2016 Q4 Goals Update

Yep, missed the Q3 summary. That’s not really surprising since I really lost momentum not too long after the last update. I sort of don’t want to do this update because of that, but since I’m more on the ball now it would feel disingenuous to pass on it.

Oh, also, since this is a personal organization post, it’s for my own record keeping. It will be meandering, too detailed, and unedited. Read at your own peril.

Quarter 2 & 3 Summary

I didn’t do great. I barely did anything. Well, that’s not true. I got back on the wagon for September. But yeah, did bad. I’m not even sure why for some of it. I know that the vacation really put a hiccup in things, since I lost momentum on practically everything. I know some of the time was lost to being too busy/tired but honestly that’s just an excuse. I spent some time getting back up to par on electronics and I’ve spent some time teaching my nephew about how to build electronic stuff. I can’t remember exactly what slowed me down between April and the vacation though.

Oh well, can’t change the past.

When I reevaluated things for September I cut some things that aren’t really important anymore. And honestly, it just reinforced the fact that I need to have fewer goals on the major list. I think next year I should try to slim it down to 5 goals if I can next time. But they should be big goals. I can do the other things as bonus goals or whatever. Anyway, on to the point-by-point analysis.

Q2 & 3 Detail Breakdown

 

I’m just going to do the stuff I actually accomplished or made progress on, since I had a bad couple of quarters.

Bike 100 miles – Progress – I got back to training on this at the end of Q3.

Japanese Study – Progress – I’ve been going through the JLPT N4 Memrise deck along with some other decks. I missed a few weeks, but not too much. I’m actually already more prepared in vocab for the N4 than I was for the N5 when I took it. Though I’m not as prepared in some other areas as I was when I took the N5. All in all though, I’m happy with the consistency and progress I’ve made when practicing.

NFC Posts – Progress – I only did 1 post, but it’s something

Twitter – Stretch goal complete – I have over 1000 followers across accounts, and almost 1000 just on my main account. I need to make this goal bigger next year. Far too easy.

Quarter 4 Plans – The End of the Year

Alright, I’m going to spend a little more time here. I spent some time prioritizing and planning, but I’m still going to try to get as much done as I can for most of them.

I have a pretty good idea for my areas of focus for the rest of the year. I’m much more restricted on what I can get done due to calendar restraints than I was earlier in the year, so I really should have made an effort back in May – August to get some of these done. I’m basically going to have three TOP priorities for the rest of the year: Fitness, Japanese study, and NaNoWriMo. I’m having a hard time writing this in narrative, so bullet lists here we go. I have a more detailed list, but I’m keeping that to my day to day plans. Not really worth publishing. Here’s where my focus will be:

October Focus

  1. Fitness
    1. Super strict diet control
    2. Training towards biking 100 miles
    3. Regular biking
  2. Japanese Study
    1. Finish “learning” the JLPT N4 deck (1244 cards)
    2. Keep review queue for JLPT N4 deck under 500 cards
    3. Start practicing grammar and listening
  3. Writing
    1. Prep for NaNo
    2. Finish Novella 1 draft 1
  4. Take the AWS Exam (if I can fit in the schedule)

November Focus

  1. Fitness
    1. Diet control as possible
    2. Do 100 mile attempt
    3. Regular biking
  2. Japanese Study
    1. Keep cramming the JLPT N4 deck
    2. Do the JLPT practice test (and unofficial tests)
    3. Cram in every way possible, since the N4 is right away in December
  3. Writing
    1. Win NaNo (try to finish in 10 – 15 days)
    2. (Probably no writing after NaNo, since JLPT coming up)

December Focus

  1. Fitness
    1. Diet control as possible
    2. Regular biking
    3. Start lifting again
  2. Writing
    1. Novella 1 should be ready for post-production
    2. More Novellas should be prepped
    3. Possibly pound out some quick and dirty novellas to publish under another pseudonym
  3. Wrap up
    1. Use December to try to finish any remaining goals or generally progress as much as possible.

Conclusion

While I’ll probably end up missing most of my goals this year out of slacking off for a good third of it, I think I’ll be able to have a pretty good overall amount of progress by the end of 2016 as long as I don’t give up now. I’m getting more and more stressed about JLPT, since this is the first time I really really want to pass the thing. If I don’t pass this year, I’m going to take it again next year until I manage to pass. Then I move on to the next level. I’ve kept up the practice, but I am still a self-study, so it’s incredibly hard to keep at it and know if I’m making the right kind of progress. I sort of feel like if I don’t manage to pass this time, I’ll have a hard time maintaining momentum for next year. Oh well, I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.

Aside from that, if I can end this year smaller than I started it, I’ll take it as a not complete failure, though obviously I’d have liked to get further. Also, I wish I’d focused more on finishing the things I’m writing.

I might do a post on the JLPT before or after I take it, but otherwise this is probably the last “goals” post before the summary at the end of the year. Next year I’ll have fewer goals I think, but bigger ones. I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but it’ll probably be a weight loss goal, a JLPT goal (let’s hope it’s N3), a writing goal, a Twitter/social impact goal, and maybe something else. Five seems like a good number. I don’t really have time to think about it until after I get that N4 taken though…

Time to get back at it.


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