2015 catch-up and new goals

Remember back in January, when I made all those lovely new year’s resolutions? Want to know how many I’ve kept so far this year? Let’s have a quick catch-up:

1. Edit the ‘novel’ I wrote last November. Nope, not even started.

2. Go to the theatre more, including at least one West End show a month. This one I think I’ve more than managed…

3. Clear my desk at work every Friday afternoon. Apart from a couple of weeks when I forgot, this is still sort of happening – although it’s more ‘pile everything up and tuck it in a corner’ than actually clearing the desk.

4. Get up at least fifteen minutes earlier in the mornings. Er… no. If anything, I’m worse at getting up now than I was before, because I’ve got into a very bad habit of going to bed really late (this is often because I’m up writing a theatre review). This also means I’m usually tired at weekends, so I end up sleeping in and wasting any spare time I might have to catch up on things. And so I have to do them in the week – and the whole cycle starts again.

5. Stop snacking. I wouldn’t say I snack a lot, still, but I also think I could definitely eat better than I do. Again, this is usually because I’m too busy to prepare healthy meals, so I just end up throwing something together – often something that’s bad for me.

6. Try and stop worrying about silly things. I think I might have to just accept that I’m never going to stop this. It’s just the way I’m made.

7. Learn German. Well, I completed the uTalk challenge – but that’s as far as I got. And I haven’t done anything since. Doh.

Clearly, theatre aside, I haven’t had a particularly successful year up to now – so I’ve decided to set some new goals for myself, to achieve between now and the end of 2015:

1. Go to bed before midnight when possible. Don’t spend the evening faffing about and then start working at 11pm (she says, writing a blog post at 10.30pm…) Try and get six hours sleep a night, minimum.

2. Get up ten minutes earlier each day. More if possible. Ten minutes is really not that much.

3. Edit the novel. It’s scary because it needs a lot of work, but it’ll be worth it, even if nobody but friends and family ever read the finished article.

4. Get back to blogging on here at least twice a week. Make a plan; schedule posts. Be organised.

5. Learn to say no sometimes. Stop trying to do everything, and don’t feel guilty about refusing.

6. Stop eating rubbish. (Not literally, obviously.) Eat more salad and other good things.

7. At weekends, get up when the alarm goes off, not an hour later. Make to do lists for any time off and then actually do the stuff on it.

8. Do more exercise. Plan another charity walk, and get training for it. (I think we all know running’s not an option.)

9. Get back to learning German. Start by going back through uTalk, and take it from there.

10. Finish the big clear-out. Remember, the one that was supposed to happen in February, but didn’t?

So these are my new goals, and you’re my witnesses. I’ll be posting more over the next few weeks, setting myself some specific targets and deadlines, and at least once a month with updates – so hopefully that’ll mean I actually stick to them this time. If not, you have my full and total permission to shout at me…

Happy new year (again)! And now if you’ll excuse me, I think it’s time I went to bed 😴

Happy New Year!

I don’t know about you, but I love New Year. Not New Year’s Eve itself, which is usually pretty overrated, but the idea of starting over, taking on new challenges and generally getting things right that maybe haven’t gone so well before. And so I always make New Year’s Resolutions.

Usually by the end of the year, I’ve forgotten what they were, and I don’t pretend that I always keep all my resolutions, but I enjoy the process of thinking through what I want to achieve over the next twelve months. There’s nothing quite like starting the year feeling optimistic about what lies ahead 🙂

So here we go with my 2015 resolutions:

1. Get my novel draft to at least a stage where I’m willing to let people read it, and at most ready to actually do something with.

2. Go to the theatre more, including at least one West End show a month. (I’m well on track with this; I’ve already booked to see The Scottsboro Boys and Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown this month.)

3. Clear my desk at work every Friday afternoon, so I can start fresh each Monday.

4. Get up at least fifteen minutes earlier in the mornings. I was doing well with this all the while I had Tommy the cat staying with me (who needs an alarm clock when you’ve got a hungry cat wanting breakfast?), but now he’s gone home I’m back to my old habits. This usually means I have to run around the house in a mad rush, then sprint to the station and arrive at work feeling stressed out and tired. It seems to me that if I could drag myself out of bed just a little bit earlier, it could make all the difference. I guess we’ll see.

5. Stop snacking. In fairness, I’m not usually a big snacker, but in recent weeks, thanks to an excess of Christmas cake, mince pies, chocolate coins and the like, I seem to have spent a lot of time stuffing my face. Hopefully now that the holiday season’s over, I won’t be so tempted, but either way, it needs to stop. Although maybe not straight away, because I do have a lot of Christmas chocolate still to eat…

6. Try and stop worrying about silly things. Not really sure how I’m going to enforce this one, but being neurotic is one of my worst habits. I once spent about a week worrying that I’d been caught by a speed camera in my car, even though I didn’t know for sure there were any cameras (it later transpired there weren’t), and I hadn’t actually been speeding anyway. I’ve even been known to worry because I have nothing to worry about. So here’s the plan: every time I catch myself worrying about something ridiculous, I’m going to donate at least £1 to charity. (The amount will go up depending on how crazy I’m being.)

7. Learn German. I talked about that already. And I want to do a new challenge every month, so I’m open to suggestions 🙂

Plus, obviously, the usual – win the lottery, marry a millionaire, retire to the Caribbean, get a pet tiger cub. Normal stuff.

How about you? What are you hoping to achieve and/or give up in 2015?