At the end of 2021 I decided to abandon the traditional New Year’s Resolutions in favour of setting goals month by month. I decided on four themes that would serve as threads holding the goals together throughout the year.First published on Jan 1, 2023
At the end of 2021 I decided to abandon the traditional New Year’s Resolutions in favour of setting goals month by month. I decided on four themes that would serve as threads holding the goals together throughout the year.
From a simple data perspective it went as follows:
Not great. I’ve been pondering the successes and failures over the past few days and, whilst far from definitive, have concluded that I lost sight of the over-arching themes and descended into making a high level to-do list rather than actionable and important goals.
That’s not to say it was all a failure. The monthly accountability proved excellent for getting things done that I wouldn't have otherwise. Things like Eat at a Michelin star restaurant, which I ended up doing five times, or Research and buy new camera. These are things I’ve wanted to do but quickly forget about or de-prioritised. The monthly review and goal setting was a great way of keeping my ADHD riddled brain on track and getting things done.
It is apparent that the system fails when things are hard. Any goal that would be of significant effort, especially if fitness related, quickly failed. I tried multiple times to get back into running, to hit Peloton targets and develop a sustained meditation practice. These things that were difficult were easily dismissed and became failed goals.
The four themes I hoped to focus on were Physical Fitness, Mental Fitness/Health, Leaning and Career.
My physical fitness and health are significantly worse now than at the start of the year.
Mental fitness/health is fairly unchanged; ups and downs, strikes and gutters.
Learning, similarly, has been up and down. Lots of big moments of progress and then laziness and lack of discipline to push further.
Career is the standout. I moved to a new company in June and have significantly increased financial freedom, future opportunities and general work satisfaction.
I had an epiphany recently that I am sure many other people have already had. I am not promising anything new or original.
Physical fitness and health are everything.
Everything. Every goal, every idea and everything I do and want to achieve is either drastically heightened by excellent health or prevented in part by poor fitness. Everything.
So that’s it. I will stick to the monthly system to keep myself accountable but there are no themes beyond physical fitness and health. I have faith that everything else will begin to fall into place.
I wish you every success for the coming 12 months. Happy New Year!