My October goals did not go as planned. It was a busier month than usual, especially as I played chauffeur for my mom for the entire month and seemed to have more plans than usual. So I kinda threw a lot of my goals to the wayside as I tried to keep my head above water with my busy schedule. That’s life, though! I’m rolling over a lot of my October goals into November, so we’ll see if I can knock them out this month!
October Goals
1) Do a 30-minute workout three times a week. LOL, no.
2) Update all of my blog posts from 2010. Complete! Yay!
3) Drink water every day. LOL, no.
4) Establish a better nighttime routine with lights out at 10:30 p.m. No, but I’ve decided to switch my exercise time from morning to evening. Before, I was trying to get up by 6 a.m. to get in a workout before starting my day, but it was so hard to make that happen when I was going to bed so late. (Hence, the goal of going to bed by 10:30 p.m.) So, I decided to experiment with evening workouts. I’m usually finishing up work around 5:30-6:00 and then I’ll do my workout. I don’t usually like waiting so late in the day to work out, as it gives me so many hours to talk myself out of doing it, but I hope this will a) help give me a mood boost at a time of day that is roughest for my anxiety (nighttime) and b) allow me to get a bit more sleep, even if I go to bed later, as I’m setting my alarm for 7:30 a.m.
5) Pay off my credit card. No, but very close! I think I can maybe make this happen in November. Fingers crossed!
6) Recycle some old electronics/cable cords + do a Goodwill drop. Ugh, no. I need to add a few more things to my Goodwill bag so I’ve been holding off on doing that dropoff. And while I could have dropped off my old electronics/cable cords at Best Buy, I was halfway to the store when I realized I left the iPad Mini I wanted to donate on my dresser, blergh. Next month!
7) Organize my iPhone photos from the first half of 2022. Complete!
8) Make a doctor’s appointment. No. I’ll probably wait until early next year for this doctor’s appointment, once I’m on a PPO plan and have a more reasonable copayment ($30 as opposed to $150. HMO plans are for the birds.)
9) Redecorate my bathroom. Complete! I love the change so much. 🙂
10) Continue making myself dinner three nights a week. I didn’t really keep track of this last month. I think so?
November Goals
1) Do a 30-minute workout three times a week. Rollover goal.
2) Update all of my blog posts from 2011. Another year to categorize!
3) Drink water every day. Rollover goal.
4) Complete NaBloPoMo 2022. Yay! This will be such a fun goal to complete.
5) Pay off my credit card. Rollover goal.
6) Recycle some old electronics/cable cords + do a Goodwill drop. Rollover goal.
7) Organize my iPhone photos through October 2022. Once I complete this goal, I will be all caught up on photo organization. My plan is to do the previous month’s photo organizing in the following month.
8) Start Christmas shopping. I already have some ideas for family/friends so I’d like to knock out some of my Christmas shopping early in November if possible.
9) Get my third tattoo. This has been on my yearly goals list for 3 years and it’s time to finally make it happen. November is the month I do it!
10) Update my One Line a Day journal and keep up with it. I am so very bad at filling in my One Line a Day journal. Thankfully, I have my “Everyday Moments” Notes app where I keep track of one good thing every day so it helps me out in a pinch if I get a few weeks behind and can’t remember what I was doing/thinking/feeling on that day. However, I really want to use this journal for more than just happy moments: I also want to document hard things, things that happen at work, and just things I want to remember from this time in my life (aka, the stuff I don’t always use for Everyday Moments). I need to get caught up (I’m about a month behind, eeks) and then stay caught up.
ahhhhhhhh this reminded me that I really really really have to recycle two old laptops and some ancient phones. But I don’t know how to remove the hard drives. I know this information would surely be available via YouTube, but I AM BEING SO LAZY. Anyway, must do this, thanks for the reminder.
Also, I am loving this season of your podcast! I have the party one all queued up for my (super long and snowy) walk today!
It took me forever to go through my old electronics and remove all my personal info so they can be recycled! I finally just forced myself to do it one afternoon and IT WAS SO EASY. But it took me yeeears to make it happen. WHY.
I’m so glad you’re loving this season! It’s been a fun one to record. 🙂
I always love these posts and you do such a good job of tracking things.
I am behind on photo organization and it is stressing my out. Not because it’s “hard” but because I find it to be so very unfun once I get behind. If I only tackled it 10-15 minutes each week, it would be easy AND enjoyable. Now I’m behind and it’s tedious and frustrating.
You know how much I love your bathroom makeover! It looks fantastic and must feel so great to cross that off your list!
Thanks, Elisabeth! Sometimes I feel like I’m so bad at tracking, lol, so a compliment like this lifts my spirits. 🙂
Isn’t it crazy how just getting a little bit behind on photo organization can make the whole thing seem so overwhelming? Argh! I hope you can find a way to set aside some time this month to get back on track.
I like the idea of trying a different workout schedule. It doesn’t make sense to keep doing the same thing over and over again that doesn’t work. Maybe doing it later in the day will reduce your anxiety, give you more sleep AND of course also get the workout done. It’s definitely worth a try.
i’m excited that one of your goals is “Start Christmas Shopping.” I love Christmas shopping in November when there’s no pressure- I’m going to get started with that as well.
I wish i could pay off my credit card this month…. SIGH.
Yes! Why keep doing the same thing if it’s not working? I agree!
I think my goal to pay off my credit card this month was vastly overstating what I’m able to do. Ha!
Oohhh…are you going to give us any hints about the tattoo? I’m not a tattoo girl myself, but I’m so interesting in other people’s tattoos. It seems like such a brave thing to me to get one.
Your goal of making a doctor’s appointment reminded me that I should try to get one scheduled before mine switches! Off to make a phone call right now!
I am happy to share my tattoo idea! I want to get the words “I am because you were” tattooed in a script font with two small-ish butterflies. It’s an homage to my grandma; butterflies were her favorite and every time I see one, I like to pretend she’s visiting me. <3 My plan is to get the tattoo right under my left collarbone.
I’m so excited for your NaBloPoMo! I know I am terrible about commenting but I still read every day through Feedly and love knowing there will be a post each morning while I drink my coffee. I have been tracking goals in my paper planner this year but haven’t even thought about November yet. Maybe I’ll make it a goal to keep my household virus free for the rest of the month, ha!
Thank you for continuing to read all of my inane thoughts, Emilie! 🙂 A virus-free household in November sounds like a very good goal!
Kudos for acknowledging that October just didn’t go ” as planned” and that there’s no shame just rolling goals over into November. This is how it goes. I am curious to hear how the evening workout routine works for you – I used to be an evening exerciser (and loved it) but have found that I feel much better for the rest of the day when I move in the morning.
I want to check out this ” every day moments’ app.
I didn’t explain my “Everyday Moments” Notes app very well – I just keep a running list of my favorite moment from every day in the Notes app on my phone. Nothing too special! 🙂
October was a mess over here as well between work travel, sick kids, me being sick, being really busy at work, etc. I felt like I was juggling a lot of balls and not very well… I did not exercise much or get 10k steps in. But it just couldn’t happen for factors out of my control. It was the kind of month that made me glad I don’t set goals because I doubt I would have achieved any! And as an upholder, that is really really defeating for me!
I have an ongoing photo/video project and it brings me so much joy. The kids love watching videos of themselves. We have some really funny ones of Paul – he watched one last night like 10 times! So my current self is thanking my past self for taking so many videos!
It’s always hard to have a month when not many goals get accomplished. Thankfully for me, I’m not too hard on myself with accomplishing my monthly goals. I can see how setting monthly goals and not accomplishing them would be defeating for an Upholder, though!
Well some month are just rough. A busy October seems like something we have in common. I am intrigued about your blog organizing. What exactly do you do? I have a. feeling I should be doing that too but no idea how to start. So maybe you have been talking about it previously then please pint me in the right direction.
I hope you can achieve many of your October goals. I like how you decided to switch exercising routines because they are not working.
My blog organizing project has been a massive undertaking since I’ve been blogging since 2009! At first, I went through every single blog post I’ve ever published and listed out the category and tags I’d like to use in a spreadsheet. Now, I’m going back through those blog posts and updating images/adding new tags/replacing the category/etc.
Good grief, you accomplished SO MUCH despite the busyness. Really, you did!
Isn’t it frustrating when you get behind on something recurring (for you, photo organization, for me, blog reading) and then it just *compounds*? So, so frustrating.
I love that tattoo idea! Cannot wait to see it. <3