Goals for 2009 (because resolutions don’t work) and accomplishments of 2008

Today is the day we traditionally look ahead to the coming year and decide what changes we want to make or what new things we want to accomplish. In the spirit of that tradition, here are my goals for the coming year.

A brief digression: I don’t say “resolutions” any more, because resolutions don’t work. Resolutions are usually vague and difficult to achieve, such as “lose weight” or “be a better person.” Goals are usually better defined and thus easier to achieve. You can check off a goal when it is done.

1. Take a cooking class or two to improve my basic skills, such as my knife skills. This should be an easy one because my husband gave me a gift certificate for my birthday. I want to advance my skills in my favorite hobby.
2. Expand my garden, and grow and preserve more of my own food. This is a goal I share with my husband. To achieve this goal, I want to spend more time planning the garden this winter and to spend a little time each day working in the garden when planting season comes. I also want to fill our little freezer with produce from our garden so none of it goes to waste.
3. Record daily the best thing about my day. This is an idea I got from another blog. I am not good at keeping daily journals, but I figure that I can stick to recording one good thing about each day. The goal is to help preserve my memories, especially as my son is growing and changing every day.
4. Maintain my current weight. I am lucky in that I lost all of my post-pregnancy weight and then some. I don’t want to put the weight back on. I have several specific, achievable strategies for achieving this, including eating more home-cooked meals, eating lighter at home, making better choices in restaurants, reducing sugary foods and being more active. But I love food and cooking, so I also want to leave room for occasional treats and splurges without feeling guilty about it. It’s all about adopting a lifestyle of moderation and balance.
5. Make a plan for the next 2-4 years of my life. While my son is young, I want to spend a lot of time raising him and enjoying him as he discovers the world. But I also feel like it is time for me to plan for the next phase of my life, specifically my career, as I suspect I may have the time available to institute such a plan. This may mean going back to school or otherwise furthering my education; it may mean taking a risk and trying something entirely new. I haven’t decided yet, but I’ve been on the fence about this for a while, and this is the year I want to decide and start moving forward.

Those are my goals. I also have some projects going on, mostly hobby-related. One project is to reduce the amount of catalog junk mail coming into the house, which I have blogged about here.

Now a brief reflection back on 2008, which was a fantastic year for me. I gave birth to my son, which has completely transformed my life in so many good ways. As a result, I have successfully reduced my job to a part-time, telecommuting position, which has relieved a lot of my stress and enabled me to find a good balance between work and family. I actually think this has been my most productive and successful year at work, despite maternity leave and then going part-time, because I have really been able to focus and achieve what I set out to do.

In my writing life, I have grown my books blog, which although it isn’t as widely read as my cooking blog, is in many ways more satisfying because of the communities I have tapped into as a result. I spun this blog onto its own domain, and I am currently satisfied with its structure and format. I have developed my life management systems to the point where I am really happy with them, and I feel like I am able to take care of the business of my life (cooking, cleaning, home maintenance, me maintenance) without a lot of stress or effort (maybe I’ll blog about some of these someday). As for myself, I feel like I have been able to relax and roll with the unexpected better. I think part of this is a side effect of becoming a mother, but partly it is a result of consicious effort.

All in all, 2008 was a good year for me. It was a good year for our country, despite the economic freefall, in that we pulled together and made a choice to change. I feel a lot of hope and optimism for the coming year.