goals

Day 91: Monthly Check in 3

~ joypetite ~ Leave a comment

Time for my third monthly check-in! It’s been three months since I started this self-improvement plan (project?) and I think I’ve done relatively well so far! The holiday season is quickly approaching so it’s best that I come up with a few ways to stick to my goals (next post!)

  1. Work on my Novel – I finished my novel (again!) after cutting out the whole middle section. Now it’s just time to edit again (and again and again and again. Will the editing never stop?) I do think I’ve learned a lot in this process and hopefully my next book will not require so much cutting and rewriting and editing (but it probably will.) I’m hoping by the end of the year I can have a solid book and begin sending query letters to agents.
  2. Ballet – The cycle for the beginning of class started again, so hopefully it’ll stick this time! It’s definitely been a struggle (clearly), but I’m always hoping to do better.
  3. Promotion –  DONE! 
  4. Get out of credit card debt – Blargh. Still working on this and I will be for quite some time. Hopefully with my promotion I can start paying it off more aggressively (plus that bonus and tax return next year will hopefully help!)
  5. In a relationship – Still Bumbling. I’m not sure if anything is going to work out. Usually I get irritated with people by the third or fourth week and I can feel it happening again. There’s just an expectation with online dating that everyone wants to either just hook up or jump directly into a relationship. And I don’t want either of those things so I feel people are often disappointed.  And I’m resistant to both so we get nowhere in the end.

So there’s my third monthly check-in. Ninety one days in and I’m a little farther along with all my goals except Ballet. Perhaps November will be Ballet month, just like October was meant to be Ballet month.  Eventually I will figure out a way for it to stick!

Until tomorrow.

274 days to go. It’s a lot of time and it’s no time at all, right?

Day 76: Be Terrible

~ joypetite ~ 1 Comment

Yes! Success! For the first time in a couple months I went to ballet class. I was initially apprehensive about going because I haven’t been in awhile and even when I was going, my attendance was quite spotty. I’ve realized recently that often times my decision not to go to class had only to do with my own fears and anxieties. I was the one standing in my way because I was worried my teacher would judge me for all the progress I’d lost! Which is ridiculous! I’m not going to become a professional ballerina or even go on to dance in any sort of recital. This is for exercise and for fun. For my health! The thing I should be least worried about it what my teacher will think of me.  The thing I should be most worried about is making sure I attend class, so I can take care of my body and myself. And so this is another lesson I learned. Be Terrible.

Okay… don’t be terrible, but don’t be afraid to be terrible at something. I’m an adult! I have a job I find moderately rewarding and pay my own bills. Everything else is just for my own enjoyment and happiness. So what if I’m terrible at pirouettes.  At least I’m getting out there and spinning across the floor like my four year old self would be proud of!

This advice is important for not just exercise, but also for writing! I’m often worried of what will happen at the end of writing my book. Will all the hard work be for nothing? Will it be rejected? Will I even get an agent? Will it arrive on shelves and then sit there until it’s put in the bargain bin and I’ll never write another thing again? Or will I be a wild success so I can quit my day job and just spend my days writing and writing and writing? (Yes, please!) But none of these are an option if I don’t at least finish the book. So let my story be terrible and I’ll fix it up afterwards. After all you can’t even read empty pages.

Until tomorrow.

289 days to go.

 

Day 75: Preparing to Fail

~ joypetite ~ 2 Comments

I fail a lot as I work towards my goals (clearly). I think most people do, but we just don’t hear about it very often. We do hear about how many businesses a person started before they succeeded or how many books a person wrote before they got published, but I feel like we don’t often hear about the day to day failures.  Those days we didn’t exercise or didn’t write or didn’t practice the instrument we’re trying to learn. These days can be very discouraging and can often roll over and over until months have gone by. Of course I don’t want months to go by! So, I’m always finding ways to make sure sure I succeed every day (or most days). I often don’t, but the best advice I’ve come upon so far is to “Prepare for Failure”.

I love this because it assumes I’m going to fail. It assumes I’m going to be tired after working all day and not want to write/exercise/blog, which I am and is often the reason for my not doing something. So instead of thinking you’ll be your best self and accomplish all the things you wanted to accomplish, this little nugget of advice assumes you won’t. And that you should figure out what you can do to make sure failure is less of an option.

For me this means writing in the morning because I know I’m going to be tired at night and put off doing it after work. It means changing into my exercise clothes at work and NOT GOING HOME to just “rest for a moment”. It means preparing a list of blog topics in advance so I don’t have to think up things at 9 or 10 at night.

So think you’re going to fail and then you’ll succeed.

Until tomorrow.

290 days to go.

Day 72: Goals for thought?

~ joypetite ~ Leave a comment

Only 72 days in and  I’ve completed one of my goals for the year…it’s strange how some things happen faster than we expect them to and others drag on and on….  But the past few days I’ve been wondering if I should add another goal to replace it or if I should double down on my current goals. It’s strange how some things happen faster than we expect them to and others drag on and on.

I am tempted to double down on my current goals and then perhaps add another one in November or December. Or at least try and pick up another hobby since my last one was rather uninspiring. After all, October is supposed to be Ballet month and only four days in I’m not doing very well. I have no idea how work can be so absolutely draining, but it is. I’ll try to get back on the wagon this weekend. It really is the goal I find the hardest to make any headway.

Until tomorrow.

New update: 293 days to go

 

Day 69: Happy October!

~ joypetite ~ Leave a comment

Eek! It seems like I was just doing one of these at the beginning of September. It positively flew by and now we’re here – October 1.

I know we just had a monthly check-in, but there is an update!

  1. Become a Novelist
  2. Ballet
  3. Promotion
  4. Credit Card debt
  5. In a relationship

That’s right! There was a job open and I was waffling about applying for awhile, but I did and I got it. It’s a bit too soon to celebrate since we’re still discussing salary, but I think it’s just they’ll give me what I ask for or they’ll keep it the same. There’s not a danger that I would turn down the job or that they’ll un-offer the job to me. 🙂

Hooray! What good news for the start of the month. Of all the goals I’m slacking on the most I think Ballet is the one I’m having the hardest time with, so I want to make October my ballet month. I’ll do my very best to get back on track this month and I’ve made a few adjustments to my schedule, so it should be easier (ahem…should be…but we’ll see how that goes.

Perhaps in a few months I’ll be able to cross off one more of these. Nothing happening yet! Just wishful, positive thinking.

Until tomorrow.

Day 62: Monthly Check-in

~ joypetite ~ Leave a comment

Gah! I’ve sort of neglected this project the past few weeks. It’s been busy! I took a cooking class and a ceramics class and have been going to a whole bunch of events after work. It’s been two months already since I started so it’s time for my second monthly check-in!

  1. Work on my Novel – I cut out the whole middle part of my novel, so that was sort of a set back, but I feel it will be stronger in the end. (And make more sense!) I’ve been working on it pretty steadily, so I’m pretty pleased with my progress here.
  2. Ballet – I haven’t done much here! I had some really special events come up, so I skipped class for the past month. It’s not great, but I’ve planned out my week this week so hopefully I’ll get back on track!
  3. Promotion –  A position opened unexpectedly in my department and I applied! It’s looking good so far, but we’ll see what comes of it. I’m not sure if it’ll be a good decision in the end or not, but I guess we’ll find out. Stay tuned!
  4. Get out of credit card debt – Still chugging away. I think by end the end of the year I should be out of one and then I can start seriously paying off the second. (Ugh!) But hopefully if I do get that promotion, I’ll be able to pay it off more aggressively. 🙂
  5. In a relationship – I joined Bumble. It’s still early stages, but at least I’m making an effort. I don’t want it to take away from my other goals, so I think I’ll limit how much time I spend on Bumble and going on dates. It is a very time consuming thing.

So there’s my second monthly check-in. Sixty two days in and I’m a little farther along with all my goals except Ballet. It’s almost October so perhaps that will be my October goal. I’ll also try to blog more.

Until tomorrow.

Day 47: A Half Week in Review

~ joypetite ~ Leave a comment

Soooo….I did a half week in Finance. Not what I wanted to do, but good enough. I like these week long challenges and this is the first in a series (next one will start on Monday!). Perhaps I’ll make them rotating challenges so that I’m constantly working on the things I want to be working on. It’s definitely a good way to keep myself accountable!

I noticed I have spent less money since the beginning of the month, which is good! I’ve been keeping an eye on everything I’m spending and have made a conscious effort to spend less on food and random cups of coffee. (Yay me!) It’s only September 9th, but that means a third of the month is almost done!

I haven’t been tempted to buy much recently, although I may need to take a peek in a bookstore soon. 🙂 The main lesson which helped me is Time vs. Stuff. Buying less stuff or rather buying stuff that is of equal value to the time I spent earning what it costs will help me cut out extraneous purchases from my life. Honestly there’s not a whole lot of things I would happily spend ten or twenty hours working towards. I really think I’d much rather spend time working towards experiences than things (not really news to anyone….) but it’s hard to remember sometimes.

Until tomorrow.

Day 44: Side Hustle

~ joypetite ~ Leave a comment

Side Hustle! Everyone should have one in this day and age. Maybe it’s my millennial mind speaking, but I feel like jobs can be touch and go nowadays. It’s nice to have some extra income, but it’s also nice to have an extra stream of income if your job is made unexpectedly obsolete. Or if you decide your boss is terrible or your coworkers are terrible or if your commute is terrible and you just can’t stand them anymore.

I am currently working on two side hustles: this blog and my book. While it’s my dream to be a writer without another job to support myself, I’m a realist and I won’t let myself believe it until I’m well past the mark of success. In the meantime, having a hobby I enjoy is nice and some extra cash wouldn’t hurt too.

Perhaps it’s too transparent to say I want to monetize this blog someday, but it’s true. Even if it’s only a little extra, at the moment I enjoy it and every bit helps. (Doesn’t everyone hope to monetize their blog someday?!?! Perhaps not?)

And of course writing. It’s a lot of work and it may take years for something to come of it. (Or never…) But I think that’s usually the case with a side hustle unless you already have a set of skills which you can apply as a second job (piano teacher, graphic designer etc.) It’s definitely a risk that all my hard work and time will amount to nothing, but that shouldn’t stop me. And if I earn some extra $ on the side to help me pay off my debt and work towards my other financial goals, that works too.

I also have a farfetched plan to make candles, but that’s another story for another day. 🙂

Until tomorrow.

Day 43: The Dreaded Credit

~ joypetite ~ Leave a comment

Ugh. So I was dumb and dug myself into a hole of credit card debt when I was unemployed. Basically I put everything which wasn’t rent on a credit card. Which is dumb! But also, what else am I supposed to do when I don’t know where my next paycheck is coming from.

Thankfully, I found a full-time job which I mostly like and offers me sweet health benefits and a steady paycheck! That means it’s time to start digging myself out of the trouble I got myself into. And I’ve been steadily working on it. I’m almost done paying off my lowest balance credit card and should be done by the end of the month. (Yay!)

It’s been hard, but I’m so excited to get to 0. I keep an excel chart (of course) of how much I pay off each month and if I hit it then I get to mark it green and if I don’t then I mark it red. It’s a little bit like crossing of a to-do list, which gives me the little bit of reward I need to be happy. 🙂

Then it’s on to the next one! Hopefully I’ll be able to pay off more of it if I get an increase and a promotion, but I’m not counting on it. It’ll be so exciting to be free of debt. Yay for financial freedom!

Until tomorrow.

Day 41: A Week in Finance

~ joypetite ~ Leave a comment

It’s the beginning of September! And it’s time to talk about finances! Personal finance, not like the great big world of Finance (capital F). I do think a good place to start for anything is to write down your goals. I prefer pen and paper because I find it really gets into my brain, but whatever works.

Today I was reading the Refinery29 Budgeting Slideshow and I stumbled across their financial goal tracker. I have a less pretty, less organized version of this, but who doesn’t love a good worksheet, right? So here’s what I have:

Near Term Goals (2 months)

  • Increase savings to 1000
  • Have no more debt on Credit Card 1
  • Buy my black dress!

I think I’m well on my way to these. I have a weekly deduction from my checking account to my savings account and I’ve calculated that I’ll have paid off all of Credit Card 1 by the end of October. Yay me!

Maybe then I can buy that black dress I’ve been eyeing forever.

Short-term Goals (Less than 2 years)

  • Pay off Credit Card 2
  • Save enough to go on a European vacation
  • Have a second stream of income

I’ve calculated it out again and after I pay off Credit Card 1 (which has been quite a struggle), it should take another year to pay off Credit Card 2 if everything continues as it has. That means no raises and no huge emergency purchases. (Fingers crossed!) I’d like to go on a nice vacation without worrying about how much money I’m spending and I’d also like to pay for most of it in cash. And I’m also working on having a second stream of income with this blog and potentially my book. It doesn’t have to be a lot, but every little bit helps! Here’s hoping!

Mid-term Goals (2-10 years)

  • Buy a house
  • Own a horse
  • Go on one super fancy vacation
  • Max out my retirement every year

These are getting sort of out there and they seem kind of hard to imagine given my present circumstances, but a girl can dream, can’t she? .

Long-term Goals (10+ Years)

  • Have a million dollars saved?

Honest 10+ years seems so far off I can’t even imagine who I’ll be or what I’ll want by then. Financial independence is a must though, so that’s what I’m aiming for. A million dollars is a lot, but dreams, right?

So there they are. The big picture. Tomorrow I’ll get into the nitty gritty of all the budgeting goodness.

Until tomorrow.

P.S. I’m not 100% sure I’m labeling these days correctly, but oh well.