Here are my resolutions for the new year. All of them are related to my profession and working towards the life I want to live. I don’t have a five year plan, but consider this a down payment on one.
1. Blog at least once a week.
I’ve publicly committed to this goal on the Project 52 website because, really, without the threat of public humiliation this goal stands no chance of success.
2. Clean up this damned site.
I’m a professional web designer for crying out loud and I’d really prefer it if my blog reflected that fact. This will have to be an ongoing project though because, between the day job, wife, son, commuting, chores, dogs, and regular day-to-day stuff, I’ll only have a few hours a week to devote to all the various things on this list.
3. Try to make those blog posts useful.
Hey look! I updated widget x in the sidebar! Yeah, crap posts like that have to go. Or, at the very least, they need to be relegated to a few lines each and not counted towards my project 52 goal.
4. Sell stock images and website themes.
At the tender age of 36 I’m thoroughly tired of the rate race. I wants me a lifestyle business. Seriously. The plan is to sell stock images through iStockPhoto and stock themes through ThemeForest. I’m not going to be quitting my day job anytime soon but I’ve set some modest goals.
5. Become better at project management.
This is kind of a big deal. I suck at project management and there is no way I’ll keep my resolutions if I don’t get better at it. I need to manage projects better at Spiceworks so I can carve out the personal time for my projects and I need to manage my projects better in order to complete them with how little time I’ll have. Plus, I’d like to occasionally see my family.
6. Manage my personal projects like my job projects.
This goes hand-in-hand with the above goal. While I’m on the subject, I’ve been using Things to manage projects at work but now that I’m going to be managing another web designer and working as part of a team on many other projects, I need something a bit more robust. Any suggestions?
7. Start writing short stories or even a novel.
I’m going to let you in on a secret: I’ve always wanted to be a writer. It’s the one thing I’ve been too afraid to even attempt. In no small part because of my complete lack of knowledge regarding things like grammar and sentence structure.
This goal is very personal. So personal in fact that I don’t care if anybody else ever sees it. I just need to write it, whatever it is.
So that’s it. Seven goals for 2010 and all of them about moving my life forward. Frankly it’s felt pretty stagnant for a few years now. How about you? What are your goals for 2010?
