One of the most common New Years resolutions people make this time of year has to do with loss, weight loss to be exact. While losing some weight does sound great to me, I prefer to think about what I want to gain in the coming year. Here’s what I came up with:
- Patience
- Confidence
- Knowledge/wisdom (personal growth, medicine, spiritual/religious, blogging/online world)
- Time
- Health
- Sleep
- Love and friendship
- Money
With these larger themes in mind, I spent some time thinking about the specific goals I have for different areas of my life for the coming year. Instead of having these goals just swimming around in my head, I decided to write them down. There’s such a power in putting things down in writing. It makes it more concrete and real. It also gives you something physical to go back to on a regular basis to see how you are doing and hold yourself accountable. I plan to review these goals weekly as well as periodically (either monthly or quarterly) to see if there are any adjustments I want to make. Here are my more specific goals for the year:
Self
- Daily thought work – 5-10 minutes of writing down my daily thoughts.
- Read 1 book per month (at least 6 personal growth books per year).
- Exercise 20-30 min 3 times per week.
- Get to bed by 11pm 3 nights per week.
- Study the weekly Torah portion.
Marriage
- Date night once per month.
- Write a letter to my husband once a month.
- Overnighter without kids once a year.
Family
- 10 minutes of alone time daily with each child 3 times per week.
- Dinner as a family 3 nights per week.
- Meal plan weekly.
- 1:1 outing with each child every 3 months.
- Overnighter/vacation twice a year.
- Mother/daughter cousins trip once a year.
Friends
- Invite a family for dinner twice a month.
- Adult night with friends twice a month.
- Neighborhood book club once a month.
Medicine
- Read/review a medical journal weekly.
- Attend Grand Rounds weekly.
- Close patient charts by Friday each week.
- Attend 1 medical conference outside of work yearly.
- Present at 1 medical conference yearly.
Money
- Max out my 403B.
- Fully fund my Roth IRA.
- Fund 3 529 accounts.
- Contribute to HSA account.
- Create a written financial plan.
Blog
- Start a blog.
- Learn how to create an email list.
- Learn how to monetize a blog.
So there it is. My goals for the year. It feels a little scary putting them down like this because there are so many and it feels a bit overwhelming. On the other hand, it’s also somewhat of a relief. Now I have something I can look at regularly to help me stay focused.
What are your goals for 2020? What do you hope to gain this year?
