Goals Check-in: January

So, how am I doing on those goals?

Read 100 books in 2012.
I've read 19 so far, but I haven't reviewed any of them.
I found out that keeping myself supplied with new reading material was tough when the local library was closed over the holidays! I even resorted to borrowing my sweetie's Kindle in the first week of the year... and found that I don't really like reading from an e-reader. I seem to absorb less information or something. Or maybe it's that I already stare at screens ALL DAY LONG.

Exercise for 90 minutes per week.
This was a hard one to keep track of, until I realized that my FitBit was already doing it for me! Along with counting steps and monitoring sleep patterns, it categorizes activity as "sedentary", "lightly active", "fairly active", and "very active" and tells you how many minutes you've spent doing each category at the end of the day. So I just added up how many "very active" minutes I logged over the week. How many? 216 / 181 / 147 / 202. Hmmm. I don't feel like I'm really moving around that much (most of my day is spent seated in front of a computer). Maybe I need a new measure.

Get rid of (sell, donate, recycle) 80 items from the house by the end of the year.
I started the year by sending 6 pairs of shoes and about 20 clothing items to Out of the Closet. Then, later in the month, I helped my sweetie prepare for a clothing swap at a friend's house, and found some more stuff of mine to add to the pile -- 20 more items. So that's a total of 46 items in the first month alone. I'm getting pretty good at this. Heck, I helped a good friend clear out a lot of her clutter, and it felt great! I wonder if I should sign up for a Declutter Challenge later in the year -- 52 items in 52 weeks? One every day for a whole month?

Write 70 posts for this blog in 2012.
In January: 14 including this check-in. I'm sure my classwork will have an impact on how often I post, but I'm also planning on writing up some more content beforehand for those times when I'm offline or super-busy.

Volunteer 60 hours in 2012.
Nothing so far beyond my usual church commitments (Sunday evening choir, helping with services as a reader or Communion holder, and occasional meetings of the pastoral search committee). I ought to see what Hands On Bay Area is up to.

Save or donate 50 percent of my take-home income.
In January, I saved 57.2% and donated 10.8% of my net income. (I'm counting the cash I applied to the accounts, not any interest earned.) Here's how it broke down:
Emergency Savings: 15.1%
Xmas 2012: 1.8%
Wedding: 5.7%
House Fund: 7.1%
Grad School: 23.4%
Roth IRA: 3.5%
401(k): taken from paycheck; 4% of gross income; not counted in this total
HSA and medical FSA: taken from paycheck; not counted in this total
Investments: taken from bonus; not counted in this total
Church Pledge: 7.3%
Other Donations: 3.5%

Distribute 40 business cards by the end of the year.
Crikey! I need to get those printed.

Spend 30 minutes per day in meditation.
This one has been tough. Finding 30 minutes a day where someone does not need my time/energy/attention... well, I can only imagine how much harder it will get when I have kids! Maybe I'll re-envision the goal by splitting it into 10-minute chunks.

Be able to do 20 pushups at once by the end of the year.
Um. Well, I can do 3 full pushups in a row. And a whole lot of wall pushups. It's a start.

Write 10 recommendations on LinkedIn in 2012.
None yet.

So we're off to a pretty good start!