Dreams and Goals for January 2020

Good morning, my friends! Happy, happy new year! Welcome to a brand new day, month, year, and decade! I have been looking forward to this day for a while now, because although I realize there is nothing magical about one day in comparison to the one before it, I'm a girl who thrives on fresh starts. 2019 was a heavy year for us, and I have been looking forward to the hope of a new beginning - in many facets of life.

As I enjoy the fullness of this day, I thought I would share with you some of my dreams and goals for this fresh-start month. To look at the whole year feels a bit too big, so I'm just looking at January for now. I have worked hard to prepare for it, and now that it's here, I want to live it well.

* Finding fresh consistency in working out. Don't most lists for a new year contain an immediate nod to health in some way? If you've been reading here for a while now, you know that Ryan finds much joy in working out. I don't, but I do find much joy in my clothes fitting! 2019 was a year of extremely inconsistent workouts for us. For the majority of the year, we didn't have the luxury of maintaining our own schedules, so when something had to give, it was too often a workout. Both of us crave a return to normalcy and consistency with this. My personal plan (already mapped out for the month) is to complete a progressive workout cycle six days a week. Each day has seven different exercises that start small and gradually build toward the end of the month. In addition to that, I plan to run a 5K every Wednesday. (I even named them all so they will feel cute as I run them.) On Sundays, when I take my Sabbath from working out, I plan to do some stretching, because I know that will be relaxing and good for me at the same time!

* Study in Psalms each day. In 2019, I studied the four Gospels in depth. After much prayer, I feel led to move my study to Psalms for 2020. One of my simultaneous goals for the new year is to be more intentional and devoted in my prayer life, and since so many Psalms are prayers, my hope is that studying them intently will help my prayer life to grow. I have a brand new commentary all ready for my first day of study today!

* Enjoy three at-home dates. Besides workouts, another piece of our lives that took a significant toll in 2019 was our intentional dating. We did date throughout the year - and regularly, at that. But they weren't always creative or well-planned. Partway through 2019, I began planning a series of dates for 2020, and all of them can be done right at home. Our hope is to alternate those with dates that take us somewhere fun. The first of my three ideas is already mapped out, and I can't wait for it!

* Get a fresh haircut.  I haven't had my hair cut or colored since August, and I'm starting to feel all frumply. No time for that! I also haven't had a different haircut in over three years. (Probably getting close to four if we're counting intently.) I think it's time to change it up.

* Finish the Atlanta scrapbook. Now that I've returned to working full time, I can't use my extra daytime hours to work on scrapbooking. I have several half-finished projects lingering in my account, so my goal for January is to finish the book about our trip to Atlanta. If I'm careful about my time, I might be able to accomplish even more than that, but I always overcommit, so I'm trying to start out easy.

* Archive two months of blog posts. I'm still working on the long, arduous task of archiving old blog posts. It takes me about an hour to archive one month's worth of posts, so I figure surely I can find two extra hours in this month to archive two more months' worth of material, right?

* Work on memorizing Scripture. I am terrible at memorizing. I've told you this before! A few weeks ago, I found this list of 100 verses that are important to know. Some are verses I already know (at least generally) so that makes the idea of 100 verses less daunting. I don't know that I can memorize all 100 in a year, but I would love to get a start on it and try!

* Organize entry closet and foyer table. At the end of last year, I'd started reorganizing/decluttering some areas of our home. (Closets, drawers, etc.) Again, returning to work means I can't do these projects during the day, but perhaps I can slowly work through them during weekends or evenings. Since we are in the heart of coats/hats/gloves season, I've decided my January project should be to weed out the coat closet and foyer table. I want to reorganize and get rid of things we don't or can't wear.

* Read a book. In the last few months, with my increased work at church, I haven't had time to read like I used to. I miss it! Even though work at church has only INCREASED with taking a full-time job, I'm hopeful that I can carve out a little bit of time each day for reading. I used to read a book a week, so I'm hoping a book for the whole month is attainable!

So there you have it! My main goals for the month! I know that all of this, combined with reacclimating myself to working outside the home and my church responsibilities might be a bit much, but I surely am going to try to do my best!

How about you? Are you a goal-maker? Anything on your hope-to-achieve list for January?