Goals

May 2009 Goal Review

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F-side
photo credit: FLY2005

This is my monthly review of the goals I set for myself at the beginning of the year.

My first goal is to increase my passive income. I made a little progress on that this month. I put most of the money I made from the medical study in my stock account and will use it to buy a dividend-paying stock tomorrow. Anyone have a stock tip? 🙂

My second goal is to lose 30 pounds. I went from 219.2 pounds last month to 218.8 pounds this month. That isn’t very good progress. If you’re entered in my $500 weight-loss challenge your odds of collecting look pretty good.

My third goal is to increase my number of subscribers to 500. I didn’t make any progress towards that this month as my subscriber count stayed about the same. I’ve made some small changes this last week, such as installing a new theme, that I think will help increase my subscriber count. I need to work on promoting my blog and improving my content though to make better progress on increasing the readership of my blog.

It wasn’t a very good month since I only made reasonable progress on one of my three goals. There are some big changes coming in June. I’m not sure if they will actually help me meet my goals but there will definitely be changes.

Also, if you want to enter the $500 weight loss challenge you need to do so now. I will be closing the challenge to new entrants tomorrow, June 1,2009.

My Lifetime Goals from 10 Years Ago

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While sorting through my important papers I came across a list of lifetime goals I made about 10 years ago. It is rather sad to see how little progress I’ve made towards those goals. I plan to make much better progress on them in the next 10 years.

  1. Run a marathon.  – This is the only goal I’ve actually completed.  I’ve run 4 marathons since then and plan to add more.  I like the idea of running a marathon in every state and D.C. but not enough to make it a goal at this time.
  2. Write a book. – I wanted to write a novel back then but I’d like to write a non-fiction book now.  I have an idea for a non-fiction book (not personal finance) that I should write a proposal for but I’ve never gotten around to it.
  3. Visit all 50 states.- I’ve visited a few new states since then.  The states I have left are AK, CT, DE, ID, LA, ME, MD, MI, MT, NH, NY, ND, OR, RI, SC, SD, VT, WA, and WI.  I’ll knock out a few of them when I hike the AT later this year.
  4. Visit 20 foreign countries.- At that time I had been to three foreign countries-Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Mexico.  I’ve visited all of them again since then but haven’t added any new countries.  I’ll be in Maine for my hike. Maybe I’ll take a side trip to Canada and 0ne more country to my total.
  5. Be able to retire at age 40.- That didn’t happen. It doesn’t look too bad for 50 though.
  6. Learn Spanish or another foreign language.- This one I put quite a bit of effort toward but didn’t make much progress.  At one point I had some basic Spanish skills and could carry on a simple conversation with a patient Spanish speaker. I never did develop close to the fluency I wanted though and my Spanish skills have diminished in the last few years from lack of use.

Although it has been 10 years these are all still goals I would like to achieve.  Check back in 10 years and I’ll let you know how I did. 🙂

$500 Weight-Loss Challenge

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Your weight indicates your health
photo credit: sylvar
As I have done terrible so far this year on my weight-loss goal I have decided to try something different. My original weight-loss goal for this year was to lose 30 pounds. I’ve gained weight since setting that goal so I now need to lose 40 pounds and am aiming for a weight of 180 pounds.

In order to meet this goal I’m asking you, my readers, to hold me accountable. I need some extra motivation and since I am money motivated I’ve decided that if I don’t meet this goal I will give $500 to my readers. The prospect of losing $500 should motivate me to lose weight. I’m not sure how I will distribute the $500 but it will go to readers of this blog. You will somewhat have to take my word for whether I meet my goal. I will post before and after pictures as a form of proof though. If I haven’t posted by the end of December that I’ve met my goal contact me and remind me of this challenge. To be eligible to receive part of the $500 you need to leave a comment on this post. Thanks.

***I have turned off the comments and closed the challenge to new entrants. Thanks to everyone who entered for all the support and encouragement. I will keep you updated on my progress.

April 2009 Goal Review

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This is my monthly review of the goals I set for myself at the beginning of the year.

My first goal is to increase my passive income. I made some progress on that this month. I opened a reward checking account that pays 5.03% which produced a nice increase in the amount of monthly interest I receive.

My second goal is to lose thirty pounds. My weight went from 220.4 pounds to 219.2 pounds last month. I consider that not making any progress. I should be starting my hike soon which will take care of the weight loss. There is a chance I won’t hike though and if that happens I have a different plan for losing weight.

My third goal is to have my subscriber count reach 500 subscribers. I reached a new high of 393 subscribers during the month although I haven’t maintained it. Considering I haven’t done anything special to promote my blog this is good progress.

I made progress on two out of three of my goals last month which is ok. I’m aiming for three out of three this month.

Time Tracking Results

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I kept track of what I did with my time last week to see where I was wasting my time. I already knew before I started that I was wasting a lot of time on the Internet but now I know exactly how much time I’m wasting. I’m spending over four hours a day on average on the Internet. I do have a couple blogs and other sites on the Internet but most of the time I’m online I’m not doing anything productive. Until I am finished with my R&W I’m restricting myself to one hour a day online. I’m going to write my blog posts offline to the extent possible so I should still be able to keep up with my blogging.

I also like to eat leisurely lunches out and read the newspaper cover to cover. This might be a reasonable indulgence once every week or two but I’m doing this two or three times a week. I’m now restricting that activity to no more than once a week. That should make it a special treat and save me money and time.

The other big time waster is TV. I generally watch a couple of hours a day. This includes DVDs which I actually watch more than TV. I don’t plan to cut back on this activity for now because I think it is a reasonable use of my leisure time. I just have to work the rest of the day rather than making my whole day leisure time.