Personal Goals Review 2019 #4 (the finale)
At the end of 2018, I set out some personal goals for 2019. One of these was to review the goals 4 times a year. Links to previous reviews… #1, #2, #3. Here goes for the end of year review .
Here’s the TL;DR summary from the spreadsheet I’ve set up. I achieved all my goals apart from my weight.
>> Read 50 books. Exceeded target. 58 read. Second highest year since I started keeping a log in 1996.
>> Summarise 100% of non-fiction books read. Achieved. 18 non-fiction read, 100% summarised. The summary is simple a three-sentence summary on the index card I use for a bookmark, but this technique continues to prove helpful.
>> Cycle 4000 miles. Target Met. 4346 miles done. I dropped off my activity considerably after cycling LEJOG in June and it wasn’t until Dec that I properly got back on my bike and realised once again how much I enjoy riding my bike.
>> Write 10 Blog Articles. Achieved. 10 published. When you’re week noting, it’s quite hard to develop other ideas into themes. I know it’s a bit cheating to count this update as a blog article, but there are some more substantial items such as my six month reflection in my new job and more daft things like my thoughts on starting a new notebook.
>> Cycle LEJOG. Completed! A very rainy nine days of Cycling in June 2019 — a summary is on our JustGiving page.
>> Get to my target weight for LEJOG. Failed. I got pretty near just before LEJOG, but then it all went to pot. Dropping off the cycling from August for the remainder of the year certainty didn’t help.
>> Write weeknotes. No target (intentionally). I managed to write a weeknote for every full week I was at work, which amounted to 46 in 2019. It has now become a Friday evening habit that feels an essential part of finishing the week well.
>> Find some decent podcasts. The podcasts I was listening to in July have stuck and I’ve added some more. I’m regularly listening to WB-40, The Leadership Quest, Safe for Work, BBC Inside Science, Cautionary Tales, Feakonomics Radio and The Kings Fund. So the challenge now is to find enough time to listen to them all.
Other metrics:
- Gigs attended: 5
- Football Matches attended: 9 (including 5 Boston matches)
- Trips to cinema: 6
Conclusion
I’ve enjoyed the accountability of documenting my targets for the first time this year and publishing quarterly updates. I don’t spend a lot of time thinking if I’m on track or not, because most of these are now part of my normal rhythm of life. Whether I need some new targets or different things in 2020 will be something I’ll think about over the next couple of days.
