The Infamous Goal-Setting Post of 2014

I’m sitting on a very turbulent flight from Montreal to Chicago.  A baby’s crying in the cabin somewhere, but I have the last four rows to myself so I’m trying to imagine that this bestows on me some special fortune. The flight attendant thinks I’m cool anyway, he added a lemon to my drink.

Flights are good times for reflection, so I’m going to use my unexpected privacy back here to write up my annual goal-setting post (here’s 2013, 2012 and 2011, if you’re interested).

I didn’t realize how difficult 2013 was while I was going through it. I actually didn’t realize just how hard the year was until I wrote up my annual review last week and read it back to myself. Wow! Perhaps it’s a testament to my ability to see hardship as challenge and shift my approach when something isn’t working rather than letting myself sink into it. Or maybe I just didn’t let myself stay still very long and kept pressing forward as a survival mechanism. I’m not sure. In any case, I’m grateful for the challenging year because it clarified a lot for me.

Nonetheless, 2014 is going to have a decidedly slower pace. Some people have a hard time getting into gear and being productive. This happens to me occasionally, but I typically have a much harder time relaxing. I always just feel like there’s something I should be doing. But I need to relax more, at the very least, for my health.

Health / mindset goals

In my annual review, I mentioned that I’ve been dealing with some health/HPA-axis issues. I am committing to fully healing from that. A big part of healing your adrenals is relaxing and keeping stress at a minimum.

Here are a few things I’m going to do to help de-stress:

• Work fewer hours and take more days off.
• Read more, preferably non-business related stuff.
• Take Grendel on more long walks.
• Try to find a yoga and/or meditation class that I like.
• Take more naps.
• Keep up the gratitude journal (it’s been about 3 weeks so far and it’s definitely helping).
• Stop talking with other people about health/nutrition, unless they are my patient. 🙂 Seriously though, I think that talking about it so much has actually slowed my recovery. I’m ready to ditch the label of “sick person”, which I think I unconsciously adopted.

Mindset goals:

• Stop holding on to things I can’t control. When I get angry or worried about somebody else’s decisions, shift my focus to something awesome in my life or do something nice for myself.
• Assert myself more. Get up in the morning with purpose, re-commit to my morning ritual, ask myself “what do I want right now?” a lot, especially in mundane scenarios like when deciding what to make for breakfast or what to wear on a particular day. (On a related note: compromise is important in a relationship, but knowing what you want is a precursor to effective compromising.)
• Adopt more of a “HELL YEAH! Or No” attitude when potential opportunities  and partnerships arise.

Work goals

My work goals are pretty simple. In 2014 I’m committing to two main areas: Growth and writing.

Growing Puttylike

In the next year, I want to triple the size of the community here at Puttylike. This is going to require me to take a lot more risks and I’m going to be keeping Pam Slim’s 20X Rule in my mind (I might even hang a “20X” reminder on my wall).

Writing my book

I got pretty heavy into speaking last year, but lately I’ve been finding that preparing for talks has impeded my ability to write my book. Typical multipod dilemma, but it’s time to shift some things around.

I’ve been aching to write my new book, Multipotentialite, and just haven’t had the time. So once my big Colorado talk is over at the end of January, I will be strategically adopting the label of “Writer” and each day I will get up and WRITE. I received the book, Daily Rituals for Christmas and it has inspired me to really take my craft more seriously and get this baby out to the world.

There will be other projects certainly. I want to do more coaching, update a few things here at Puttylike and continue to outsource the parts of running this business that don’t inspire me. I also want to plan an in-person retreat with my mastermind group and write a lot of powerful blog posts for you guys over the course of the year.

Non-work / other passions

Science

I’m going to be pursuing my interest in science in a more formal way by taking some classes at community college. This is not necessarily with any career aspirations in mind (though if it leads me there, cool), but rather, for personal interest. I want to take chemistry, biology, A&P… I already know a lot about brain chemistry, autoimmunity and gut dysbiosis through my own research, now I just need to understand the basics.

Music

I will be recording another album in a month with my band, Tip of the Hat. Year 2, the tradition continues!

Working with teenagers

I would love to find an opportunity to work with teenagers, maybe as a camp counselor at Rock Camp for Girls or if I could find an on-going volunteer position helping out at a high school drama club, that would be awesome. No opportunities have yet presented themselves, but it’s something I will be looking into.

Do more nice, unexpected things for others

A few weeks ago, a very kind admissions officer at a community college made a call and stretched the truth to get around some dumb bureaucratic rule so that I could take my placement test.

I was having an awful morning that day and he turned it around for me.

The next day I went back, thanked him again and brought him some chocolate. He was touched. I could tell that he was going to go home and tell his wife about it, maybe even brag to his colleagues while enjoying his chocolate. I knew I’d made his day and it felt amazing.

It got me thinking. I would really love to make people’s days more often through small and honest gestures. I’ll be seeking out opportunities to do more nice things in 2014. It feels good and I like  letting people know how awesome they are and how much I appreciate them.

**

So that’s it. It’s not concise, the way that “embodiment” was last year (that theme, by the way, really didn’t end up having much bearing on my year). But I’ve thought a lot about what I want and I’m pretty excited to be moving forward into the new year.

Your Turn

What are your goals for 2014?