Monday, December 31, 2012

2013 Goals











With the new year a day away, it's time to talk goals for 2013 and I need your assistance! 

I have a number of goals that I'll mention here to hold myself accountable:

1)  Stocks: Achieve 12 performance bonuses on my SpikeTrade.com account this year.  Keep better records/analysis of each trade in my personal account.  Achieve at least a 10% return in my personal account.  Continue to network with other active traders to continue to fine tune my trading skills.

2)  Fitness/Health: Gain 10 lbs over the course of this year, preferably through gaining muscle by increasing weight training.  Also planning to take the stairs up the 6 flights at our condo whenever I'm not carrying a heavy load and continue increased cardio as well.

Wifey also shares a fitness goal to lose a certain amount of weight and get toned through additional cardio and trips to Planet Fitness.  

Make better choices with meals.  For example, choose a vegetable side vs fries, brown rice instead of white, wheat instead of white bread, etc.  Also utilize good tasting low carb/wheat pasta. This one the wifey also shares as well. 

It may be tough for me adding more cardio and making healthier food choices at times, while trying to gain weight.  I'm thinking some sort of shake/supplement may be needed, if you have any suggestions let me know.  Only issue is that whatever it is, can't be high in cholesterol. 

3)  Travel:  We definitely need to get away this year, most likely in between semesters for the wife's college courses at the beginning of May.  Only issue is we need someone to stay here to watch our kitties.  Our last trip away was far too traumatic upon return with two sick kitties and rather than have a pet sitter just stop to feed our boys twice a day we really need someone to be here to give them more attention and Poker needs pills twice a day.  So if you're a cat lover, trustworthy and a close friend or relative looking for a free oceanfront condo to stay in for a week at a perfect time of year, let me know!

Also hoping to see Max and Hadley and crew a bunch as well.  First trip to see Max and family in 2013 is coming up this week, yay!

4)  Job:  I start with an indian based outsourcing company on 1/2, continuing to work as a contractor with the same company I've been at for the last 5 years and 8 months.  Depending on how things unfold, I will most likely be keeping my options open for new opportunities.  Since it's worked before, I'll wish for a job with less work, more pay and more freedom!

5)  Dream/Vision Board:  I'm also going to work on creating a vision board for this year and recommend everyone do the same.  I forgot about that until I just read this post on Forbes.com when searching for info.  It doesn't have to be difficult or time consuming, just grab a few magazines or search for pictures online and start printing/cutting them out and put them on your board and post it somewhere you'll see every day.  You might just be amazed at the results, dream big!  Here is an example I found online to get you started:














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In the immortal words of Monty Python....And now, for something completely different! 

So, with those goals out of the way, I wanted to take things in a different route for 2013.  Many of you saw my post last week Support For Fallen West Webster Fire Fighters.  I put forth a donation challenge to my readers and family/friends on Facebook and they came through.  It felt really good to be able to help out in some small way with total donations between myself/family/friends of over $400 to the Michael "Chip" Chiapperini Memorial Fund.  

I was motivated to take action due to the emotion of the terrible tragedy in my hometown in addition to the massive outpouring of support from the community and folks all across the nation on the Prayers and Support for Webster Firefighters Facebook page, which is still continuing in a huge way.

Hundreds or possibly thousands of firefighters from all across the state and country came in for the viewing and funerals for the two fallen firefighters Tomasz Kaczowk and Michael "Chip" Chiapperini.  The creators of the Facebook page put forth a challenge to local businesses and followers to pay for rooms at local area hotels.  The response was amazing.  Lots of individuals were paying for rooms, lots also bought food gift cards to provide to first responders checking in, companies put up large blocks of rooms, one contributed $10,000, restaurant owners provided food, people volunteered, basically everything that anyone mentioned a need for was quickly taken care of.

And lots of reports from out of town firefighters are coming in giving thanks for similar acts of kindness.  Many went out to local restaurants after the services and strangers had taken care of their meals already.  Employees at Wegman's Supermarket said they saw similar acts all day long where grocery bills were taken care of, employees would buy them coffee, etc.  People were going out of their way to do anything they could to show their support.  

It was and still is so impressive and inspiring to see the huge outpouring of emotion and support for everyone during such a terrible time.  As a result of everything I've seen over these last few days, in addition to the 26 Acts of Caring that Ann Curry kicked off in response to the terrible tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary, I'm motivated to make 2013 the Year of Caring and keep that going forward.

Tomorrow I will kick things off with a new post entitled 2013 - Year of Caring.  I think 26 acts is a great starting point, that would be one act every 2 weeks and it seems very doable.  My hope is that once we kick things off and get started, that it will be contagious and we'll want to do more and it will spread and we'll all help counteract all the negativity and make the world a better place!  In addition, it will make you feel good and who doesn't want to feel good right?!  LET'S DO THIS, 2013 is going to be great!

1 comments :

Jen said...

I haven't put thought into goals yet, but i like yours. It's always nice to start clean and dream big! Can't wait to see what you do for your acts of kindness.

 
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