Goals for 2015

This year, I decided to organize my goals that was both simple and complex at the same time. The organization is simple because I will have only two goals per category. I will be able to keep track of what I want to accomplish easier with just two goals to think about. The complexity comes with eleven categories, eleven areas in my life I feel I need to improve. Eleven.

Let me explain.

This last year of life was a bit of a whirlwind for our family. We started a new job. We finally started our blog. We moved from Arlington or Portland to Charlotte to Böblingen to Sindelfingen back to Portland and are currently homeless. We traveled to Seaside and Washington D.C., Paris and Berlin. Oh yeah, and we also had a baby and raised a toddler. We even crossed a few items off our bucket list.

But I've hardly had any time to focus on myself, much less on improving myself. At the same time, however, this year has been one of the best of our lives. Aside from the fact that this year was crazy, we think we loved it for two reason: we lived with less and we lived in the moment. We lived intentionally.

Never before had we spent more on experiences than on stuff. Never before had we spontaneously taken advantage of a free weekend than relaxed all day because "we deserved it." We built our home with time, not tools. And we filled our lives with love, not things. We saw fewer movies but saw more of the world. We made more plans but we also made more memories.

And we thought it can always be like this.

There is no reason we can't explore more of Portland this next year. There is no reason we can't hike through the forest or visit the beach or climb a mountain or eat exotic food every weekend. There is no reason we can't find newer ways to give meaning to our lives.

So now that we are settling down in Portland into a lifestyle that works really well for us, I want to improve myself in the following areas: physical, nutritional, financial, spiritual, recreational, educational, organizational, social, cultural, marital, and professional. I know, I know: It seems like a lot. But these are all areas of my life that are important to me and that I give attention to anyway. And if I can make them better, what's not to love?

In each of these categories, I will complete two goals. These goals are totally doable. Many of them I have already started this year, but my goal is to make them consistent. For example, in financial I want to plan a menu a week in advance and stick to a $40/week budget. I started meal planning earlier this year, and I want to really perfect that skill. (By the way, have you ever used PepperPlate?) I also want to not buy any "extra" things for the entire year. I'm actually really excited for this challenge. I also want to cut my entire closet down to 50 pieces, finish my programming course, plan a family camping trip, and learn to use a DSLR camera. Curtis wants to volunteer at Habitat for Humanity, learn to forage, eat two cups of fruit and three cups of vegetables daily, and ride his bike to work three times per week (which he now might not get to do since our apartment is too far...). Sebastian doesn't want to do anything . . . but as my professional goals (ha!) I'm going to help him ride his balance bike, use the toilet, and count.

We are really excited for our goals, not because we have a lofty idea of what our lives could be—but because we already know how grand our lives already are. And we intent to keep the momentum.