2022: Picking up steam
Happy New Year!!
Hi everyone! Happy New Year!! I hope you had a pleasant 2021 and have an absolutely amazing 2022.
Here’s a quick recap of some major events that took place in my life in 2021:
- I graduated from NYU with a degree with Computer Science and Data Science.
- I got a job as a software developer at a unicorn.
- I moved to the Pacific North West.
- I traveled back to New York for a month.
- My family moved to Florida and I visited there for a month as well.
- I read 43 books and short stories.
2021 was overall a great year with a lots of amazing milestones being met for me. But as I have been doing for the past two years on this blog, let’s review how I did in regards to the goals I set for myself.
Last year, at the very start of 2021, I wrote a post outlining my goals. There were a few categories of goals I highlighted in that post, but after reviewing it while writing this post, I realized that they all had one common core theme: build up good habits through consistent and increasing effort. So, with this as my theme for the year, how did I do?
Well, from my current standing, it looks like I’ve got a good start! The first half of this year was a bit slow. I wasn’t able to really build up any great habits and wouldn’t say I really stuck to this main theme. Some of the things I wanted to do was build up a good habit of exercising regularly and reading daily, neither of which I would say I did during the first six months. But after moving to the west coast, I had quite a bit more time to myself which allowed me to build up some new habits. For one, I started reading quite a bit more consistently. Last year, I read a total of 43 books and short stories, a new personal record. And while I’ve been living in Florida, I also started exercising daily by playing Tennis with my family and going to the gym often. So, by the end of 2021, I can definitely say that I’m on track to continue building up the habits I have been meaning to cement for the past couple of years.
Some other goals I had were to do well in school and graduate, continue posting on my Medium blog, and learn more about personal finance. My last semester was one of my best during my undergrad and I definitely learned a lot about personal finance by reading a few books and articles and watching a ton of videos about the topic. However, I definitely didn’t keep up with my Medium blog, being that I only posted once last year in which I actually wrote that I would post more often… but anyways, overall, a success!
I would say that my last year goals were pretty much met on most fronts. I purposefully did not make highly specific goals (like read 30 books) because I know from years of making goals that those don’t work as well, and really only end up making you feel bad about yourself. Instead, I focused on outlining a theme for the year which I would try and follow as best as I could, and in regards to meeting my theme for last year, I did pretty well!
So what about 2022? Well, here are some goals I am setting for myself.
- Do well at my job and try to learn as much as I can from my peers and team. I have been pretty lucky to be on a team with a lot of very smart and friendly people, and so, I’m hoping to really gain as much as I can from my time on this team and learn all that I can from my fellow coworkers.
- Read 52 books! I know, I know, I just said that I don’t want to make specific goals, but now that I have a better habit of reading more often, this is a much more attainable goal. While 52 is the number I’ve set, the way I’m really viewing it is to read about 4 books a month, which is definitely doable in the form of two audiobooks and two physical books. But as every year, we’ll have to see how I do!
- Pick up an extra curricular activity besides reading. This can be constantly improving on the guitar or piano, or actively learning more Korean, but I think one thing that’s missing from my life is the constant development of a completely separate, non-work related skill. (Non-work in this case referring to anything not professionally related, which is really anything tech.) I haven’t fully decided on what it will be, or if will even be one specific thing, but I’ll be putting in a plan for that soon!
- Exercise regularly. I’ve already been building up this habit in the last month of 2021 and I’m using the momentum I’ve gained to keep it up in 2022. I found that playing a sport with other people makes exercising a lot more fun so when I go back to Seattle, I’m thinking of either joining a Tennis group or finding some other group sport activity to participate in. But whatever the case, the goal is to stay regularly active.
- Document my thoughts. This can be in a journal, or a blog, or really, even in the form of video essays or personal vlogs. But the the goal is to keep track of my observations and thoughts and feelings more regularly. I’ve heard this can be beneficial for many reasons, but the real reason I want to do it is to keep track of my personal progress. My thoughts and though process are bound to change as I continue to grow, and so, it will be interesting to look back and see how I used to think about things down the lane.
So there it is, my goals for 2022. I can’t really pick out the specific theme yet, but I’m sure as the year goes on, I’ll have a clearer view of what my year will be focused on.
I hope you all have a productive and wonderful year ahead.
And please feel free to share your goals for 2022 with me as well! I’m looking forward to hearing about what you’re all striving towards in the coming year.
