1. Two blog post's a week.
If you follow my blog, it's clear that this did not happen. I attribute that to a lack of planning. With a full-time job and the responsibilities that come with being a full-time adult, there is time to accomplish things, you just have to be very choosy about what you let yourself spend time on. I say that to myself, mostly.
My goal for my bog posts will remain the same. Two a week. I know I can do it, but this time I will work on pre-writing. I will take my Saturdays (or any day that I find I have a lot of free time) and devote as much of this time to writing, writing, writing. It's all about getting ahead of the game. Once I get ahead, it will be a lot easier to keep up with my quota.
If you follow my blog, it's clear that this did not happen. I attribute that to a lack of planning. With a full-time job and the responsibilities that come with being a full-time adult, there is time to accomplish things, you just have to be very choosy about what you let yourself spend time on. I say that to myself, mostly.
My goal for my bog posts will remain the same. Two a week. I know I can do it, but this time I will work on pre-writing. I will take my Saturdays (or any day that I find I have a lot of free time) and devote as much of this time to writing, writing, writing. It's all about getting ahead of the game. Once I get ahead, it will be a lot easier to keep up with my quota.
3. Three chapters a day. And it must be one book at a time. Not counting the Bible, of course.
This proved to be far more difficult than I had anticipated. When I was in middle school and high school, I was a bookworm. I loved to read, and I still do, but now I work until 5:00pm, and not 3:30pm. And that whole being an adult thing- yah, that is a thing that takes time after work too. So I am a little on the fence about this goal. I might or might not keep it. I could end up reducing it to fewer chapters per day, but I am still adamant about reading more. So we will just have to see how February goes.
This proved to be far more difficult than I had anticipated. When I was in middle school and high school, I was a bookworm. I loved to read, and I still do, but now I work until 5:00pm, and not 3:30pm. And that whole being an adult thing- yah, that is a thing that takes time after work too. So I am a little on the fence about this goal. I might or might not keep it. I could end up reducing it to fewer chapters per day, but I am still adamant about reading more. So we will just have to see how February goes.
5. Expect three pictures per month.
I am actually proud to say that I have kept up with this one! (Gold star for me.) I have been using pictures that I personally took in all of my blog posts since the one I put up in January about my goals, and it has been great to combine two things that I love in that way! THIS goal is more than achievable, and I will continue to keep on posting at least three pictures each month. I will consider increasing this goal depending on how February pans out. I want to push my self when I am comfortable, but then again, I am also struggling with the rest of my goals. If I am able to get on top of my other goals easily, then I might conceder adding a few more pictures to this quota. If I am still barely screeching by on the other resolutions, I might keep it where it is.
I am actually proud to say that I have kept up with this one! (Gold star for me.) I have been using pictures that I personally took in all of my blog posts since the one I put up in January about my goals, and it has been great to combine two things that I love in that way! THIS goal is more than achievable, and I will continue to keep on posting at least three pictures each month. I will consider increasing this goal depending on how February pans out. I want to push my self when I am comfortable, but then again, I am also struggling with the rest of my goals. If I am able to get on top of my other goals easily, then I might conceder adding a few more pictures to this quota. If I am still barely screeching by on the other resolutions, I might keep it where it is.
8. I really like to do stretches on my yoga mat in the morning, and I use to make at lest fifteen minutes of time for it every day. I'm going to go back to that.
Did not happen. Just didn't. I have a routine I like to use when I wake up, and everything. I just neglected to wake up early enough. That is my monster to tackle this month. I must start waking up with enough time to really start my morning off right. Breakfast, getting ready, stretching, time with God- they are all very important to me! But when I wake up with 40 minutes until I leave for work, I have time for one of those things-maybe.
This all gets back to my need to spend my time more wisely and efficiently. I realized about a week into this month that I waste a ton of time at work on my phone. I use a ton of data, and even end up going over our limit. It was also beginning to effect how my boss was viewing me as an employee (eek!), so I decided that enough was enough. I forwarded my work email to my hubby, and have been leaving my phone in my car all work day since.
As a result of God's brilliant suggestion, my productivity has gone up, I work my entire day, and at the end of my day, I feel invigorated! God blessed me with my job, but I was squandering it. As soon as I listened to God's suggestion, my work life changed completely! I now love going in to work, and work as hard as I can. Work is vibrant and challenging, whereas before it was dull and seemed to go on for days on end. I know that the same could happen with my mornings if I would stop practically worshiping sleep.
God gives us the hours of every day, and I love how it feels to fall asleep after an alarm probably more than most. But it is not God's plan for my life to sleep away so much of my day! For me, living intentionally for God and the goals he has set before me means getting enough sleep, but also saying "enough sleep!" when I need to wake up. God has placed some incredible goals before me, and they will take sacrifice, and it will be daily. If the only reason that I wake up earlier is to spend more quality time with God, then it will be so so worth it. I guess this might be a new goal then: 11. Wake up at 5:30 every day.
Did not happen. Just didn't. I have a routine I like to use when I wake up, and everything. I just neglected to wake up early enough. That is my monster to tackle this month. I must start waking up with enough time to really start my morning off right. Breakfast, getting ready, stretching, time with God- they are all very important to me! But when I wake up with 40 minutes until I leave for work, I have time for one of those things-maybe.
This all gets back to my need to spend my time more wisely and efficiently. I realized about a week into this month that I waste a ton of time at work on my phone. I use a ton of data, and even end up going over our limit. It was also beginning to effect how my boss was viewing me as an employee (eek!), so I decided that enough was enough. I forwarded my work email to my hubby, and have been leaving my phone in my car all work day since.
As a result of God's brilliant suggestion, my productivity has gone up, I work my entire day, and at the end of my day, I feel invigorated! God blessed me with my job, but I was squandering it. As soon as I listened to God's suggestion, my work life changed completely! I now love going in to work, and work as hard as I can. Work is vibrant and challenging, whereas before it was dull and seemed to go on for days on end. I know that the same could happen with my mornings if I would stop practically worshiping sleep.
God gives us the hours of every day, and I love how it feels to fall asleep after an alarm probably more than most. But it is not God's plan for my life to sleep away so much of my day! For me, living intentionally for God and the goals he has set before me means getting enough sleep, but also saying "enough sleep!" when I need to wake up. God has placed some incredible goals before me, and they will take sacrifice, and it will be daily. If the only reason that I wake up earlier is to spend more quality time with God, then it will be so so worth it. I guess this might be a new goal then: 11. Wake up at 5:30 every day.
9. I am committing to at least fifteen minutes of solid prayer time. It's as simple as that.
I did not really do this one like I wish I could tell you I have. I did it some of the time, but, and this goes back to the time thing again, I really just need to manage my time better. I am frequently very tired after I wake up. I have tried praying and spending time with God in this state, but the quality of this time suffers greatly. So I decided to devote the first 15 minutes that I am home after work to prayer with God. I did do that for a little while, but in the following weeks, I soon let it fall to the wayside. I rationalized that I didn't want to loose my momentum and that this chore really needed to be done first, but I was wrong. Wrong because it says a lot when you have a million things tugging you in all directions, but you choose to ignore the signals firing in your brain in order to simply be quiet before God.
I will almost always make time to read my Bible every day. It just feels too out of the ordinary when I do not. But real devoted prayer time has never been my strong suit. I just did not learn it and make a habit of it like I did with studying the Word. But I know in my head how important it is to talk with God. If I were asked if spending time in prayer was important, my answer would be a resounding yes. So why don't I??
I am out of practice, I don't make time, it can bee a little boring-there are any number of excuses that I could hurl out. So it's time to stop trying to think of ways to make prayer more glamorous for myself. It comes down to if I am going to be faithful to do what I said I will do or not. Am I a faithful person, or am I not? I am willing to ask that question with the risk of finding the answer to be no. Right now, in this area, the answer is, "no". But I can still get up, and I can still keep on going. I might not be where I want to be-where God desires for me to be, but I have faith that I can get there with God on my side. As I lean into God and the fact that he is my righteousness, I know that this will come to pass. I just need to not quit.
Is for goals 2, 4, 6, 7, and 10, I definitely have to say that I feel good about these. I have continued to not let my lack of experience in writing and photography scare me, and it has been a lot of fun viewing the things that I do without the fear of sucking. So I feel confident in how number two (Dare to Suck) went.
Number four, Let Yourself Off the Hook has gone very well. Even though I pretty much failed on most of my goals right off the bat and well through the entire month, I am still incredibly excited about each of my goals! In fact, I know that even though the results of those goals has been mostly failure, God has been working mightily in my life this entire month! I have never had as much ambition, and clarity for my life as I have right now. I am ready to rocket forward for whatever God has for me! And even when I fail, I will not let myself wallow in self pity anymore. God has far too much planned for me. I must, and will continue to let myself off the hook.
As for goal number six, Just Do You, Boo, I haven't received very much pushback form others. No one has made me feel as if I should not do what God has placed in my heart, and I think that says something important. It is mostly in your head. The part of your brain that tells you that you can't do what you want because of the negative people around you is lying. Sometimes in life, there will be people who it would be best to ignore, but I think most of us can take a deep breath and exhale. And let me tell you a secret, most folks around you could not care less what you do or don't do. Yep, I said it. So take it from me: ignore the people spewing hate, but also ignore the voice in your head trying to tell you that everyone will be hating on you if you decide to follow your dreams, because it is lying. It's as simple as that.
Goal number seven is Finish Projects, and I actually did finish one of the projects that Teagan and I had started at the beginning of the month. Teagan and I, as we read through the Don't Limit God book, decided that we were going to make a list of things that we were no longer going to limit God on, I decided to make a painting to hang in our room as a reminder, and I finished the painting! Granted, my mind is already telling me how I could do a painting like this better next time, but it is done. And I am pretty happy with the end result.
Goal ten was to stop limiting God. I think that I have learned how to do that a little more through my change at work. I have also learned how to not do stop limiting God as well this month. It has been an journey, and I expect to never get to a spot in which I think that I have completely imagined all that God can do for me. Because God can do anything. His ability far outreaches the mind of any man. So I could never come to a point that my mind is expanded enough to know all that God can do for me. And that is so amazing and humbling.
All in all, I think that this has been an amazing month. God has shown me a lot about myself that I never wanted to believe. He has also shown me how to conquer some of the most difficult mountains in my life. Read: flee from temptation. I may have not had a month of completing every resolution on my list, but that is why I set them for a year. I will continue to walk with God and expect an amazing outcome that brings him glory.
My resolutions still stand, and I will add and amend as necessary. Next month I will update my progress and note all that God has done in my month. God is doing big things, and he desires to do them for you too! Do yourself a huge favor, and get real with God. Ask him what he wants for your life. Ask him what you really need to change or get rid of in your life. He will be faithful to answer. And when we let God in the mix of our lives, there is no cap on the supernatural changes that we will see.
I did not really do this one like I wish I could tell you I have. I did it some of the time, but, and this goes back to the time thing again, I really just need to manage my time better. I am frequently very tired after I wake up. I have tried praying and spending time with God in this state, but the quality of this time suffers greatly. So I decided to devote the first 15 minutes that I am home after work to prayer with God. I did do that for a little while, but in the following weeks, I soon let it fall to the wayside. I rationalized that I didn't want to loose my momentum and that this chore really needed to be done first, but I was wrong. Wrong because it says a lot when you have a million things tugging you in all directions, but you choose to ignore the signals firing in your brain in order to simply be quiet before God.
I will almost always make time to read my Bible every day. It just feels too out of the ordinary when I do not. But real devoted prayer time has never been my strong suit. I just did not learn it and make a habit of it like I did with studying the Word. But I know in my head how important it is to talk with God. If I were asked if spending time in prayer was important, my answer would be a resounding yes. So why don't I??
I am out of practice, I don't make time, it can bee a little boring-there are any number of excuses that I could hurl out. So it's time to stop trying to think of ways to make prayer more glamorous for myself. It comes down to if I am going to be faithful to do what I said I will do or not. Am I a faithful person, or am I not? I am willing to ask that question with the risk of finding the answer to be no. Right now, in this area, the answer is, "no". But I can still get up, and I can still keep on going. I might not be where I want to be-where God desires for me to be, but I have faith that I can get there with God on my side. As I lean into God and the fact that he is my righteousness, I know that this will come to pass. I just need to not quit.
Is for goals 2, 4, 6, 7, and 10, I definitely have to say that I feel good about these. I have continued to not let my lack of experience in writing and photography scare me, and it has been a lot of fun viewing the things that I do without the fear of sucking. So I feel confident in how number two (Dare to Suck) went.
Number four, Let Yourself Off the Hook has gone very well. Even though I pretty much failed on most of my goals right off the bat and well through the entire month, I am still incredibly excited about each of my goals! In fact, I know that even though the results of those goals has been mostly failure, God has been working mightily in my life this entire month! I have never had as much ambition, and clarity for my life as I have right now. I am ready to rocket forward for whatever God has for me! And even when I fail, I will not let myself wallow in self pity anymore. God has far too much planned for me. I must, and will continue to let myself off the hook.
As for goal number six, Just Do You, Boo, I haven't received very much pushback form others. No one has made me feel as if I should not do what God has placed in my heart, and I think that says something important. It is mostly in your head. The part of your brain that tells you that you can't do what you want because of the negative people around you is lying. Sometimes in life, there will be people who it would be best to ignore, but I think most of us can take a deep breath and exhale. And let me tell you a secret, most folks around you could not care less what you do or don't do. Yep, I said it. So take it from me: ignore the people spewing hate, but also ignore the voice in your head trying to tell you that everyone will be hating on you if you decide to follow your dreams, because it is lying. It's as simple as that.
Goal number seven is Finish Projects, and I actually did finish one of the projects that Teagan and I had started at the beginning of the month. Teagan and I, as we read through the Don't Limit God book, decided that we were going to make a list of things that we were no longer going to limit God on, I decided to make a painting to hang in our room as a reminder, and I finished the painting! Granted, my mind is already telling me how I could do a painting like this better next time, but it is done. And I am pretty happy with the end result.
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| Chief is a master photobomber. |
Goal ten was to stop limiting God. I think that I have learned how to do that a little more through my change at work. I have also learned how to not do stop limiting God as well this month. It has been an journey, and I expect to never get to a spot in which I think that I have completely imagined all that God can do for me. Because God can do anything. His ability far outreaches the mind of any man. So I could never come to a point that my mind is expanded enough to know all that God can do for me. And that is so amazing and humbling.
All in all, I think that this has been an amazing month. God has shown me a lot about myself that I never wanted to believe. He has also shown me how to conquer some of the most difficult mountains in my life. Read: flee from temptation. I may have not had a month of completing every resolution on my list, but that is why I set them for a year. I will continue to walk with God and expect an amazing outcome that brings him glory.
My resolutions still stand, and I will add and amend as necessary. Next month I will update my progress and note all that God has done in my month. God is doing big things, and he desires to do them for you too! Do yourself a huge favor, and get real with God. Ask him what he wants for your life. Ask him what you really need to change or get rid of in your life. He will be faithful to answer. And when we let God in the mix of our lives, there is no cap on the supernatural changes that we will see.
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