Set your 2014 personal goals in today’s post. This is the final of three posts on conducting an annual review. Learn how to get started in our initial post and how to set business goals in our second post or download a free PDF of the whole series.
A Well-Rounded Life
Jumping off Preikestolen in Norway towards a new year!
This is the last weekend of 2013. Our last chance in 2013 to reflect, relax and enjoy the beautiful year we’ve had and the great year to come.
In the new year, many of us will set resolutions of how we want our life to be. While some of these resolutions may be business related, most tend to be about your personal life including health, time with those you love and a new skill or activity you want to undertake.
As these resolutions show, a well-rounded life is what we seek. A life in which we find personal and professional contentment.
This year, instead of setting a New Year’s resolution, set personal goals to balance your professional goals. With actionable, measurable personal goals, you can create the life you want to live.
Start with Reflection
Think back to resolutions or goals you made in the previous year. How did you do?
I use the annual goal template inspired by Chris to create goals and also have them on a Google Drive account so they are easy to find and check every three months.
Here are a few of the goals I hoped to accomplish in 2013. These are potential categories you could use while setting your personal goals.
Friends and Family
Like most people, I want to spend time and energy with the people that matter to me. Last year many of my goals were focused around the birth of my baby girl. They included:
- Have a successful home-birth
- Spend two weeks with the baby not working
- Cloth diaper and breastfeed the baby (not me per say, but me as a supporter!)
- Daily focused time with my wife
- Call my Grandma once a month
Check, check check on the first three. I can also do better on spending quality time with my wife, but I think we did very well. I did speak with my Grandma a number of times before she passed away.
This year, I aim to continue caring for our daughter with just one day a week with a caretaker. I also want to meet in-person twice a month with my brother John to just chat, talk monthly with a few key friends and write one letter a day.
Key takeaway: Pursue what you want now because you may not be able to in the future.
Service
A big goal in 2013 was to focus time donated to service organizations so I could do good work for a few instead of going through the motions for many organizations.
My goals were:
- Cancel membership to organizations I’m not helping
- Host a success community Ignite event
- Build a functional SDWAC web presence
I did quit Rotary which I am a big supporter of but which I didn’t devote enough time. I was unable to say no to some pro-bono web projects which always seem to drag me down. I need to improve that next year.
I was proud to host not one but two community events and look forward to next year’s goal of hosting a quarterly community event, the first of which will be TEDxBrookings.
Key takeaway: Make it a priority to quit something. Goals can be doing less, not more.
Travel
Travel fuels my creativity and excites me. I am always happy when I can plan or look forward to a trip. Last year I wanted to make sure travel stayed a part of my life, even as a parent.
I wanted to visit a new country with my daughter in 2013 and earn 100k miles to use for future trips.
Bagels in Montreal
In October my wife and I visited Montreal, Canada with our two month old daughter. It was surprisingly easy and taught us that staying in an apartment through a site like AirBnB helps as does setting expectations of moving slow. I like traveling as a parent because it forces me to enjoy the moment and place where I am as opposed to trying to plan an extra bus ride or flight to see one more thing.
The miles went incredibly well. We were able to put business expenses on a high mileage card and also take advantage of a 100% US Airways mile purchase match. With $400, my wife and I accumulated 80,000 miles, which should be enough for two round trip tickets to Europe in 2014 (plus a free lap child!). If you want to earn lots of miles you can join me in Chris Guillebeau’s Travel Hacking Cartel (I’m a member and affiliate).
This year, I want more of the same. We are going to visit at least one new country and earn another 50k miles.
Key takeaway: If something is important to you, make it a goal and keep it through the stages of your life.
Spiritual and Health
Last year I set the goal of weekly meditation and finding a spiritual home for my family. Neither went to well so those are back on the list this year. To help out, I’m adding a 15 minute block on Mondays and waking up early thanks to Andy Traub.
Health-wise, I was a bit ambitious aiming for climbing once a week, running four 5k’s and 1 half marathon, learning how to swim well and finding five lifts and increasing each by 20% by the end of the year.
This year, I’m tempering my ambition, going for two 5k’s, five lifts once a week, climbing once a month and a walk with my dog every other day.
Key takeaway: Starting is the hard part. If you set goals too high, you may never start.
Financial
I break down financial goals to earning, giving and saving. Last year I had a personal income goal (which I hit), a goal of setting and keeping a monthly budget (not quite there yet), a goal for savings in the bank (made it!) and a goal to max out the IRA (not quite).
This year it’s get debt free! We’ll chip away at student loans, car payments and start a savings account for our daughter (by automatically depositing before I get paid).
Key takeaway: Know yourself. If you need to set aside money at the beginning of the month/year to meet your savings goals, do it.
Create quantifiable goals. When you reach them, increase slightly and go out for a meal (or other reward).
Goals to Balance Work + Play
The past three newsletters we’ve walked through creating an annual review, setting business goals and finally creating personal goals.
For me, a successful and enjoyable year is a combination of achieving what I want professionally and personally. If you’re not living the life you want to live, it doesn’t matter if you’re making lots of money.
In 2014 my word is legacy and that seems to be a term people think a lot about but take little action to achieve. In the coming days you’ll be day-dreaming about what 2014 could be like. Great! Now map out a plan to get there.
What you’ll find by breaking down your vision in to action steps is that you can achieve great things over a long period of time.
- Want to travel to Europe? Save $10 a day for a year.
- Want to run a half marathon? Start with one mile and increase a half mile each week for six months.
- Want to learn a new language? Spend 15 minutes a day on Duolingo.
The hardest part is actually doing what you set out to achieve. To help you, find an “accountability partner.” Someone you tell what you are trying to achieve and someone who will check in and ask if you’re still moving forward.
That is what’s most important: move forward. As we’ve found at 9 Clouds, you can live the life you want from right where you are. You can connect with customers for your business, access information about any topic on earth and communicate instantly with anyone you love.
There is nothing stopping you from living exactly as you dream about as the new year begins.
A Happy New Year
This year, reflect on what makes you happy and do more of that.
One way to find this center of happiness is to think back on the times in your life when you felt the most joy and contentment. What were you doing?
Maybe you were traveling, living in a certain city or surrounded by certain friends or family. When you find the constants in your happiest moments, you can work on making sure those are present in the year to come. For me its travel, time with friends and family and learning.
With a look ahead and a nod to the past, you can make this year exactly how you want it to be.
We’ll be here to help throughout the year, providing inspiration and resources to help you build the businesses and lives you want to live from right where you are. If there’s anything we can do to help you, please let us know.
Thanks for all your support this year and for joining us as we create digital homesteads in the years to come.
