If you read my Planning For A Kickass New Year post, you know that I’ve been thinking on my goals and my process for it all for a while now! But I’m a weirdo and I don’t actually set everything in stone until the first week of the new year because a big part of my ~process~ is to reflect on the past year as a whole (and the holidays get too crazy for me to really do that…and honestly pre-baby I was always too hungover on the 1st to do anything productive).
I thought maybe it would be interesting to share my “process” of how I reflect on the year and try to channel it into the goals I’ve been setting for 2018 and just allow myself to LET THINGS GO that I don’t want to bring into 2018 with me.
P.S. Check out my Best of 2017 post!
3 Things I Want To Leave In 2017
1. Worrying about things I can’t control (I did A LOT of that re: things with Riley especially and like worrying about why someone did or said this or that)
2. Feeling guilty over things I can’t change
3. Being distracted by my phone
3 Things I Want To Bring Into 2018 With Me
1. The burst of creativity I had in the past few months of 2017 (especially in relation to this blog…after feeling pretty MEH for most of the year)
2. My village (my village of family and friends were so, so crucial in 2017 and I want to keep that close connection)
3. The joy I’ve found in motherhood (I’d really like that to continue…despite the ups and downs I’m sure will happen)
An Obstacle Of 2017 That I’d Like To Hurdle Right Over In 2018
Less time to do all the things I want!!! Clearly I can’t go buy more time and my life has changed so that I don’t HAVE as much free time as I did pre-Riley. But I don’t want that to stop me — I want to learn how to make the most of my time, delegate, prioritize, ask for help and be more efficient/manage my time. You know…rather than wasting time whining that I don’t have enough time.
What Didn’t Work In 2017
Not believing in myself & letting things like fear/the unknown/anxiety get in my way of things
How I will change it in 2018: Stop doubting myself by taking inventory of all the ways I kicked ass. Taking the plunge on a few things I hemmed and hawed about in 2017 because of fear/the unknown.
What Worked In 2017
Leaning on my village + teamwork between Will and I
My One Word For 2018 That Will Guide All My Goals & Such
CREATE
My one word was almost “DO” because I wanted to be focused on taking action this year but I decided on create because I think it works. This year I do want to focus on ~creating~ more than I consume. But create goes deeper for that for me. This is the year I really want to create the life that I want (that sounds so corny). BUT REALLY. So often I just keep going on the path that has been put before me and forget that I can create the life I want. Don’t like my job? Create the path I want instead. I want to create opportunities if I don’t like the ones that naturally are before me. I want to create systems and processes that work for me. I want to create solutions to things that bother me. I could go on. I think the word will really for me and help inspire me in my goals and the problems I may face.
I’m not quite sure that I want to share ALL my specific goals (maybe I can find a way to in my Monthly Rewinds) but I figured I can share some of my very general goals that I’ve hammered out into smaller, specific and more actionable goals:
Blogging: ~Officially~ make the change from “book blogger” to “lifestyle blogger” — it’s definitely the right direction for me as I’ve naturally found myself toeing the line for years. I feel so renewed in my blogging journey and as I’m in my 8th year of it I find that to be a pretty fantastic feeling. Don’t worry, there will still be a good amount of book stuff because that’s who I am through and through…but for myself I needed to relabel my blog and give myself permission to be something else. Hard to do that after almost 8 years!!
Health & Fitness:
1. I want to be gentle with myself and my body, first and foremost. I carried a kid and birthed one (rather traumatically I might add)….my body is awesome. It’s done things I can’t even believe it did…and I was there. Secondly, I do want to get back into exercising. But I want to be gentle with myself in how out of shape I might be…but also push myself. If that makes sense?
2. (this is a Will and I goal because we got off track healthy eating wise since having Riley) but we want to get back into it and find some simpler meals and get a good rotation that become staples. Before Riley we ate healthy but some of the meals were a little complicated but we didn’t care and we took forever to find different meals on Pinterest and combing through our favorite food blogs (we barely ever ate the same thing). We actually just took a step on this goal TONIGHT as I write this and bought this gigantic Healthy Eating bundle on sale and I’m so glad I found it. We flipped through it and I’m excited to try the meals! Meal-planning has become the bane of our existence, to be honest. We have less time to spend so much time scrolling through Pinterest/blogs to find healthy meals and we got rid of all of our cookbooks because #space so this was the most perfect solution for us!! I mean, there’s literally everything (paleo, crockpot meals, budget meals, quick meals, keto, also a whole bundle about batching/freezing which is something Will and I have talked about). You can buy just the ones you want but we got the whole thing because we were interested in most of all of it and it was obviously the better value if I did my maths right (although I don’t math well so lol)
Career: I’ve been….just ignoring this one for too long. If you have been following the blog for this long…I got laid off from my marketing/social media job in 2012 (a week before my wedding!) and I was unemployed and busting my butt to look for a new job for a year. I had to get a job when my unemployment went out so I started nannying. I kept looking for jobs and trying to carve out what my next move would be….and nothing. I struggled hardcore with depression during that time and I finally just quit for a while and just kept nannying (I mean, at that point, 3 hours out of my workday I got paid to read while the kids napped). I started trying again and I just felt…lost. I didn’t know what I wanted anymore and I got more and more discouraged….and just stayed where I was. I wasn’t really happy but I just let myself be “content” with it. I love the kids (most of the time) and the parents are awesome but it’s just not what I want…though I am endlessly grateful I have a job right now that allows me to spend my days with Riley. SOOOOO…this year is going to be the year that I get my shit together with this and really figure out what my next move is because just being content (but not the good kind of content) is NOT WORKING.
Relationships: I want to make my marriage a HUGE priority. Already in the almost 6 months of being a family of 3 (well, 4, if you count Finn) and I can already see how you have to be super intentional about your marriage (and really all relationships) after having a baby. I also really want to keep maintaining my amazing friendships I have right now. For the first time in a long time I’m super content with my circle and I don’t have any of those relationships that feel like they just put more stress on me than anything else…the ones I just kept dragging along with me because I couldn’t cut ties for whatever reason.
Organization: This is the big one! I feel like my life is chaos in ever way. I need to get it under control big time — my physical space and digital space.
Book Related Goals: I want to unhaul HALF of my books. God, I’m sweating/crying just thinking about it. But the reality is that there are a lot of books I’ve had on my shelf for WAY TOO MANY YEARS and they’ve gone unread so it’s time they find other homes. If I ever want to pick them up in the future I’ll go to the library. Along with that, I need to get rid of half the books on my Goodreads or at least organize my TBR better. I set my reading goal for 40 books but I don’t really care if I meet it or not. I’m more interested in just reading the books I really want to read with my limited time.
I’d love to hear about your plans/goals/one word for 2018 is!! I’m excited for what is in store for me (and you all!)
P.S. Check out my Best Of 2017 post!
[Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links which means that if you click on a link and purchase something I’ve talked about or recommended, I’ll receive a very small percentage of the sale. Please see my disclosure policy for more info.
Chelsea says
Love this post and all of your insight. You have inspired me to make some goals myself. I would love seeing monthly posts of goal updates. Please share any good and easy recipes you find! 🙂
Jennifer @ YA Book Nerd says
I love your Create goal – good luck with all that you want to accomplish this year!
Emily says
I hear ya on the unhauling of books. I did A LOT of clearing out of my shelves last year, and I for sure want to do more!
And I definitely understand wanting to go more “lifestyle” vs. “book blogging.” I love reading and talking about books, but I learned while doing BookTube that it’s not the ONLY thing I want to talk about. So, my blog has turned into a book/writing/lifestyle one too.
Brandie says
It’s so easy for a marriage to take a backseat after having a child. It really opened my eyes – to make it work we had to make sure to make time for each other. It’s a balance between work, being a mom and being a wife. And self care is SO important. If you’re not taking care of yourself and doing things that make you happy, you can’t be the best wife and mom. Make sure to put yourself first once in awhile and do things you enjoy. 🙂
April Books & Wine says
Honestly unhauling gets easier and easier the more you do it. Last year I unhauled 560 books. What really made that number jump out of control was that I made a mini goal to record all of my unread physical books. So as I was going through and putting them on goodreads I kept saying to myself, okay I am no longer interested in this book and don’t care. Or, I am moderately interested in this book AND THE LIBRARY HAS IT SO I AM ADDING IT TO MY LIBRARY CATALOG WISHLIST (my library catalog lets you make lists of books so I have a reading wishlist and an audiobook list and a financial books list) and unhauling it.
Also thanks for sharing that meal planning bundle, I think I may end up buying it. We eat terribly and eat out like every other day. Now that I have to pay the full amount on my student loans (not eligible for income based) we have to cut back on spending so much which means that our biggest expense after the mortgage is all the money we spend on restaurants (in December we spent $307 at Restaurants and $14 on fast food).
Give yourself permission! I will love whatever you write. Alsoooooo did you ever write the book that was in your head? I remember you were talking about that idea and it sounded excellent.
OH AND SPEAKING OF CAREER idk if you know this but if you sign up for Activate with Bloglovin you get the opportunity for Sponsored Posts and can make some okay side money on that. Like I have a sponsored FB post coming up for diapers and I’ll be making $50. Which isn’t too bad and I got free diapers out of it too!
Jessica says
I totally relate to your book struggle! It surprised me that I have so many books, collected over the years, that I haven’t read or won’t re-read soon. I’m still in the process of cleaning them out and finding second homes for them.
I’m excited for the changes that you’re officially starting for your blog! It’s been a journey and I can’t wait to see where it takes you next! I think “create” is such a nice motto for 2018 since it encompasses so much.
Linda says
Two of my biggest goals are maintaining relationships better and eating better. I really, really need to get my cooking game in shape. At some point I “realized” (or maybe decided?) that I don’t like cooking and it has become this internal narrative that I need to rid myself of. My biggest issue is that I don’t have an organized rotation, so every week when my husband and I sit down to plan meals/grocery shopping we just have no ideas, and there are so many recipes out there it’s overwhelming. I need a better way of keeping track of what I’ve made in the past and liked so I can make the same things. Cooking is actually easier when you’re not starting out with a new recipe each time that you’ve never made before. Plus, you get to use up the weird ingredients you bought for that one recipe and never used again (I’m looking at you, pomegranate molasses.)
On the relationship front, I tend to just get together with a couple of my closest friends and hardly ever see my less-close friends who I actually like to hang out with but don’t make a priority. I never regret getting together with someone, but often avoid making plans in the first place because my alone time is so precious. I need to get out of this cycle! I also need to make my relationship with my husband more of a priority. It’s so easy to slip into just doing chores and things together and not actually doing fun activities. Plus we have a *very* difficult dog and for the longest time every time we’d even go out to eat, we’d end up just talking about the dog and all of her problems. Ridiculous. Thankfully she is practically like a normal dog now so we can move our attention to other things. I’m looking forward to working on these goals this year!
Michelle says
In reading your reasons for your word, I totally agree that it is a fantastic word for you. You created a new life in 2017, so focusing on creating the life you want to live is a perfect next step in 2018. I look forward to seeing where your journey takes you this year!
Lisa @ Reading, Writing, and Random Musings says
I love this post! I love how you have reflected on what works and what doesn’t and where you want to go from here. I often think about the things I want to change, but I don’t think I’ve spent enough time thinking about what is working and how to capitalize on that. Thanks for giving me some food for thought. I may need to do a little more thinking and revise some of my objectives for the year!
Kimberly at The Windy Pages says
That’s awesome! What a great list.
I have some similar ones. My daughter is 21 months now and I’m just getting back into fitness and losing weight (thankfully). So that’s a top priority for 2018 as well as unhauling books too. There are just too many honestly and they make me anxious so I’ll be a lot less patient with my reading time and focusing more on physical books instead of digital ARCs or ebooks.
Good luck with your goals!
Leandra says
I got rid of most of my book collection over the past year, too. They were taking up so much space, and like you, I knew I wasn’t going to read many of them. So now I have just one bookcase, that have only my favorites on it, and that I reread often. So when I look at my bookcase, it’s like looking at old friends! =) I hope your 2018 is beautiful!
Nereyda says
I got laid off from my job in 2013 and nannied for almost 3 years and I feel you. I adored the kid I nannied and was grateful for the job but ig was hard on my confidence and self esteem. Lots of great goals, my word of the year this year is Me because I really want to focus on myself and self care.
Alice says
I didn’t set goals for 2018, but I decided to blog about my monthly ones this year, I feel more comfortable about them 🙂
I’m glad you decided to go back blogging and lifestyle is more flexible and allows you to be more, well, YOU in my opinion. I’m excited for you!
Charlie says
The past year and a half I have also been struggling with anxiety, which I didn’t recognize as that until this spring (and then I was in somewhat of denial for months). I am feeling so much better about life and more motivated and I am so glad you found that, too! I look forward to seeing where you go this year. I hope you find that job you love – I’m also looking!
Chrissi Reads says
I love reading your posts as you write in a style that makes me feel like I know you. It’s lovely. I do hope you achieve your goals this year. <3
Annemieke says
I hear you on the career. My contract did not get prolonged during my pregnancy (and it wasn’t a job that I could combine with a kid as I had to be too flexible). I always thought I would want to go back to work quickly but as I am now a stay at home mom I feel quite comfortable with that. But I also might be scared to get out of my comfort zone. I don’t know if I would want to return back to my previous line of work (people with learning (and sometimes physical) dissabilities).
I hope you are able to find your way this year in the career and organizing path. It can be a struggle but when putting in the effort can be quite rewarding. <3
Haley says
I love the word “create” for defining the year. That’s a great one.
This year I don’t really have all that specific of a goal. I moved to a new country last year, though, which meant a lot of things fell to the wayside as I adjusted. And by “a lot of things” I mostly mean Internet things, like social media and my blog, but also reading as well. Really my only specific goal for 2018 is getting back into books and my blog now that I’ve settled, more or less, into my new city and job.
Aubrey D. Aster says
This is such a good little reflection post! Thank you for sharing. It’s fun to see what people want to work on in the coming years. I might use this formatting at some point if that’s okay 🙂
Jamie says
Absolutely! And thank you!