Happy New Year! Now that a new year has started, it’s time for me to share my 2019 goals. I hope you enjoy.

Last Year’s Post – My 2018 Goals + My Word For The Year

//My Word For The Year//

My word for this year is fearless, which felt like a very cliche word to choose. Normally, it takes me a while to choose a word, but once “fearless” entered my mind, I couldn’t bring myself to choose anything else. I want to do the things that scare me. I have a tendency to hold myself back from things I want to do based on what other people want for me. Or I’m just too embarrassed. An example of this is that I don’t post about my blog on Instagram because I’m embarrassed about my extended family reading things I write. (It’s something I want to start doing this year.) That’s a small way fear stops me from doing things.

There are so many bigger things I can relate the word to, but basically, I want to do the things I am scared of. Not things like skydiving (because I’m not afraid of skydiving), but getting out of my comfort zone in general. This year, I want to do whatever crazy idea or plan I make in my head instead of just letting it stay there.

//Three Life Categories

I’m using the Powersheets Goal Planner again this year. At the beginning of the planner, there is a section where you choose three out of ten life categories to focus on for the year. These are the three I chose.

Academics

This isn’t one of the sections in the planner, so I added it. 2019 marks the end of my junior year and beginning of my senior year. This is my last full year as a college student, and I need to start preparing for the year after that. This means things like keeping my grades up, studying for the GRE, looking up job prospects or grad school requirements, etc. These are very important things I need to focus on in 2019 and that’s apparent in my goals.

Recreation

This includes things like going out, travel, etc. Since I live on campus now, I have more opportunities to go out on weeknights. I did that way more at the beginning of last semester than I did near the end of it. I want to make time to go to the free dance classes and movie nights. I want to make more time for fun this year in between work and school.

Last year was mostly about working and saving money, so I didn’t travel as much as I wanted to. This year, I want to make time to travel because I won’t get as much time off in the future once I get a job. I only have a few spring, summer, and winter breaks left. Now that I have some financial stability (for a college student at least), I can afford to take more trips.

Health

My health completely tanked last year. More on that in this post, but basically, I had a lot of health problems last year. I don’t want to lose weight or anything. I want to continue working out regularly, but I also want to create habits like start taking vitamins every day. I also want to be more consistent with physical therapy to improve my back pain. More on this later.

Now on to my 2019 goals.

//My 2019 Goals//

I don’t share all my goals publicly for privacy reasons and some won’t be very interesting for you. Here are most of my goals for 2019.

1.//Take 4 Trips [Go To Europe]

This is going to be a huge undertaking but I’m sure I can do it. I want to take four trips on my own this year, separate from any family vacations we may take. Something I’ve learned in the last few years is that it’s not that expensive to travel if you’re smart about it and prioritize it. Four felt like a big number, but I think it’s possible. All of these trips don’t have to be international or solo trips. I want to travel within the U.S, too, and if a friend wants to tag along, I’m game.

The big trip I want to take this year is definitely Europe. That was my goal for 2018, but I, unfortunately, couldn’t go, so a Eurotrip is definitely a priority this year. My plan is to go this summer.

As for the other three, I’m open to anything. I really want to visit Harry Potter World because I haven’t been since it opened and so much more stuff has been added. There are also plenty of U.S states I haven’t been to.

2.//Prioritize My Health

This is pretty much a vague description encompasses my two biggest health goals:

Physical Therapy Every Day
Take Vitamins Everyday

Those two are definitely the biggest habits I want to cultivate this year. As for the physical therapy, I want to give it a go for another year before considering surgery because the orthopedist said that the disc in my back could move back with physical therapy, but it hasn’t improved that much in the last year. I’m going to try again, but I think I will end up needing the surgery because I’m too young to live with chronic back pain.

I also suck at taking vitamins every day, so I’ve been working on that. I’m happy to say that I’ve been taking them consistently in December and don’t foresee any hiccups in the next few months. I plan to start taking other vitamins as well, not just the ones the doctor prescribed me after taking my blood test. I’ve noticed a huge difference in my energy level since I started taking them. I definitely had a B-12 deficiency because I feel so much better already (and I didn’t even think my energy was that low until I started taking the vitamins)

In general, I think I do a good job at prioritizing my health. I practice self-care and work out 3-5 times per week. I just set this goal to keep health at the forefront of the mind this year. Even when it comes to the little things, like using a humidifier in the winter or taking care of my skin. I want to remember to do things like that.

3.//Prepare For Post-Grad Life

This goal also encompasses a bunch of my mini-goals for this year. Now that I’m nearing college graduation, I need to start preparing for what comes after, whether that’s grad school or a job. I’ve already laid out a general plan and to-do list to go through this year, so you’ll see some of the action steps I’m taking in my monthly goals. Here are some examples of things I want to get done:

Study For And Take The GRE
Update Resume
Open A LinkedIn Profile

4.//Post 100 Blog Posts

This goal kind of scares me because I was not able to post consistently in 2018 and I fell out of the habit. The thing is that this goal is completely doable! There are 52 weeks in a year, so all I have to do is post twice a week all year with four get out of jail free cards. I’m already prewriting posts before the spring semester starts to get ahead, so hopefully, you’ll see a lot more of me this year.

5.//Sell An E-Course On Blog

One of my goals for 2018 was to create a product to sell on this blog. I spent a lot of time bouncing around ideas on whether that would be an e-book or an e-course and ultimately decided on writing an e-course. I’ve already decided on what it’s going to be about and have outlined it. You’ll find out more in the future, but my goal is to launch it by August of this year.

6.//Read 100 Books In A Year [Read 12 Classics]

This goal is very daunting. I was going to play it safe and try to aim for 70 books, but I just couldn’t get this number out of my mind. If there is one thing I’ve learned in 2018, it’s that reading 100 books is completely doable. I finished 80 books last year and I spent a lot of time watching movies, t.v. shows, and YouTube videos in between, so there was plenty of time in those 12 months that I could have finished 20 more books.

I’m going to give this a try this year and hope I come through. I don’t think I’ll be as strict with myself this year as I was last year about what to count as a full book (For example, I would count three graphic novels as one book because they were so quick to read). I’m not doing that this year. I’m totally okay with counting a 30+ chapter fanfiction as a book if it’s really good. The only thing I’m going to bind up is comic books because I’ve gotten back into reading comic books recently (something I haven’t done since I was like, 10), so I think I’ll make six or seven issues count as one book read. The goal here is just to read more for fun in general. Not just to finish a book for the sake of reading.

The other part of this goal is to read 12 classic books this year, meaning one book per month. I read a lot of classic books as a child because those were the types of books my dad would read in Bangladesh and Thailand, so those were the ones he would give me to read. In the last ten years, I’ve read less and less classic books for fun in the last ten years. I mostly just read them for school, but I still loved them. I’ve gotten back into reading classic books in the last few months and I want to dedicate 2019 to reading classics I haven’t read before/classics I haven’t read since I was really young. More on this in a future post.

So those are my 2019 goals. Some of them are very daunting, but I’m super excited to see what this year brings. Hopefully, I’ll update enough for you guys to read along with me.

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What are your 2019 goals? What are you most excited to get done this year?

My 2019 Goals + Word For The Year

//My Word For The Year//