This year, I decided to draft a shorthand list of my goals that I can refer to throughout the year. Some of these are tied to longer-term strategies and plans, but most are just for fun.
I also left four slots empty for goals that I want to add during each quarter of the year. I’m trying to add one additional goal per quarter as they occur to me throughout the year.
Now that we’re wrapping up the second quarter of the year, it’s time to check in on my goals and see how things are going.
Here are my 22 goals for 2022 and the progress I’ve made so far:
Reading Goals
- Post at least two videos per month to my YouTube channel related to books and reading (you can check out my YouTube channel here). So far, so good. I’ve posted 8 videos about reading to my YouTube channel in the first quarter of the year and another 6 videos in the second quarter of the year. While I’d like to do some extra reading vlogs, I’m not stressing about it. At minimum, I’m focused on a TBR video and debrief video each month and that’s working well so far.
- Read over 150 books throughout the year (see what I’m currently reading by connecting with me on Goodreads). I’m definitely on track with this! I passed 130 books read in June so I’m well on my way to completing this goal over the summer.
- Read the 14 books in Robert Jordan’s “Wheel of Time” series. This goal is moving forward, but a little slower than I had hoped so I need to pick up the pace. I’ve read four books in the series so far and I’m continuing to enjoy it. Listening to this series on audio is also something I can highly recommend.
- Read the 17 books in Louise Penny’s “Inspector Gamache” series. This goal is also going well so far. I’ve read nine of the books in this series at the halfway point of the year, so I’m on track to complete the series this year.
- Complete an alphabet reading challenge each month to read more books that I already own (see more about this challenge in this YouTube video). This has been one of the most fun parts of my reading life this year! In January I read books that started with “T,” in February I read “F” books, March was books that started with “M,” April was “N” books, May was “B” books, and June was “U” books. This has been a great method for diversifying my reading and working my way through books that I’ve had in my digital library for a while.
- Contribute to a little free library in my neighborhood. I located a couple of little free libraries within walking distance of my house and I’ve contributed books a couple of times now, so this goal is completed!
- Visit all of the 26 different branches of the Denver Public Library and choose my favorite one. So far, I’ve visited two of these branches that are closest to me and I saw no progress on this in Q2. One challenge is the limited hours of some of the branches, so I need to make a more strategic plan to complete this goal.
- Maintain my daily Spanish language practice (so that I can eventually read fluently in Spanish). Even though I’ve been able to do this practice daily, I’ve mostly been reviewing what I already know versus learning new vocabulary. Similar to my update in Q1, I’d like to devote a little more time to this so that I can increase my knowledge over time rather than just maintain the knowledge I already have.
Goals that support my mental, physical & emotional health
- Experiment with an art journal (and fill the 240-page sketch book I bought for this purpose). This is a goal that I’m considering retiring. Although I like the idea of this goal, I’m not really motivated to practice it at all. I’d rather swap this out for something more interesting to me, so I’ll consider that in Q3.
- Meditate daily for at least 15 minutes. This is definitely not happening every day. I love this habit when I can squeeze it in, so this is going to stay on my goal list for Q3.
- Complete at least one 30-day yoga challenge. I haven’t completed a 30-day challenge yet and that may be a bit ambitious given my schedule and other fitness goals. I’m thinking I might replace this goals with completing a day-long yoga retreat (even if self-designed) instead.
- Explore at least five different walking trails in the Denver area. No progress on this goal, but I’ve gotten a few recommendations from colleagues about good trails to try so I just need to carve out some time for this one.
- Walk 10k steps per day the majority of the days in the year (183+ days). This is a goal that I saw some progress with in Q2. In Q1, I had only hit 10k steps 19 days, but in Q2 I started a more consistent walking practice and now I’m at 42 days. That is still on track to hit 183+ days before the end of the year, so we’ll see how much progress I can make in Q3.
- Walk or run over 1000 miles throughout the year (on average, a little less than 3 miles per day). I logged about 55 miles in Q1 and added another 100 miles in the last month of Q2. For the second half of the year, 1000 miles may be a little optimistic, but since I’m back to regular walking every day on my treadmill I may be able to get close.
- Walk a half marathon. The longest mileage I’ve walked this year is a 10k and I’ll need to more than double that to meet this goal. It hasn’t happened yet, but I’m still looking forward to doing this in 2022.
Goals with my partner
- Pay off 15% of our mortgage. So far, we’ve paid off just shy of 7% of our overall mortgage this year. I’m really happy with this progress since we’ve had steady extra payments each month.
- Double the amount in our current savings account by the end of the year. This is a similar update from Q1: we’ve been able to add a little to our savings, but we also learned of some additional updates that we need to make to our house that may impact this goal. I may adjust this goal later in the year once we get all the estimates for the work we need to do.
- Watch all the Star Trek movies with my partner. I have no extra progress on this goal for Q2. We have watched two of these movies so far and have 11 left to watch. My partner and I started watching Bones and that’s where most of our tv watching time is going right now.
TBD
- TBD for Q1 — I decided to add an additional reading goal to try and read 22 books for each month of 2022. So far, I’ve been able to do this for every month this year.
- TBD for Q2 — My extra goal for this quarter was to complete a change management certification with ProSci and I can mark this goal as completed!
- TBD for Q3
- TBD for Q4
How are your goals for 2022 going so far?