2020 Resolutions
As always, my resolutions for 2020 fell into a number of broad categories. Obviously this year is getting graded on a curve due to COVID, which has made ‘be outgoing and do things outside’ a lot harder. Still, I don’t think I did too badly here.
Relationship Goals
-Take a trip with Kay as a dedicated couple-vacation. Disney perhaps? Cedar Point? Iceland?
Scrapped due to COVID. Pull this one forward. Though we did go on a road trip to get her yarn!
-Go out of your way to help Kay achieve goals she sets for herself.
Knitting was the big non-work project that Kay worked on this year. While that’s not something that I’ve gotten super into, I think I’ve been fairly supportive of it, and I think that it’s something I’m glad to have messed around with.
-Have the big talks about living together, future plans, etc
Kay and I had considered moving in with each other this autumn, but given COVID and taking in a friend at the time, it didn’t seem like a great idea to do. Maybe this year. Plenty of conversations about the future to be had, and some of which are already happening. More work to do here though.
-Watch M*A*S*H
We have started MASH, and I plan to watch more. We’ve been watching other things recently though that are gonna keep us busy for a while (Shameless and West Wing at the time of writing this.)
-Play and beat at least one Co-op game together.
We looked into this a bunch but never really settled on something that would work well. Maybe stardew valley in 2021? SevTech Ages? A Path of Exile League?
-Have at least 3 Ice-Cream related bets.
We didn’t bet on things, and also this was a silly resolution, Past Andrew. Just eat the ice cream.
Health and Fitness
-Continue to walk to work for as long as is practical. If this stops, replace it with some other daily fitness task
Well, I definitely walked to work until I stopped going to work. I think my fitness is one of the bigger casualties of this year and I’d really like to do more of it in the coming year. I felt like I was making progress and then the pandemic hit hard and I never built the habit of working out at home.
-Actively choose to try to lose weight down to 200 lbs by reducing portion sizes, deliberately making space for working out, and eating/snacking less before bed.
This was broadly successful. Lost weight consistently all year. Currently flirting below 210, and I feel like 200 is a very reachable goal with better nutrition and more exercise. Small sustainable changes are making a noticeable difference. Big win here.
-Complete some notable fitness challenge (run a 5k, climb a certain difficulty rock wall, mile swim, etc)
Meh. This did not end up happening, and while I could toss that at COVID, the truth is that I didn’t prioritize fitness enough to find this.
-Rework your wardrobe to include more flattering clothing, more mature clothing, and more clothing that isn’t ‘T-shirt and Jeans’. Branch out!
This is actually a funny one because I’m increasingly wondering if the way to accomplish this isn’t just to do one of those online style crates. If my issue is going to a store and figuring out what I want, then removing steps there seems like the obvious method. I have had a couple nice fashion moments in the last couple weeks though. Explore more here.
-Consider a weekly fitness class (Yoga?)
Was considering a yoga class weekly until pandemic things. Take two post-vaccine?
Games and Social
-Don’t play WoW for more than a month. (One month allowed to go through basic questing for the new expansion but no recurring subscription)
Success! Stayed clean all year, including the first expansion I haven’t played at all since BC.
-Look into Streaming as an easy evening activity that you could use to not-hermit.
I did look into this and did a dozen streams or so. Never really ‘broke through’ but also was finding the schedule of it very stressful. This has morphed into a much more social discord-streaming with friends that I enjoy more.
-Play at least 3 strongly narrative games (Cyberpunk 2077? Others?) through to the conclusion of the main plot.
I completed Assassins’ Creed Odyssey, Cyberpunk 2077, and (all that exists so far of) Genshin Impact. There were a number of other games this year, including Hades and such, which I played and basically completed as well. I’m currently playing Death Stranding and Assassins’ Creed: Valhalla, which I intend to finish as well.
-100% a video game of your choosing.
While it wasn’t a strict 100%, my playthrough of AC: Odyssey was effectively a 100%. There were very few quests I didn’t mess with, and they were all active choices, plus I beat all 3 DLCs
-Continue “The Keyway Opens” campaign, or a successor campaign if that one naturally ends. Be experimental with your game system.
This is probably the biggest success for any resolution I’ve had. We concluded The Keyway Opens in early May and almost immediately started our next campaigning the same universe (though eons earlier). This campaign, called Ringfall, has been incredible. I don’t hesitate to say it’s absolutely the campaign that I have been proudest to run in my life — and given that some of you have played in 6–7 of mine, that’s high praise.
The three players and I have been recording our sessions. We’ve got 21 episodes complete, each about 2–3 hours. That’s…a lot of content, and I’m very enthusiastic about it. Perhaps this year we’ll publish them as a podcast or something. I’ll have to figure out what the best presentation method is, because we’ve been doing a lot of mixed media — posts, flash fiction, sessions, even audio recordings. It’s a big project that I’d love to work on more.
Update: Since I’d written this at Christmas, the group has sadly disbanded due to some personality conflicts. I think that I might take a bit of a break from tabletop stuff for a couple months at least. We’ll see how I feel about running a group then.
-Try to go out at least once a week. Fight against the urge to be a hermit.
Bwahahahaha. This did not happen. I would like to get much more outdoors in next year, please.
-Attend Firefly 2020
Cancelled due to COVID. See: 2021?
-Have people over your house more for board game nights, movie nights, etc
NOOOOOOOOVID.
-Host a big ol’ New Years Eve Bash for 2021
Didn’t do this, but I did help to host a big Roarin’ 20’s online birthday party for Kay a few days before New Years that went quite well, so I think the spirit of this one is a yes.
Financial
-Get a car (Lease? Buy? Loan?)
This is still high on the to-do list. I need to sit down and do the research on this to determine what I want (and how to get it in a COVID world).
Update since Christmas: I have a loan and a car in mind. Just need to go buy it.
-Pay of your credit card, enter 2021 with no balance.
Success! All paid off.
-Cook more often. Order in less. Consider Blue Apron? (Bonus: Portion control!)
I did blue apron for about half the year and frankly, I didn’t cook most of it. I found a lot of their recipes to be way too involved for what I wanted out of my meals. I’m fine with making a more involved thing for me and Kay, but when it’s just me I’m happy to just toss on pasta, or chicken, or make some scrambled eggs in 2 minutes.
I have been cooking more often, especially when Kay is around. Progress for sure, though still not entirely there.
-Begin paying more than the minimum towards your student loans.
Despite COVID, I paid my loans on time all year and also tossed some extra money their way. Feels like good progress.
Fuzzy Goals
I always include some Fuzzy Goals in my list each year. These are designed to be larger, overarching goals that don’t fit into one category, and also aren’t really directly measurable. As a result, they’re a little more amorphous, and typically they rely more on me making a judgment call about my success/failure at them.
-Be okay with not talking to some people and letting them fade away. Don’t maintain relationships solely to maintain the sense of history. Maintain them because you want to.
A lot of my friendships have slipped a bit this year. That’s the reality of the pandemic, but I also think that I’ve gotten closer with some of my best friends — as well as starting to talk more consistently with some new friends. I really like that feeling, that I’m still meeting people and learning more about them and such. It’s not something I’ve felt a lot of the last couple years, so it’s nice to feel that aspect again.
-Have a quieter mind. Relax intentionally more. Unplug more frequently and spend quality time on your own. Read more (non-audio) books.
I read a bunch of books this year, and I really want to thank Kay for it. For my birthday, she got me a Kindle and I’ve been absolutely loving it. It’s been a true revelation to the point where I’ve rebought some novels that I own in paper to read digitally instead. I’m almost upset I waited so long and fought against an e-reader so long because it somehow just…feels good to do in a way that paper hasn’t in some time.
-Be a resource for friends who need it. Spend more time hanging out with friends 1:1 and just talking and spending quality time with each other.
For the majority of the duration of the pandemic, I took in a houseguest who didn’t have anywhere else to go. It wasn’t always easy, but living with a person comes with its own challenges and COVID makes all of those a bit more stark. I’m glad that I was able to pay forward some of the kindness that some people have offered to me over the years, and I hope to do a bit more of that as I can. That said, there were substantial costs to doing so, and I’m only now in hindsight realizing how much of a mental toll the cohabitation took on me, and it’s brought some of my needs to the forefront. It’s something that I hope to work on in the coming year — making sure I’m truly taking care of myself so that I can be at fighting weight for the helping others I want to do.
I’d intended this to be some more 1:1 hanging out time, but due to COVID that was difficult. Instead, I spent a lot of time being socially available on Discord, which has been nice, but also I think has become so much of a default that it doesn’t feel like ‘quality time’. I’d like to use this upcoming year to decide actively how to spend my time, and not just choose something as the default. More to come!
Other Things
While I didn’t necessarily set out to do them, 2021 also included a couple of other things that I think are valuable to the point of being able to note them here. The biggest two that I’ve got are noted here:
-Financial Independence:
For the first time in my life, i feel like I have my finances under control. I’m not worried about “Can I order this beer?” or “Man, can I pay these bills?” or anything like that. I can go to the dentist and not worry about the copay. That’s a HUGE change in my life, and it’s a huge load of my mind. This is a goal that’s been on my radar for ages and ages and I’m so happy to have gotten there.
-Therapy
For the first time in my life, I’m attending therapy regularly. I started out weekly with a therapist that I got connected to through some work resources, and we’ve recently moved to trying biweekly to see how that works. I like him, and even just having a designated hour to talk through things that are on my mind is really helpful. As someone who’d been supportive of therapy for other people, but had been resistant to it for myself, I think this is a great step to have taken, and I’m glad that it’s been going so well. If you’re struggling with mental health stuff (or even if you’re not) I strongly recommend checking out therapy. It’s genuinely good.
2021 Resolutions
So something I’m going to try for this year is to have a yearly theme. This is a concept that I’ve gotten from CGP Grey’s excellent podcasts (Hello Internet and Cortex) to kind of provide an overarching theme to categorize the things you want to work on. In that spirit, this will be The Year of Quality. I’m doing a lot of things already and I want to do them better and more effectively.
Relationship:
- Take a trip with Kay! Firefly counts for this, but try to make that not the ONLY one.
- Watch more of ‘Kay’s Shows’. Finish Shameless, and make sure that we keep at least one of her shows on our watchlist throughout the year.
-Find some good non-electronic activity to do together. Rock climbing? Yoga? 2 player board games? Pottery classes?
Social
-Less Doomscrolling. I know that there are important things happening in the world, and that being informed is important. I think that’s very different from being an ‘extremely online’ person. I don’t need to know whatever the most recent freak-out on Twitter is as it happens. I can take a step back from this stuff and still understand current events.
-Higher Quality Time: Do less ‘sitting in discord as a default’ and have more explicit hangouts with people at times to do things. More events! Likewise, if in-person stuff can happen this year, do some of that! Also, broadly make sure that you’re spending your time effectively. Ask yourself “what am I working on” and then do that!
-Smalltalk less. Make your conversations matter more. Choose your conversations and your conversational partners explicitly. Be okay with that answer being ‘no one’ sometimes.
Gaming and Entertainment
-Make the time you spend gaming better. Do you actually want to spend the time 100%ing this game? Don’t continue to play things beyond enjoyment. Be okay with spending time on a few games at once — or giving time to other things.
-Write more. You always like writing things, and you enjoy having done it. Writing more than the 5–10 pages you did this year will not be hard, and you should do it. Maybe try to write a novel this year?
-Play games with friends more frequently. Among Us is always fun, run a minecraft server with friends. Play a path league (or even private league?)
-Continue to play emotionally driven narrative games.
-See if you can finish Pandemic Legacy, or some other kind of campaign based game. (ISS Vanguard? Kingdom Death?).
Health
-Add more music to your life! I find that music has been something that I’ve been listening to more often recently, and I’m enjoying the positive effects on my mood. Don’t just sit around the house quiet. Put some music on, dance, enjoy it, and let it push you forwards! (Addendum: Recommendations for good artists/bands/music?)
-Continue the downward trend on your weight and crack the 200lbs barrier, and then hold steady at that weight.
-Build at least one physical habit, be it yoga, climbing, Beat Saber, or something else. You *need* some physical activity in your life consistently.
-Continue to go to the doctor, dentist, optometrist, etc and keep on top of your physical and mental health. Don’t just let it slip.
-Continue to go to therapy.
-Only order food in 2 times per week. Cook food at home otherwise. Track this somehow.
-Get a COVID vaccine.
-Try to have a consistent wake up and bedtime. Initial target is midnight and 8am respectively.
Financial
-Start to buffer your savings so that you can have a number of months of security fund in case of emergencies or job loss. Aim to have at least 10k in savings by the end of the year.
-Continue to hold no balance on your credit cards. Start working on building your credit score up in a more targeted way.
-Pay off your car if it makes sense to do so. (Buried Lede: Buy a car, scheduled for this weekend?)
-Continue the patterns you’ve started to establish re: buying nicer clothing. Look good this year, both at home and outside.
Fuzzy Goals
I recognize that this year’s list is a little less concrete than previous lists. I think that’s fine, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t have a bunch of even more amorphous goals that I want to put on my radar for judgment in a year.
-Keep your momentum going. Things are on a good track. You just need to keep going.
-Take time to breathe. Be okay with taking time to breathe.
-Find some projects to put the plurality of your effort into. Your project should be your hobby.
This year, I hope to feel Ambitious.
