So, we’re officially a month into 2022—January has somehow come and went. I’d like to say that I’m going to be even more productive than last year—and I know I will be more productive, but how much more—well that is the question.
I feel like January has been a ‘tester’ month. I started out with large plans, and then the inner critic came out and tossed them all into the wind. I’m realizing that I need to find a ‘harmony’ if you will with my inner critic—a time when I’m more than willing to say ‘I’m done’ for the day, and a time when I politely tell my inner critic that there is still work to be done before playing ‘hokey’.
So, we’re now about six weeks shy of starting year three of the pandemic (the US started shutting things down roughly mid-March 2020), and I’m scared that we’re starting to ‘normalize’ this damn virus and all its variants. In terms of the total number of cases of the virus within the US, when I published ‘December in Review’ on January 1st, I noted that we had reached almost 55.7 million cases and now as of January 31st—we have reached a little over 76.2 million cases (that is 20 million cases in a month). The numbers are going up due to the omicron variant that is more contagious than the previous variants (and doesn’t seem to care if one has had their vaccine and booster shots or not).
Its looking like the younger kids (under the age of five) could be eligible for vaccines come as early as March or April—that means if everyone does their part, we may just be able to see the end of the pandemic within a year or so. Because, as I mentioned last month—the only way this pandemic is going to get under control is vaccinate, vaccinate, vaccinate, and also listening to those who have decades of experience working with infectious diseases.
I managed to get several posts published on the blog/website during January—but I didn’t get to updating/modifying the last set of pages I’ve been needing to—again the inner critic won that round of ‘battles’. I’d mentioned that I’d removed the games I’d been playing on the kindle at the end of December—only to re-download and overplay them again this month. I deleted them from both the kindle and my amazon cloud today—so there is won’t be giving into any urge to download to play occasionally.
But before I can look ahead to setting goals for February, I need to look back at the goals I set for January and how I did with each of them.
The goals for January included:
- 130-155,000 steps
- Continue with a second round of Morning Meltdown 100 (may only be M-F)
- Read at least one non-fiction book from my 2022 non-fiction book BINGO card
- Continue setting up my ‘master’ plan for 2022-2025 (and beyond)
- Read two to four (if not more) fiction books (and write mini-book reviews to be posted on the blog and other sites)
- No spend days/no spend weeks/ Limited spending week
- Time outdoors, meditation/sitting quietly, daily gratitude journal entries, and daily oracle card drawings
- Craft time
- Continue working on updating the blog/website
- Assignments for the diamond group
- Work through at least one module of a personal/professional development course from my 2022 e-course BINGO card
So how did I do with each of them?
130-155,000 steps: I managed to get a little over 144,000 steps (144,123 steps or 58.91 miles to be exact). There was a walk at Boomer Lake, and a walk with Chaos through the neighborhood this month. I would have preferred to surpass the 155K steps—but I didn’t, though I did get past the bare minimum number of steps.
Continuing with a second round of Morning Meltdown 100: This didn’t really happen. I started it back up at the beginning of the month, but just didn’t feel like pushing play daily. I’ve realized that this is a ‘theme’ at times for me—I complete a program, decide to repeat it and then fizzle for a while before I actually manage to repeat the program (happened with LIIFT4).
Currently I’m thinking of just putting on music and lifting weights three to four times a week, streaming a yoga/Pilates/cardio workout once or twice a week, and then trying to get in a walk on the other day of the week. We’ll have to see how this plan goes.
Read at least one non-fiction book from my 2022 non-fiction BINGO card:
I managed to finish reading the following books:
‘Work Quilting’ by Vicki Walton
‘Girl, Take Back Your Career’ by Solange Lope
I’m now bouncing between several other non-fiction books (like I usually do), though some of them aren’t currently on the 2022 non-fiction BINGO card.
Continuing setting up my ‘master’ plan for 2022-2025 (and beyond):
I mentioned in my Capricorn New Moon goal review post that I’d let my imposter syndrome/inner critic derail me for a good portion of the month, so this was one of the goals that fell by the wayside.
Read two to four (if not more) fiction books:
I managed to read quite a few fiction books this month, though I only wrote and posted mini-book reviews for two of them.
The ‘new’ books I read during January included:
Dusk Unveiled (Ravenwood Coven #2) by Carrie Ann Ryan (book review posted)
Nothing But Ink (Montgomery Ink: Fort Collins #3.5) by Carrie Ann Ryan (book review posted)
The following books by Michele Miller:
From the Wreckage
Out of Ruins
All That Remains
West: Male POV
Into the Fire
After the Fall
Until We Crash
The entire Maverick Billionaire series by Bella Andre and Jennifer Skully; the seventh was just released and I went back and read the first six that I’d bought over the years.
Inked Fantasy by Carrie Ann Ryan
In addition to several ‘re-reads’, that I decided I didn’t need to list out, but I am keeping track of in a spreadsheet so that I can include them in my end-of-the-year total.
No spend days/no spend weeks/Limited spending month:
Nope—January was a bad month in terms of spending. I did delete various games again from the kindle, and then went ahead and deleted them from the ‘cloud’ as well. Hopefully this will help me really curb the impulsive spending.
Time outdoors, meditation/sitting quietly, daily gratitude journal entries, and daily oracle drawings
There was some time spent outdoors this month. With the temperatures bouncing back and forth—there were days spent sitting outdoors, while the next day I barely stepped foot outside.
Mediation/sitting quietly, daily gratitude journal entries, and daily oracle drawings only happened really for the first half of the month, and then inner critic/imposter syndrome derailed me.
Craft time:
I did a little crafting throughout the month (some photography, and color by number). I’m going to try to start another abstract cross-stitch project this coming month as a way of switching things up.
Continue working on updating the blog/website:
Nope. I only managed to post nine blog posts last month, though there was a decent amount of traffic to the page (at least according to wordpress analytics). This will probably be yet another goal for the next two or three months (as I don’t see me getting all the pages I needed redone done in just a couple of weeks).
Assignments for the diamond group:
This has been slightly slow going—remember the saying ‘you are your own worse enemy?’—Well that has been me. I’ve been getting in my own way on a lot of the assignments. I’m slowly working through the mindset/reflective questions (and am thinking that at least one or two of them may become a slightly longer ‘essay’).
There is still another month or so of the group—and I’m aiming to transition by the end of the summer (or at least then find a part time job possibly on campus since I’ll be really tight on funds by then).
Work through at least one module of a personal/professional development course from my 2022 e-course BINGO card:
I’m working through two of the courses on the BINGO card:
Write Your Way to Freedom (a course on becoming a freelance copywriter), and How to work for yourself (an course on Udemy talking about freelancing/side-hustle)
But I did finish watching two other short ‘courses’ on Skill Share:
Productivity Basics: How to become more productive in 4 steps
Personal and Lifestyle Branding: Building your story
It is slightly funny how I started the month with big plans to be highly productive (and even watched a small course on it)—and ended the month being somewhat unproductive.
While I wasn’t perfect with all the goals (and some I wasn’t even in the ballpark of being ‘okay’ with)—acknowledging those mistakes are progress in and of themselves.
I’ve deleted all the games on the kindle that I would spend way too many hours and way too much money on playing. While I bought quite a few books this past month—I read most of them (at least most of the fiction books I’d bought). I’ve also realized that I do get antsy during the day (at times), and that I really do need to find a variety of recipes for protein-rich breakfasts (since I’m pretty certain I’m not getting nearly as much protein as I should be getting).
I’m still debating on whether or not to do the monthly spending challenge updates (especially in light of how much I spent this month)—but it is a way of keeping myself accountable.
So, January wasn’t the ‘perfect’ month—but I’m not aiming for perfection, I’m aiming for progress, and progress was made.
I read two non-fiction books, and have started several others (and I’m over halfway through one of those), I watched two short courses, and spent part of the time earlier this month working through a couple of other courses.
I deleted the games (not just from the kindle, but from the amazon cloud as well)—that means I have to ‘search’ for them if I want to download them again, and not to mention having to ‘start’ from the beginning.
The goal is still to ‘change’ this year—getting a remote position, starting the freelance side-gig, and everything else that I want to be trying to do—I’m not going to let ‘Pam’ stop me, she may slow me down quite a bit—but I’m going to keep moving forward.
Therefore the goals for February will include:
- 120-140,000 steps
- Daily Intentional Movements (walks, chores, lifting weights, yoga, and so forth)
- Read at least one non-fiction book (preferably from the BINGO card, but not required)
- Read at least two-to-four fiction books (and have mini book reviews posted on the blog and other sites)
- No spend days/no spend weeks/limited spending month
- Time outdoors, meditation/sitting quietly, daily gratitude journal entries, and daily oracle card drawings
- Daily craft time
- Work through at least one module of a personal/professional development e-course on the 2022 e-course BINGO card
In addition to the above goals—I’m also going to work on improving my time and project management skills as well (as being better at both will help me reach the above goals and all other goals as well).
While I may have ‘missed’ a few goals (or at least completed ‘half’)—I still made progress. Knowing that I was sabotaging myself, and how I was doing it—half the battle, the other half is determining how to ‘fix’ the sabotaging problems so that I am productive as I go forward.
What are some of your favorite time/project management tips or tricks?
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