12 Goals for 2019 - Mid-Year Check-in

Hello, Reader!

One of my first posts on this blog was about my goals for this year since I began it right at the start of January. I shared my goal setting tips and reasons for the goals I’ve set myself and I still feel pretty good about those goals, but the truth is that by this point in the year, most people have forgotten their new year’s resolutions and yearly goals so I’m here to refresh your memory. Here’s how my yearly goals look, six months on. 

Out of the twelve goals I’ve set for myself, I’ve been able to tick off 3 so far. Not too bad, in my opinion - a quarter of my goals reached and it’s only June! The thing about yearly goals is that you have the whole year to reach them, it’s not a race. The three goals that I’ve reached are: starting a blog, 12 sketches and taking up a sport. The first one was reached as soon as the year began really; with my first blog post, I was able to tick that one off my list. What I’m most proud of, however, is that I’m still sticking with it! I’m writing this post six months into the year and I have not missed even one week of posting and that is the real achievement; not just starting a blog but successfully running a blog. I’ve only completed my 12 sketches recently - I think I’m finally finding my art style and, again, I’m really proud of myself. If you’ve ever seen my art, you know that I’ve always made quite realistic pieces and although I’ve experimented with materials, I haven’t really experimented with styles. So I took this opportunity to work on that a bit more! I’ve started drawing much more stylised portraits and practising inventing princesses during my babysitting hours, and I’m really impressed with myself for getting outside of my comfort zone a bit and trying something new! Moreover, I think everyone knows that I’m not a very sporty person, but I’ve finally decided that I’ll take up a sport. I’ve thought long and hard about what sport it will be and in May, I went to my first pole dancing lesson. I know what you’re thinking: ‘don’t you need to be like… actually... fit to do it?’ and the answer is yes - yes, you do. The first lesson was very painful and scary because I don’t actually have much strength in my arms, or generally anywhere. I was achy for about three days after the lesson, thanks to my lack of exercise within the previous months. But most importantly, I had a lot of fun and I decided to keep going - and that’s how I reached another one of my yearly goals!

I do have more goals that I’d classify as “in progress”; ones I haven’t reached yet, but I’ve started working towards. One of the big ones is mastering Spanish. The problem with this one is that I’m not sure when I can decide that I’ve mastered a language - that sounds kind of impossible. I mean, I’m fluent in Polish and English and I still struggle with speaking those sometimes and I know that my Spanish isn’t on the same level as my English, but perhaps closer to my Polish if we’re talking about the extent of my vocabulary. I’ve passed my Spanish course with a 98% so I’d say I’m quite confident in the language, both in spoken and written language, officially being on level B2. However, have I really “mastered” it? I want to keep growing my language skills but if the year was ending now and I had this level of Spanish, I’d probably say I’ve achieved this goal. Let’s see how advanced I can get in my Spanish by the end of the year! My reading list is another one in progress- I knew that this one was really ambitious but I’ve read ten books this year so far and have written a book review for each so I’d say I’m making good progress and I’m not really worried about not reaching this goal because I know it’s encouraging me to read more regardless. The other three goals I have “in progress” are my remaining lists of twelve: 12 embroidery pieces, 12 paintings and visiting 12 new places. Again, I’m making pretty good progress on those! So far, this year, I have finished 5 embroidery pieces, 7 paintings and I’ve visited 10 new cities. I already have my remaining 7 embroidery pieces planned out, I’m doing paintings when inspiration strikes and I’ll reach my goal of 12 new places by the end of the summer! 

As you can see, there aren’t many goals I haven’t gotten started on yet. There aren’t many, but there are some- I haven’t completed any online courses and I haven’t even started learning sign language or how to cook or how to drive. I won’t make excuses, because I don’t need to really - I’ve still got 6 months to get on with them. I’ve been trying to squeeze in online courses into my to-do list and I’m getting better at it, but the truth is I’m just not making it a priority- and that’s okay! I’ve started an online course in January but I realised after a few lectures that I just genuinely wasn’t interested in the topic so I dropped it. In May I picked up another one, which I’m slowly getting through but it’s still difficult to make time for it. Sign language also hasn’t been high up on my list of priorities simply because I’ve been focusing on Spanish and it’s definitely quite difficult learning multiple languages at once, even if it’s a language that doesn’t involve any speaking. When it comes to cooking, I’ve been trying out some recipes here and there but nothing really substantial. It’s quite situational, really. I’m still living at home and in Madrid, I ate with my host family so I haven’t had much of a chance to learn how to cook. I know I could easily find those opportunities if I wanted to, but, again, it isn’t really high up on my list of priorities currently. Lastly, learning how to drive has definitely been getting delayed long enough, but, in my defence, I’ve been out of the country for the majority of this year so far and I did know when I set myself this goal that I’d be pursuing it towards the second half of the year- so I’m not really feeling any pressure, I still have time. 

Chances are that you forgot all about your goals from the beginning of the year. Now is your chance to pull them out again and see if you’ve achieved any of them or if you need to get to work because 6 months have already escaped you.

Good luck!
Love,

Agnes xo