2012 Goals

I’ve decided to change the format of my goals for 2012.  Instead of an enumerated out list, I’m going to have a goal statement with actions that I will revisit on a semi-regular basis.  To start I will state the goal, give a little background, and set an actionable task that I can achieve.  The idea is that this will keep me more motivated toward progress.  We shall see!

Goal 1: Save 3-6 months in an emergency fund.

Too much time has passed since we paid off our last debt.  The next step is to save up a 3-6 months rainy day fund, and we fell woefully short of that for a variety of reasons.  We were doing very good until the baby came, then hospital bills, a new (used) car purchase, and the continued reliance on some comfort spending to deal with stress has led to a less-than-ideal state.  On top of that, we just had to replace our water heater so that makes setting the first task easy.

Task 1: Survive until February, sticking to the budget and conserving money where possible.

Goal 2: Build another instrument.

This year I want to continue my foray into learning to build instruments.  Last year I spent the lion’s share of my time working on Dad’s ukulele while I saved up enough cash to make a purchase of tools, tonewood, and an acoustic guitar kit.  The purchase happened late in the summer last year, and I wasn’t able to execute quickly enough to begin work before the weather turned cold.  I want to start out this year working on my own acoustic guitar kit (from StewMac) and as the summer warms up I will add into the mix my project to build two Les Paul guitars alongside a buddy of mine from work.

Task 1: Set up spindle sander and purchase template wood for acoustic project.

Goal 3: Read more books, targeting 10 non-fiction books for the year.

My previous desire to read has slowly perverted over time into spasmodically checking Facebook and reading just enough to get by when solving problems at work.  I have noted a very disturbing trend of comfort in my current set of skills and interests, so this year I want to get back to reading.  I have accumulated a small (large) pile of books that have either been started or ignored after purchase, and I will begin by finishing off some of those from my reading pile before moving on to new endeavors.

You will notice that I am targeting non-fiction books, but I am non-specific about the content.  I suspect based on my reading pile that this will run the gamut of professional development, religion, guitar-building, and programming… so be prepared for some variety.  Also, given my past record of reading voraciously I stand a very good chance of blowing this 10 book target out of the water, but only time will tell if I return to old habits or if I am destined to eat my own words.  Just in case you’re interested, I will post the titles and authors of what I’m reading.  If you have follow-up questions, feel free to hit me at any time and we can have a nice discussion of literature.

Task 1: Finish reading ‘Leadership Gold’ by John C. Maxwell, for half-credit.

That’s all the goals I am setting for this year.

There are several other areas that I want to continue developing in or rekindle, but I don’t feel a specific drive to set a goal around them and have to track them throughout the year.  These include, but are not limited to: continuing my spiritual/charitable development, getting back to karate, blogging, taking less work stress home with me, getting some weight off Teddy by walking him more, and spending quality time with Tasha and Eve but again… these are cross-cutting activities that are hard or annoying to track.  It’s not that these things are not important, in fact in many ways they eclipse the goals that I have set… I just don’t want to get so bogged down in tracking things that I lose time to actually do things.

So there ya go!  Expect an update periodically as I finish tasks and set new ones.  Questions and comments welcome!