Everyone does goals differently. We approach them annually on January 1st or around back to school time. We fix them as permanent staples in our year or revisit and revise every few months. We have a long list of 20 aspirational to-dos or simply one big dream. I always like seeing the different ways people work on getting what they want out of life, so here’s how I do it.
I package my goals according to four major themes: work, life, learning and health (and yes, you better believe I color code them in all my list making).
Work goals encompass anything related to what I do to make money. Things like client projects, admin/billing, or working on aspirational projects I hope will someday contribute to my income.
My current work goals include:
- Maintaining all my regularly scheduled work duties.
- Holding myself to scheduled work blocks instead of just working when I feel like it (hello to the challenges of being your own boss and working from home!!!)
- Exploring a few new avenues for making money and being more creative.
Life goals are things I do to maintain day to day functionality, including chores, errands, and home projects.
My current life goals include:
- Cleaning unwanted stuff out of the house and donating or recycling it (this one is ALWAYS on my list—how do I have this much stuff??)
- Sticking to a chore schedule so I’m not constantly frazzled by a messy house.
- Giving a little DIY update to a few pieces of furniture I’m not totally in love with.
Learning goals include anything I’m interested in learning. That might be brushing up on skills I need for work or investigating something I might want to pursue.
My current learning goals include:
- Doing one Creative Live course per month to keep my ideas fresh and my mind interested. Anyone else use this site? It has so much useful info for free—I love it!
- Reading a few chapters a week from this book to brush up some skills I need for work.
- Learning about managing my money and investing. This is one I’ve been putting off for a long time because it’s intimidating as hell.
Health goals are my favorite because this is where I prioritize my mental and physical health. Anything that keeps me happy and healthy goes into this category, like planning trips, trying a new recipe, scheduling exercise, or making doctor appointments.
My current health goals include:
- Trying a new recipe once a month to keep things interesting in the kitchen. My favorite spots to find new recipes are Joy the Baker, The Kitchn, and Love & Lemons.
- Doing fun outside fall activities like visiting the cider mill, apple picking, and going on hikes.
- Keeping up with a weekly exercise routine that my boyfriend and I have recently embarked on together.
How do you do goals? What are you working on right now?
sooo many things 