2012 Goals

I hope everyone enjoyed a safe and happy New Years!  I was lucky enough to spend the evening with a very good friend and made it home safely right at midnight, just in time to see some fireworks that were being shot off near my parent's house.  Last year, I followed 3-4 drunk drivers at about the same time of night but this year I didn't see any.  Go home town!  We woke up on New Years day to this:

Very pretty, but not enough to snowshoe in!  It's been a very mild winter and I have yet to be able to break out my snowshoes this year.  I'm very sad about this.  I need to find a place to snowshoe near the town I live in.  I've heard there's some good places but I haven't found them yet.

To follow up on my last post, here's my spring semester goals (mid Jan-mid May) and my long term 2012 goals.

Spring Semester Goals:

1. Be less hard on myself.  Everyone who knows me well will tell you that I can be very hard on myself.  This is especially true when I don't meet a goal or if I have a bad day at work.  I need to give myself a little slack as I can't be perfect and I don't necessarily want to be.
2. Let things go.  I take my work home with me.  I teach undergrads and a lot of issues tend to come up.  For whatever reason, I take these issues home with me and leads to a lot of stress.  Not good.
3. Get my fibromyalgia (or whatever it is) under control via natural methods such as supplements (I will be starting to take ribose as soon as it is delivered) and stress reduction.
4. Continue to take my Thursday yoga class.
5. Work out 4 days a week (aside from yoga).  I learned this past semester that I need to keep the number a touch lower as I get really down on myself if I don't hit the number I set for myself.  I am not willing to set myself up for failure!
6. Cook!  :)
7. Meal plan every week.  I am hoping to save on my grocery bills by planning my meals and buying specifically for them rather than just buying a bunch of stuff and then trying to piece together meals.  The one thing I splurge on is high-quality foods but I feel like I could save on it a bit more.

Long-Term 2012 Goals:

1. Read one book a month.  I got a Kindle for Christmas (thanks mom and dad!) and plan to put it to good use!
2. Hang on to the healthy living train for dear life (a classic repeat from 2011).  My plan is to cook and make 90% of my own food using whole foods and exercise 4 days a week (more if possible).
3. Try one new recipe every week.
4. Walk a 1/2 marathon, health permitting.  I hope to pick one in the next month and start training.
5. Make plans with friends and family more often.
6. Keep my house clean and picked up.  Let's just say that this was at the bottom of my list this past year.
7. Be more positive.  I've found that I have been more negative in the past six months or so than I have in a long time.  It's time to get out of that!
8. Finish the afgan I have been working on for nearly 10 years.

I think that's where I'm going to cap my goals for 2012.  I have a few other goals floating around in my head but I don't want to overwhelm myself.  For most of the goals listed above, I have plans on how I plan to obtain each of them.  I am trying very hard to set myself up for success this year!  2011 was a good year, but I plan to make 2012 a great year!

Happy New Years!