What A Year—Things I'll Keep and Things I'll Ditch from 2020
Another Year Older, Another Year Successfully Avoiding Ninja Assassins
This year really felt like it was trying to kill us all.
I love having an early January birthday. I enjoy that it’s a little after the Holiday season because it makes transitioning from Holiday-mode back to regular life a little easier for me. I like that as the world collectively starts a new year, I feel like I’m starting a new year of life as well, and I like that my new year resolutions correspond to both my new age and a new calendar year. (Not to mention being a Capricorn is pretty dope). My 33’rd year of life has officially come to a close—and it was a doozy of a year. Like so many of us, the year had a lot of ups and downs but despite so many low points, I feel really good with where I ended the year. I also feel grateful to be in a position to say that—I know that isn’t the case for everyone.
A Look Back on My 2020 Goals
I hard-core love a good paper daily planner. It’s how I manage my professional career, my creative side projects, my social life (when we aren’t in pandemic times), my fitness, my meal planning, and my year-long goals. Outside of helping me stay organized, it helps me track my progress through the year. My planners also serve as a paired down journal when I need to write out any emotional or creative thoughts in my head.
Looking back through my 2020 planner is much less satisfying than other years. I have full weeks where I didn’t bother to fill out anything—I just wrote “lost week” across the top—and I took most of the year off from creating content so there are just a lot of holes. It feels sadly accurate to the year I had—Busy start, got a bit fuzzy through the middle, finished off strong. Nevertheless, as I flip through my 2020 planner, I was a bit surprised to see how many of my 2020 goals I did manage to still accomplish:
YouTube/Blog—post weekly and have fun with baking/recipe content: This goal I obviously didn’t achieve. I created a few posts and videos but overall created less content in 2020 than any other year since I launched my blog. Why? I think I was going through a period where I was processing a lot of things happening and had no energy to do my own creative work. It was a weird year, so I feel it’s important to not judge myself for anything I didn’t accomplish.
Read 50 books/ Work consistently on my own book: I did hit my 50 book challenge and read exactly 50 books in 2020. This is a goal I set every year and tends to be the easiest one for me to hit as I love disappearing into a book. Work on my own? I started storyboarding something out but never got further. 2020 was a year for feeling very creatively stuck.
Create balance by meditating regularly and enjoying your weekends/time off: Okay, I didn’t meditate as much as I really should have but at the start of 2021, I have picked up the practice again. I did, however, enjoy my weekends. In the past, I would spend my weekends cramming in everything on my to-do list (grocery shopping, meal prepping, cleaning all the things…). Weekends have never felt like time off but more like a hustle to catch up on anything that I didn’t get done during the week. In 2020, I’ve gotten to work from home. I love working from home. I can use my little breaks to stay on top of things like, starting a load of laundry or taking out the recycle. I don’t have to meal prep so much because I can cook and eat all my meals at home. The 2-3 hours I gain back into my day from not having to commute lets me get everything done without feeling rushed or panicked. It gives me time for things like going to the coast for a weekend or spending a full Sunday just playing board games or rewatching every season of the Big Bang Theory. This is the first time in years I actually enjoy my time when I’m not working. It’s been heaven.
Learn a new song on the piano. Learn to bake something new: Done and done!
I also managed to achieve some bigger goals in 2020 that I hadn’t originally planned for the year. Biggest of all, I moved out of the house I was sharing and into my own apartment. I’ve wanted to live alone for years. I’ve had some roommates who are just the best (and some who really weren’t), but I’d also spend a lot of time fixing up the house and the yard, and I simply found taking the leap to move out kind of difficult after all my years there. Exactly a year ago though, my landlord announced she was selling the house. It was the push I needed. In spring I move into my adorable 1940s, vintage apartment. I went from a large, shared house to a 950-square-foot space that I didn’t have to share with anyone. I can decorate as like. I don’t have to share anything I own. I can be unapologetically me in the space. At the end of the summer, my boyfriend moved in so my time alone was technically short, but sharing a space with him hasn’t taken away anything from the experience. I love the home we’ve built together.
I also started a new job in the fall of 2020. Covid delayed my ability to make this career move for many months but I’m very excited to have made the change in my career I’d set out to do last January.
Looking Forward to 2021
After the mess that was 2020, I know many people are forgoing the traditional making of resolutions for 2021—I’m not one of them. I thoroughly enjoy making a set of goals to accomplish in the coming year and refuse to let a pandemic take that away from me. Some of my goals, like my reading goals, are ones I make yearly regardless of if I’ve accomplished them before. Other goals on this list are a bit newer for me. Last year I was a bit more focused on my career and hobbies, whereas this year I’m delving pretty heavy into the health and fitness side of things. To focus on achieving as many as I can this year, I’ll be updating my progress as I go. Get really to share this journey with me:
Fun/Hobbie
Read 50 Books: This is a challenge I set every year. I enjoy tracking my reading and after setting the goal once, my brain won’t let me read anything less without a supreme sense of self-shame. Hello, my name is Gretchen and I have a book addition.
Learn a New Recipe Every Month: I love cooking and baking but it’s easy to fall into a rut. To make sure I’m learning and expanding on what we eat, I’m setting a goal to learn at least one new recipe every month. (Pictured above is the recipe I learned for January—a French recipe from 1662, Marquise au Chocolat.)
Learn a New Song: Because it brings me joy, learning at least one new song on the piano.
Career/Professional Skills
Take a Creative Writing Class: This can be online or a workshop…
Learn a New Skill for Creative Storytelling: Improving significantly on an existing skill also counts.
Redo My Professional Portfolio: My portfolio could use a refresh and now that I’m working full-time at an agency instead of balancing freelance clients, it’s the perfect time to hide it behind a password-protected wall while I give it a little facelift.
Start Saving For Retirement: This is something I haven’t put enough of my monthly resources towards in the past. I know better than to put these things off but life has been unpredictable. This year though I’m getting serious about my long-term finances.
Not an official goal as not 100 percent in my control: Nevertheless, it’s my goal to stay full-time at the agency in 2021. As Covid has shown us, we can’t always control if our jobs are secure, but I would like to take a break from the hustle of freelance for the foreseeable future.
Health/Fitness
Get Back To My Pre-China Fitness Level: Before I moved to China in 2015, I was in the best shape of my life. While I was living abroad, though, I lost that. I got very sick with a lung infection that devastated my cardiovascular fitness. I’ve had this overarching goal to get back to my pre-China fitness for years but have found the journey to be a bit of a struggle. I’ll make progress and plateau in an endless cycle. I’ve gotten close to my goal but can’t seem to make it over that last little hump. In 2021, I’m changing my workout routine and being meticulous about how I fuel my body to try to finally hit my goal (be ready to follow me on this fitness journey this year as I’ll be blogging a lot of it to keep me honest and track my progress).
Eat Better For My Body: I’m not a “diet” kind of person so this goal isn’t a “diet.” What I do have is a long history of digestive issues. I’ve been tested many times for IBS and gluten intolerance, etc., and we’ve hit a point where the only thing left to do is keep a very detailed diary of what I eat and how I feel after I eat it. This is the year I finally figured out what foods make my body feel good and what foods just don’t agree with me. Going along with this, I’m reducing my coffee intake and upping my still water intake. I definitely have been known to drink an entire pot of coffee (so not helpful to my body), so for now, I’ve stopped using my coffee maker in an effort to change my coffee habits long term.
Home
I have some projects around the home I plan on finally getting to this year. After nearly a year in my current place, I have some decorating goals I put off in 2020 and some practical, organizational type projects to increase the usability of our space. I’ll be blogging updates as we finish certain rooms in our home and am really looking forward to curating our space. If home decor is your jam. follow along in real-time on my Instagram as well as my YouTube channel.