Do You Have Goals for 2021?

Hey, everyone! Well, the new year has come. We made it through 2020!

I’m not the person to set New Year’s resolutions. I feel like they’re kind of silly and also bound to fail. Generally, you get all hyped beforehand, promising yourself you’ll change and become a new person in the year to come. You start your resolution on the first day of the new year with a lot of excitement and commitment…and then the excitement of the change disappears. You start missing your old habits or dread your new ones. So you give up and go back to living how you did before.

So I don’t set New Year’s resolutions. When I want to make a change in my life, I try to start as soon as possible. I don’t wait for the New Year. Start immediately.

However, that doesn’t mean I don’t set goals for the New Year. Goals are important to have. Sometimes you walk into a new year with a few in mind, but you always think “oh, I don’t have to start on them right away. I have the whole year in front of me! I can do that goal later.” And then guess what? The year slips by. First a few days. Then all of January. Then February. Then BAM! It’s December, and your goals never seemed to get done. How did that happen?

I don’t know if that’s happened to you before, but it’s definitely happened to me. So what I would encourage you to do as we begin this New Year is write down some goals: any that come to mind. Then, start working toward them. The first steps don’t have to be hours of hard work every day. It may be sitting down and researching your goal, or maybe putting in a few minutes here and there to work on it. Baby steps are still steps, no matter how small they are.

Whenever you feel lost in the year, try to look back at the list of goals you wrote down. See which ones you’ve checked off the list and which ones you still need to achieve. Then find one or two that you can get to work on and continue working toward it!

Setting goals is great, even if they’re small goals. They keep you grounded and focused on the things you want to achieve. And even if you don’t get them all done in one year, at least you worked towards it and improved. And hey, you probably at least got one of them done!

With that said, here are a few goals I have in mind for 2021:

Write two new full-length stories.

Finish the polished manuscript of Raid of the Krames.

Finish the polished manuscript of Frostbite.

Reach a full 10-second handstand.

Learn the back lever (a calisthenics skill).

Read 200 books in total.

And there are quite a few more that I’m thinking of and writing down on my list!

So as soon as you’re done reading this post, I would encourage you to pull up a new document on your computer, or find a piece of paper around you, and write down a list of some goals you would like to complete this year! They could be large, or they could be small. They could be ones you are sure you might never complete or ones that you are certain you can finish. Just write them down. Work toward them. Take advantage of the year ahead and work on completing things you’ve always wanted to finish! Then, when the year is over, you’ll have some things you can look back on and be glad you worked toward them and completed them.

That’s all for this week.

Until later,