Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Resolutions Check-In

At the beginning of this year, I came up with a list of ten resolutions to get me through the year. And I want to keep myself (and you guys!) updated on how well I’m progressing to completing them, since resolutions have never been something I’m good at. ;)

 

Things I’m on track to completing:

1. Get to my goal weight of 115 - 120 lbs.

While I still have a ways to go on this goal and sometimes it seems unattainable. I am on track to complete this goal. To lose 40 pounds by the end of the year, I need to lose a little over 3 pounds a month. Right now, I’m at 8ish pounds so things are going according to plan. I just hope I can keep this weight loss up!

4. Read 60 books.

I’m slightly under this goal (by 1 book) which has to do with how school has picked up. I’m very glad I marked down this goal from 100 to 60. This weekend, though, I bought a Kindle!!! I just recently jumped on the e-reader bandwagon and I’m just so excited to get it and start reading! And hopefully, it’ll help me pick up my reading to make this goal.

7. Pay off all my credit cards.

Back in February, I received a letter from my collection agency about my biggest credit card bill. When I was young and stupid, I applied for an Old Navy credit card, thinking I was only going to get about $500 (and only able to use it in-store). Nope. Instead, I was given a $2,500 VISA to use ANYWHERE. And I did. I used that card up good. And then I got in over my head and stopped paying. It’s probably been over a year since my last payment and my balance is now in the three thousands. My collection agency gave me three options to choose from: pay it all off now, pay in monthly installments, or pay what I can. I decided to go with option 2, where I pay once a month for 12 months and then I’m all caught up. My mom is also helping me out with my other two credit cards, equaling $800 total. While I won’t be completely credit card debt-free at the end of the year, I will be 90% of the way there.

 

Things happening in the near future:

3. Graduate from college.

Fingers crossed. May 8th. Fingers. Crossed. (I’m having so much anxiety that something’s going to happen to cause me not to graduate this semester.)

8. Travel.

I’ve booked a cruise for the end of May and I’m hoping once school is behind me and I enter a new stage of life, I can start traveling more. I want to see more of the United States! I’ve never traveled outside my own time zone and I’m ready for vacations outside of Orlando. Also, blogger meet-ups. Need I say more?

10. Begin therapy.

My grandma has a close friend who is a retired therapist. She worked in the school system for over 30 years and still has her license, even working freelance for the Red Cross. I asked my grandma to ask her if she would agree to see me. She agreed, for free. As soon as we get it all sorted out, I will start therapy. It’s incredibly exciting, but I’m also very nervous about it. Mostly, though, I’m ready to tackle my anxiety issues and get control of myself.

 

Things at a standstill

5. Begin working a full-time job, utilizing my degree.

I’m starting my job search next month and I’m about 50% excited, 50% scared to death. I’m excited to see what jobs are out there and hopefully score a good job fairly quickly. But I’m scared that it’ll take me months and months.

6. Join a book club.

I was thisclose to completing this goal in January. And then I flaked. Lately, I’ve been feeling like I’m using my anxiety as an excuse for why I don’t participate in life more and I don’t want to do that. (Although, I will admit that sometimes the books don’t interest me at all.) And I keep putting off attending because I seem to think I’ll be in an entirely different country when I graduate. I don’t know why I think this because odds are more likely I’ll still be in this city, but I need to stop putting things off because of how uncertain the future is.

 

Things I need to re-evaluate

2. Run a half-marathon.

I made this goal back at the end of December, when I was preparing to run the IronGirl Half-Marathon. I’ve since dropped down to the 5K and not sure I want to keep running in races. At least for now. It’s putting so much pressure on me, pressure I’m putting on myself. I think it’s important to reevaluate the goals you set and make new ones if it seems like the ones you set are just too high. I’m not sure what new goal I want to set, but any ideas would be welcomed!

9. Complete Project 365

I am so behind in Project 365. I started strong and then began to forget to take a picture. Life would get away from me and most days, there aren’t a lot of interesting photo ops. Between work and school and homework and watching TV…my life can be pretty boring. I’ve still been taking pictures when I remember to, but it’s definitely not Project 365. I’m not sure if I should keep taking a photo every day for this year, start P365 over, or what. What do you suggest, dear readers?

18 comments:

  1. It looks like you're really making good progress on these resolutions! Oh, and D.C. is a GREAT area to come to if you wanted to do a blogger meet-up. :) Just saying....

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  2. You are doing amazingly! I need to make one of these sometime soon... I have less than 3 months left in my timeline!!

    STAY SAFE on the cruise... I was listening to the news yesteray and there was a big story on a girl who was working on a big Disney cruise ship and went missing at sea :S

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  3. i started P365 and after about a month I failed. It shouldn't be hard but it is. Ugh.

    How exciting you are almost done with school! I think a vacation is a perfect way to celebrate :)

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  4. I know I'm a big reader and all but I don't think I could accomplish 60 books in a year. I average around 45!

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  5. Ugh, that store card thing happened to me too - instead of a Target card I ended up with a Target Visa! And boy, did I run that bill up. I'm still paying it down. Good for you taking control - I need your discipline :)

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  6. You're making SUCH better progress than I am with my list of goals. In fact, mine is in need of a complete overhaul since I've pretty much abandoned it! I'm glad you posted your update because it reminded me to work on mine!

    That's so great that you're going to be trying out therapy. I hope it goes well for you and really helps you to tackle some of those anxiety issues once and for all. (And if you learn any good tips, you can share them with me!)

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  7. you're doing super well; I love that some of them are happening SOON, some are going well and some you're re-evaluating because honestly, that's totally necessary and something we should all do. Cannot wait to hear/see all about the cruise!

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  8. You're making such great progress! As I said on my blog earlier this week in evaluating my own goal-list, "an incomplete isn't a failure - it's an opportunity." It's an opportunity to either continue to pursue it after your "deadline" expires, or to reflect on WHY it wasn't accomplished and continue to grow in those areas. So even if you don't get the satisfaction of checking off each and every goal at the end of the year, you still did some awesome things :)

    Oh, and me and P365 were an epic failure of a match. I did it one year and probably did about 65% of it. The second year? Yeah. Like 12 days. My regret is I bought those stupid expensive 365 albums that I now have to figure out what to do with, ha! :)

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  9. You are doing great with your list. I wish I was half as motivated as you are. The last time I read a book (not a text book) was months ago and I totally failed my 365 project. Oh well!

    Good look with all your goals!!!

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  10. way to go on the weight loss, that is amazing!!!

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  11. Looks like you're making headway so that's good!

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  12. I made the same stupid credit card mistake when I was in college too. It sucks and I hate my old-self for it! Too bad we couldn't receive a letter from the future-us so we can warn ourselves. I'm hoping to get out of credit-card debt by the end of the year but then I'll need to focus on our student loans (yuck).

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  13. I feel you on the race pressure. Like I blogged awhile back, I don't time myself or measure myself. Running is for ME - it's actually enjoyable and I want to keep it that way. I'd love to say I ran a half or a marathon, but I honestly don't think I'm cut out for distances like that. I'm sure if I was set on it I could....but I really don't want to at this stage. I'm due to run my first 10k today and I think that's enough.

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  14. Wow! You go girl, you are doing so well so far. I think it's such a great idea to check-in on resolutions so you can see what's working and what's not. Keep it up! :)

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  15. I think you are doing awesome! And it's great that you are re-evaluating these goals to make sure they still make sense for you. I did that with my 30 before 30 list as there were some things that i set out to do that I knew were either not something I coudl accomplish or something I SHOULD accomplish.

    And it's only March! You've got 9 months left! :) Way to go, you!

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  16. You're doing super well on your resolutions so far! I also love my Kindle too, but the act of buying it meant I was too broke to buy books on it for a while... ha, my bad! I think I resolved on 60 books too, and I've got some credit card paying to do if I want to save enough money for my trip this summer. Busy busy!

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  17. The year is just chugging right along, but it looks like you're making so much of it! Way to go!

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Comments make me all giddy with excitement.

 
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