NOTE: THIS POST WAS WRITTEN ON DECEMBER 31, 2014 AND FOR SOME REASON WAS SAVED AS A DRAFT INSTEAD OF PUBLISHED. NOW IT LOOKS LIKE I ONLY WROTE 364 POSTS IN 2014. FRAK.
At the beginning of the year I set some goals for myself. Let's see how I've done.
DAILY GOAL
My first goal was to write a new blog post every day this year. I'm pretty lenient with myself, though, so I don't require that I do everything on the day/week/month I'm supposed to do them. So, for instance, while I was out of the country for a week with spotty Internet at best I didn't write anything, but when I came back I wrote two posts per day until I caught up. I actually did this a lot, in fact. Still, though,the important thing was to end up with 365 blog posts by the end of the year, right?
Well, this is blog post number 365, so this goal has been met. I had to write six (SIX!) blog posts over a two-day period, yesterday and today, in order to meet my quota, but I've done it.
Writing this much really has made me more comfortable, both at typing and at conveying my ideas through text. I think there's a notable difference in quality between one of my blog posts in January and my posts in November. Even some of my quick posts were, I think, more structurally sound than many of my earlier posts, even the ones I spent a lot of time on. I'm still finding my voice, but I'm closer to it now than I was before.
That said, not all of my posts are equal. Although I enjoyed attempting to review movies, there were only a few times I felt like I contributed any real insight. I also started and stopped several serial blog posts, including my Chrono Trigger fanfiction, my FTL story, and my employment history. I simply stopped working on each of them for various reasons. And, of course, there were the ones where I just kinda typed out whatever I had on my mind at the time, publishing posts without bothering to see if I made any sense. Hopefully that will improve next year as my almost-daily blog becomes more of an a-few-times-a-week blog.
WEEKLY GOAL
Watch a movie I'd never seen before every week. Considering that I posted number 52 yesterday, I think I've met my goal.
The only problem with this goal was that I sometimes forget how time-consuming movies can be. Last night, for instance, I set aside three whole hours to watch Wolf of Wall Street, and this was while I knew I had four more blog posts to write, a new fiancee I wanted to spend time with, and work I needed to take care of, among other things. So, usually I would watch movies while doing other things--eating, doing mindless work, that sort of thing. Only the best movies made me want to drop everything and give the movie my full attention. Otherwise, I'd get antsy sitting still for that long.
But hey, that's part of what this was all about--not only experiencing the art of filmmaking, but also seeing what effect they have on me. I've seen some pretty great stuff this year thanks to this goal.
MONTHLY GOAL
Go on one hike each month. I started this year giving accounts of each of my hikes, posting pictures and such, but I stopped for whatever reason. Partially this is because I started falling behind on my hikes, especially by the time summer came around. Still, Laura and I managed to make hiking an almost-weekly experience near the end of this year, so my second hike to Ventana Canyon was my twelfth hike of the year.
This goal was interesting because it was actually a physically-challenging goal: for the hike to count it needed to be at least a bit of a workout, and I needed to make it to my goal.
This goal took me to places I'd never have seen otherwise, and I'm hoping to continue hiking int he future, even if it's not related to a specific goal. I'm tempted to eschew one of my other 2015 goals in favor of some other physical challenge, but I cant bear to get rid of the ones I have and I don't want to add a fourth goal and make my resolutions unwieldy. So, I'll have to trust myself to keep up my physical fitness on my own this year and, if I get too lazy, I can always figure out a new goal for 2016.
See you guys next year~
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