Happy 2019!
Setting goals is something I like to do all year long, but I especially look forward to the New Year. It’s a fresh start and everyone is focused on self-improvement, which is always inspiring.
I’m not the kind of person to set goals such as ‘go to the gym more often’ and ‘stop eating chips’ as New Year’s resolutions. Partly because I don’t want to do those things, and partly because those goals are not specific enough and would never work for me. I’m a big fan of S.M.A.R.T. goals: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound. Every year I improve on making my goals more S.M.A.R.T.
Update on last year’s goals:
- Read 50 books: failed. I only read 44 books. Brb having a little cry.
- Watch 80 movies: completed! I watched 87 movies.
- Visit Groningen: completed!
- Post to my blog at least once a week: went well for a while, then I got a puppy. Sorry not sorry.
- Visit Safari Park Beekse Bergen: completed!
- Get a puppy: completed!
- Get back into climbing: nope.
- Get my physical To Be Read pile down to zero: nope. But I did declutter my books in January, so the TBR pile is significantly smaller now!
- Connect with fellow autistic people: completed!
- Catch up on my Document Your Life videos: completed!
Here are my plans for 2019:
Move out
I’ve just heard that I’m getting an apartment in the summer! It’s in an apartment complex built especially for autistic people, with extra thick walls and rules about noise. I’ve been ready to move out of my parents’ house for years but could never find anything suitable (and affordable). This seems perfect. I’m so excited to move my stuff and do everything exactly how I want it!
Visit Amersfoort
Last year, I set a goal to visit the city of Groningen. This year, I want to make some time to see what Amersfoort is all about. From what I’ve heard, it’s a great city! I want to go when it’s a bit warmer outside and Nugget is more manageable (she can only go out for about an hour at a time right now), so probably the summer.
Grow out my hair
In 2014, I went from having super long hair to a pixie cut, with the idea that I would turn myself into a little hair growing factory: grow it out, cut it off, donate it to charity, and repeat. I wasn’t expecting to love the short hair as much as I did. After all these years, though, I’ve once again become curious about growing out my hair. Not to the same length it was before, but to my shoulders. Just to see how I like it. When I tried to grow it out before, I always gave up once it got to ‘the awkward length’, but this time I want to persevere!
Read 25 books
I’ll have a puppy to raise and train this year, which gives me significantly less time to sit down with a book and read for hours at a time, so I’m ‘only’ planning on reading 25 books. I want to make sure that the books I do read are ones I know I’m going to love, and not books I’m reading just for the sake of getting ahead in my Goodreads challenge. I also want to make better use of the library, especially for fiction.
Some books I’m looking forward to reading are Hank Green’s An Absolutely Remarkable Thing, Graeme Simsion’s The Rosie Project, and Joshua Becker’s The More of Less.
Watch 50 movies
Some movies that I’d like to get to this year are Paddington 2 (2017), Lady Bird (2017), and BlacKkKlansman (2018). New releases I’m excited about are The Hate U Give (2018, but 2019 in the Netherlands), Toy Story 4 (2019), and The Lion King (2019).
Keep up with my sleep schedule
Now that I have a puppy, there’s more routine in my life than ever before. I’ve been trying for years to get a good sleep schedule going, but I always caved and took daytime naps (RIP, miss you). I hope that now that Nugget is here to keep me on my toes, I can keep up with it and not oversleep. For years, I’ve been getting up at 10 AM or later. My goal for this year is to get up at 8:30 AM. I want to try to get my much-needed 10 hours of sleep as well, so that makes my sleepy time 10:30 PM.
Have 2 daily moments of reflection
My bullet journal keeps me sane when my mind is a chaotic mess. But I’ve noticed that I don’t use it as much as I should when I’m not doing well, which is when I need it the most! In 2019, I’m going to try harder to keep up with my AM and PM moments of reflection. I’ve already put these in my January habit tracker to remind me.
