Please excuse this huge picture of my face, but I think it best represents what I want to remember going into 2020 — stop taking everything so seriously & just have fun with it.
Here are 20 things I want to work on in 2020.
Personal & Home
- Custom design my own 2020 planner
This is more like a 2019 goal, but I’m putting it here because I feel like I won’t follow through on it otherwise. Coming into 2020, I want to get more organized and have a better system to be more productive. I’ve been trying various things like bullet journaling and making to-do lists all over the place but I have not been able to make it a regular habit. I’ve been seeing a ton of different types of goal setting notebooks and systems out there lately, but none of them fully captures what I need in a planner.One morning, it became obvious what needed to happen. If I don’t like what’s out there, then I need to design and print my own. With one Google search, I found this inspiring blog post:ย 3 Steps to Design & Print Your Own Custom Planner for Under $10… that’s all it took to convince me this is something I needed to do this year. I’m putting it as #1 because there’s no backing out of this one even though this feels like it goes against my core belief that I should not be wasting my time on something I can just spend some money on. More to come on this one. ๐ - Journal at least 1x a week
Journalling is different than using a planner that’s meant for productivity. I want to journal to just write some thoughts down. Comes from my 2019 insight of, if you don’t write it down, you’re going to forget it all. - Continue working on the house. Install our mudroom. Study if I’m feeling ambitious.
Home ownership (for me) means a never ending list of projects to do. Hoping I can get all the really big ones out of the way in the next few years though! I’m currently most excited about the mudroom. I want to install the PAX closet system from Ikea in the mudroom and hire a contractor to help me install the baseboards/crown molding on it so it looks fully integrated. Doesn’t seem like TOO difficult of a task right? - Make wedding album
Yea, we got married in 2017, so…. I’ve lagged on this because I didn’t want to choose my favorites. I love them all!! #indecisiveperfectionist - Make photo books for our travels
This goal is 80% for J, and 20% for me. We’ve been talking about doing this, but let’s be honest, I’m the photographer and designer of the family so, it falls on me. - Work on my summer garden
This one easily doubles as spending some time with my dad (who’s super into gardening). - Keep up reading habit – 24 books in the year?
Going to make this goal a flex goal and also count audiobooks if needed. ๐
Family & Friends
- Host the 10th annual Mas-giving
10 years ago, I hosted our friend’s first ever “Mas-Giving”, which is a cross between a Christmas and Thanksgiving celebration. I love that we have this as our unique take on “friendsgiving” and I’m proud to see it going strong 10 years later! Can’t wait to do something extra for our 10th annual. ๐ - Recruit cousins to start a new tradition for my family (and then do it)
I’m a sucker for traditions. Originally this goal was going to be “Host a family gathering at home 1x a quarter,” but I decided to think more expansively and figure out how to delegate. During my senior year of college, I started getting sappy that it was going to be our last year together in school. I decided we needed to see each other more so I started something we call “The Senior Project”. Every month, we assigned someone to plan a fun event for us and it made it just that much more special to see each other and hang. I imagine this new family tradition can look something like that. - Host more dinner parties w/ friends. The one theme that excites me the most: Cook recipes out of the same cookbook
Maybe the only way I can make sure this happens is to put it on the calendar now.ย ๐ค - Birthday & Christmas Cards
Over the years, I’ve received a number of cards from friends for my birthday and Christmas. I rarely reciprocate and I’ve started to feel guilty for not writing back. It’s always so nice to receive paper mail that’s not some stupid bill or catalog.The very practical side of me thinks that cards are dumb because it’s a waste of paper and the Marie Kondo in me tells me that paper goods like this end up in the trash anyway. But, I’m starting to have a change of heart. I think it’s a nice way to stay in touch with people who I don’t see often. I also really enjoy receiving Christmas cards because it puts me in the holiday spirit. So, sorry planet earth, but I’m going to become a cards person for a year and see how it goes.
Health, Nutrition & Fitness
- Complete 2 cleanses: Clean Cleanse & Whole 30
As mentioned in my 2019 Year in Review, my cleanse game has been very off. I want to get back into the habit of doing them again because it’s a good forcing function to get me to eat healthier and cook more at home. - Do a vegetarian month
This is something that I’ve thought about doing for a while now, but never committed to. I think this will be a fun experiement to add to my list of cleanses that I already do. Was talking to a vegetarian co-worker about this and he challenged me to do this in a month where I have to travel a lot for work so I can have more empathy for how it is for vegetarians who have to go to a lot of work events and then have no options. I’ll think more about that. ๐ - Do HIIT workouts 3x a week – planned with Natalieย
Applying a few learnings from 2019 to my 2020 goals:- I can not trust me to keep myself accountable for working out. I need a workout buddy to guilt trip me into doing it. Enter Natalie. (Thanks Natalie!!)ย
- BBG is good in theory, but we’re too old for this. Natalie and I did a whole year of BBG (Kayla Itsines’sย Bikini Body Guide)ย togetherย in 2017. We were in the best shape of our lives! After a whole year of laziness, we decided to try it again this year. We’ve learned that the workout is just too unrealistic for us to do long termย (too much jumping and too much equipment set up for no good reason).
- 7 min circuits with 30 sec/1min rest in between.ย What we both like about BBG is that it’s super short, only 30 minutes of your time, and that there’s a pre-planned workout that we don’t have to think about. This combo removes the friction of working out regularly. This year, we’re going to create our own version of BBG — still going to be challenging, but likely heavier weights, less jumping and easier to do from home.
- Be the type of person who works out (almost) every day
We all know the benefits of exercise. Recently I got a Peloton bike which means there’s almost no reason for me not to just jump on the bike for 20 minutes to start the day. Going to see how I can make this a habit.
Blog & YouTube
- Start my YouTube channel & post at least 6 videos
Ever since I started my new job at YouTube, I’ve been recording a lot of videos of food in addition to taking pictures. I want to do something fun with that footage and also practice some of the advice that I regularly give to clients. - Create Templates for key blog post formats: City Guide, Restaurant Reviews
As much as I try to fight my identity as a Food and Travel blogger, those are my two genuine interests in life. So… I guess instead of trying to fight this, I’m going to put some work upfront to make writing these types of posts super easy. I’ve been thinking about creating pre-determined templates or forms that I can just fill in, kind of like my own version of Google Maps, Yelp and Trip Advisor — but personalized. Do you see a theme here? (Ahem, #1 & #14 goals on this list.) - Finish out some of my “back log” content
No shortage of content ideas here, just lack of time or personal interest/motivation to do it. ๐ - Be more insights and data driven (like how I would advise people in my day job)
Something that I think a lot about is what I would do different on this blog if it was my full time job. To start, I want to be more experimental to make this more fun while also adopting a more data driven mindset. While I’m doing this blog as my own creative outline, I think it will be even better if it’s actually being used by other humans.
Career
- Work hardย smartย and be nice to people
I have a set of OKRs at work that I’m clearly not going to list out here. But, here’s some key themes of how I want to work differently this year:- Work smarter, not harder. I think I already work hard enough, so what needs to change is actually to work smarter and prioritize the projects and tasks that will make a meaningful difference.
- Delegate where possible.ย I have a tendency to want to do it all myself, but if I want to working smarter, I need to learn how to recruit help where possible and use all the resources that I have available to me.
- Chill out, it’s all going to be okay.ย See “Futility Burnout“. I’m learning to be less attached to specific results, but to enjoy the daily grind a little bit more. I get really stressed out thinking that I’m doing a terrible job if nothing ends up happening but in the grand scheme of things, I should just realize that it’s all going to be okay.
So, that’s it for my 2020 goals. What does your list look like? Would love to hear in the comments below!
