Well, after COVID-19 took a dump on my 2020 goals, I’m hoping for a marginally more productive 2021, we’ll see. I know calendar nerds claim that decades and centuries start with the “1” and end with the “0” – so perhaps 2020 was simply the completion of the crap-show of the 2010’s (I’m looking at you 2016).

After last year, I’ll be trying even harder to use “SMART” goals. That said, here we go:

1. Follow a piano practice schedule with some degree of personal accountability built-in (I’m thinking right now a practice log – that I can place near the piano and record thoughts for practice sessions).
2. Complete another couple of graduate school classes.
3. Read a book a month. Join a “Virtual book club” perhaps. This was one of the more positive goals I worked with last year, and I’m going to do my best to keep it!
4. Build garden boxes for Fin in our front pasture. I built the last garden box right before CV hit, and bought most supplies for more. There’s a few supplies I’m missing, but I should be able to knock out at least one box before planting season. In the event Fin doesn’t feel like planting, grow lots and lots and lots of peppers.
5. Practice writing – creative and professional. I’m currently researching non-daily journals and organizers. The guided journals I’ve tried so far have been really hit/miss and it’s been difficult to add them to my routine. For creative writing – I’m going to try to one short story of some sort a month. For professional writing – I’ll be working on a few essays / guides.
6. Build and publish a blog roll for this and my professional blog. Sadly, not so many people appear to be blogging anymore – but I’m going to keep at it. Maybe if you come, someone will build it. This is an ongoing effort from the previous year, but it’s progressing enough to include again.
7. Achieve “unpacked” status in the house. I’m hoping that this means everything is in a proper place – but at a minimum, we could always put up some shelving in our out building and pack things there. We’ve made some serious progress to “unpacked” at the homestead – but we need to double down and concentrate on it!
8. Improve / build some new skills. Right now, I’m looking at building wood working and canning skills – but if normalcy returns there might be more options. I’ve bought several things for doing small wood working projects, and it’s time that I get to using them. I really need to figure out accessibility though. I’ll probably write more about this later. For canning, I’m hoping to do some Mexican / Texan classic relish. Hopefully with garden results, but store bought can work too.
9. Rethink social media / networking and advertising based accounts. This is the most “resolutiony” of my goals, as it doesn’t follow the SMART framework (the other goals I have more measurable ideas even than I’m posting here!). Sadly, online presence is a mix of different challenges. The goal for the next year is to catalog and rethink what accounts I’m using where. Hopefully, this will mean minimizing the impact of major social networks on my life and finding different ways to communicate with friends family.
10. Maintain accountability by reporting here. Prior to the overwhelming crap storm and depression that came from it (some related to CV19, but a large amount also not and from a variety of source) – I stopped updating this blog and stopped progressing on my goals last year. This year, I’m hoping to keep the updates coming and hopefully stay accountable to myself to get things done. Additionally, instead of yearly goals, I’m starting to consider keeping a quarterly list and updating – but that’s perhaps something else to write about.

As always, the river of time will carry you away to a destination regardless of whether you want to move or not – the best we can do is steer toward where we want to go and keep an eye out if we should correct course. Best wishes for 2021 everyone.