My Goals & Habits Check-In 2019 [Annual Review Part 3]

Each year as part of my annual reflection, I use my daily journal from the year to identify what I’m grateful for, my lessons learned, and to keep myself accountable for my goals.

You can read my 2019 annual review in 3 parts:

1. Part 1: What I’m Grateful in 2019
2. Part 2: My Lessons Learned in 2019
3. Part 3: Goals & Habits Check-In

Let’s find out exactly how I went with my goals in 2019, and what I’m working on in 2020!

Progress towards my goals

I had a mixed year in terms of progress towards my personal goals (outside of the work that I do at Art of Smart Education).

I set for myself last year some goals in the four quadrants below, as well as identifying habits I wanted to implement and behaviours that would support these habits.

As you can see, I kept all of these goals pretty simple, largely because I know that my work and mission with Art of Smart is all-encompassing!

I read 39 books in 2019 (so beat my goal by 3!), and I attended 1 conference during the year. My injuries prevented me from attending a dance class or cycling in a fundraising race, and I did start pilates at the end of the year. I also have a draft written for the sequel to Secrets of HSC Success.

Interestingly, (and perhaps unsurprisingly), the goals I made more progress towards were the ones that had a corresponding habit and clearly identified behaviour that supported it.

Here are a couple of habits, and supporting behaviours I set for myself in 2019:

The first two were actually designed to help me reduce the unnecessary use of my phone (which worked incredibly well – I’ll write a more detailed blog post about this). They also, however, helped me read. With my phone outside the bedroom and the toilet, I was never checking it, and often instead reading a book, which helped me achieve my reading goal.

I didn’t always write 250 words per day, however for at least 4-5 months throughout the year, I was consistently hitting this target, which enabled me to write the draft for 2 x 150+ page books in 2019.

So the lesson learned here for me is if I want to achieve my goals in 2020, I need to more explicitly connect specific habits and supporting behaviours to each one.

What I want to get better at and improve for 2020

From reflecting on 2019 and my learnings for the year (which you can read in my Annual Review Part 2 here, there are a number of things I’d like to get better at and improve in 2020 which includes…

• Being more punctual
• Accepting myself for who I am
• Judging myself and others less 
• Saying no to more things 
• Avoid competing to be the best and copying others, and instead of competing to be unique
• Being more present 
• Delegating more and documenting instructions as I go 
• Writing and publishing more
• Developing my own personal playbook for life (like Ray Dalio’s Principles) 
• Building my personal brand more through writing 
• Healing my body for long term movement and exercise

New habits to implement in 2020

I don’t want to try and implement too many habits and risk not successfully getting any to stick.

Some of the below habits, therefore, represent continuations of habits I’ve already been building, and others are new, designed to specifically support some of my learnings key things I want to get better at in 2020.

My personal goals for 2020

In setting goals for 2020, I’ve built on the goals I didn’t achieve in 2019, while also adding a couple more. I’ve also made some of the goals more specific by quantifying them. 

My personal themes for 2020

Reflecting on what I want to improve, and my goals for 2020, I try each year to develop a couple of words to act as themes.  The purpose of this is to use these words as a simple reminder and call to action about my goals and habits for the year.

Love | Focus | Create

Love

This is to remind me to love myself to build my self worth so that I don’t use fear and pain to drive self-improvement but instead love.

Additionally, it’s a reminder to love others and therefore judge less. 

Focus

This is to remind me to say No to more things, so I can create the space in my life to focus on the few important things that really matter to me. It’s also to remind me to delegate more!

It’s also a reminder about focused, intentional movement, which I’m learning through pilates. Instead of rushing things and exercise at high pace without being present, it’s a reminder to focus on each movement.

Create

This is to remind me to write and publish more during 2020.

It’s also a reminder to not copy others and compete, but instead to innovate and create.

Now it’s your turn…What are your goals for 2020?

I’d love to hear what your goals are for 2020 – let me know by leaving a comment below.

Missed reading Part 1 and 2 of my 2019 Annual Review? Check them out here:

1. Part 1: What I’m Grateful in 2019
2. Part 2: My Lessons Learned in 2019