!

Creating goals for 2021 and reflecting on those from 2020:

December 31, 20204 Comments

It’s been a year man, I don’t think you should be to hard on yourself if you didn’t knock out all your 2020 goals, after all who thought 2020 would look anything like this in January? We were so hopeful, but life had other plans for us.

I did manage to get through some of my goals though, and I am proud of that, so lets look back on the goals I set for myself at the beginning of the year:

Get back into photography: I’ve worked on this but I haven’t perfected it! I still need to spend a lot more time with my camera than I do, but I have been picking it up more than last year, mainly thanks to my husband, but hey, we’re not all perfect.
Refocus on budgeting: I picked a bad year to focus on budgeting. Prices have gone up and the economy has crashed, but all in all, I have been a lot more mindful about how I’m spending, so I kinda succeeded, though 2020 threw a lot of curve balls at us.
Journal more: Check! I’ve been journaling all the time! In fact I was journaled today. It makes a big difference in how I’m processing my emotions, so I’m really glad I’ve returned to this habit.
Become a better cook/baker: Check! While the pandemic was bad for budgeting, it was great for cooking and baking. I’ve done a lot of it and I’ve tried a lot of new recipes as well. I feel like I’m finally comfortable in the kitchen in ways I really wasn’t before.
Read more than fifty books: Well, I read 117. So check! I know the biggest gift to this was audiobooks from the library, but they are still books so they count. I really poured myself into stories over all the forced down time in 2020, so it was pretty easy to double my goal. I feel great about it!
Lose weight: Hahaha, about that. Yeah, that didn’t even come close to happening, but hey, I’m the same pant size I started the year with, so at least I didn’t gain any?

Now lets talk about 2021. It feels weird making goals for the next year after a year like this one. I feel like I have no right to try to figure out what the year should hold not knowing what it will hold. But I guess to a certain degree, that’s every year. So here we go!

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Realigning your goals in the wake of everything:

April 20, 20204 Comments

The world has shut down, so maybe some of your goals have been moved to the back burner, after all, how are you supposed to have monthly goals when you can’t even tell me what day of the week it is?

Life happens, and it happens without our permission. We don’t have a say in the matter but we do have a say in how we react and how we adjust. I said in a previous post that I think both the “rise and grind” tactic and the “panic and do nothing” tactic aren’t healthy in this pandemic, and I stand by that. You shouldn’t be trying to be the next big thing, you should be focusing on small amounts of progress so you don’t fall behind and you should add on goals that are made just with your mental health in mind and nothing else.

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Creating goals for 2020 and reflecting on those from 2019:

December 27, 2019December 27, 2019Leave a comment

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First, let’s look back at my goals for 2019. I got about half of them, and the ones not finished were about half done. I don’t know whether to consider that a success or not, but progress is progress and I had a really busy year, so it’s remarkable I got any of it done. Let’s break them down:

Plan a wonderful wedding fit for my upcoming marriage: I did it! And it was fabulous. It was honestly the best night of my life. You can see some pictures from it here.
More time of hobbies, less time online: Eh. Okay, so I spent less time online but it was because I was spending more time hanging out with friends (yay) and doing daily tasks that increased when I moved out and got married. I did spend time on hobbies, but I don’t know if I did more than in 2018, so I will call this one a half win.
Start barrel racing again: Things got really busy in the spring season, so I didn’t start going to races again, but I took all the necessary steps to start next season. I’ve been taking lessons and we’ve finally purchased a horse trailer.
Read more than 20 books: Check. I’ve read over forty books year, so I’d say I went above an beyond on this one. Audio books have drastically altered my reading progress, though I still love those paper books!
Buy a house: We did it! It’s beautiful and it feels like home. I’m so proud of it. We’ve gotten it all decorated and I’m so excited to come home to it at the end of the day!
Send birthday cards to everyone: I started out the year strong and I got birthday cards to people I saw in person. As for the rest… well I got all my wedding thank you notes out? That counts for something, right?
Pray more: I’m doing much better at this then I was at the start of the year, though I still have room for improvement.
Finish a novel: I didn’t, but I have been making progress on one after months of not writing at all. It feels good to break my writers block.

Now as for the coming year?

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The role reminders play in self control:

July 11, 2019July 11, 20192 Comments

I’m trying to lose weight. Not a lot, but about ten pounds. I struggle with it because I don’t practice self control around food very well. Maybe it’s because I know I’m not that overweight. Maybe it’s because I like food too much. Whatever the reason, I failed at controlling myself for a week or two before I realized if I was going to do this I needed to find some sort of system to fix it.

I joined a Facebook group for weight loss support. I felt silly in it. People were trying to lose mass amount of weight and here I was trying to drop ten pounds. It seemed like maybe this wasn’t the place for me. But it was, not because I related to all the posts, in fact, a lot of them I don’t. It worked because I was constantly reminded of my goals, I was constantly reminded that I was trying to do this and I had decided that it mattered enough to me to join a group, or to comment.

I saw the posts when I logged on. I got notifications on my phone when people commented on something I had commented on.

Some people would argue that it was the support that I needed, but I haven’t made posts to have people support my journey. I’ve rather been supporting others. Dishing out support might be helpful, but it’s helpful in the same way giving your friend advice is helpful. It reminds you that you know what you’re supposed to be doing. You have all this knowledge, you just need to apply it! It’s simple if you get control over yourself.

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Little Fixes: Getting rid of my road rage made me a better person

May 16, 2019Leave a comment

We all have little problems, problems that we sweep under the rug because they don’t seem to be a big deal, or we don’t see how changing them will change anything else. We try to tackle bigger things, and sometimes that works out for us, sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes these items are to big to tackle all at once. Smaller problems also take time, but not in the same way, they take a week or two of constant reminder and discipline instead of months of it. But they change our lives too, sometimes in ways we wouldn’t think.

I recently was in terrible 5 o’clock traffic and got cut off by someone who almost missed their exit. I cursed under my breath something terribly unkind and had a moment of clarity were I realized that that action didn’t warrant that insult. I’ve cut people off in traffic before and it really wasn’t that big of a deal, because more often then not, it’s a mistake. This break through thought kept circling back around every time I muttered something unkind in traffic, and I started to realize just how often I was doing it.

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How to stay accountable: charting goals and health

April 25, 2019Leave a comment

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This past two years have been really crazy for me. I’m still getting treated for Lyme Disease, I got engaged, now I’m planning a wedding, and buying a house. A lot is happening, and when you add that onto the ever present task of bettering yourself, it’s easy to let things fall through the cracks. So I’ve been working on methods to stay on top of everything and I’m going to share the few things that have worked best for me.

Charting is something a lot of doctors suggest people with mental health problems do to track their moods and anxieties. I’ve had to do it for that in the past, luckily my mental health is pretty stable at the moment, but that doesn’t mean that charting hasn’t still been useful for my health overall. I’ve been using it to track progress with my lyme disease, as well as track what causes me to feel bad. For example, I’ve started creating a little list of things I’ve eaten that day in the corner of my planner, that way I can still see if gluten or sugar is effecting me like it used to (and I’m proud to say it’s not! It’s gotten a lot better).

I also have been using my planner to write down everything I’ve done that day, and I mean almost everything. I’m not just writing down appointments or lunch dates, I’m writing down whether or not I’ve walked the dog, what hobbies I did that day, whether or not I ate out for lunch. Having your day written down like that helps you track a lot of different things. It helps me track my energy levels in response to my lyme treatment, but it also helps me stay accountable for diving back into my hobbies.

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