2023: Looking forward
1/1/23 08:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kateSo sperrywink had a really rough year and decided to do a forward-looking post instead of a backward-looking one. As my memory is garbage, I too am thinking this would be a wise decision! I'm very bad at documenting what happened in a year. It's too long, I can't remember last week much less last January! So yeah, if people want to know what's happening with me, it's gonna be through my cold reads, because if you listen to them in order, it really would be a year in review because I talk about all that shit.
But I am going to steal Sperry's idea and do a forward-looking meme too! Lucky sauerkraut is all about looking forward and pushing good thoughts into the future to bloom when you get there. Sperry went by general life area, which I think is great, though my areas are a bit different to hers.
Home
Okay, the house is a bit of a mess after the holidays. Just in general, I do not have enough energy to keep up with managing a household plus all of my other activities and I'm not ready just yet to give any of them up for that purpose. I am willing to cut back on Stardew Valley, though, which is a dumbass stressor to add to my piles of stuff and not nearly enough fun to make up for it. So if I give that up (like I have the last two days), it turns out I have a lot of the free time I was looking for to do my fannish activities. Hopefully that will also include chores, which I do around my fannish activities, usually (in a sort of "fun thing for one episode/chapter/whatever and then do chores for 15 minutes" way). I indulge in a cleaning service once per month because while I can usually keep most stuff relatively tidy, I don't do the bigger stuff that has to be done - cleaning bathrooms, wet-mopping the kitchen floor, etc. and I just... don't want to. I'll pay for it, it's 100% worth it. So my goals for the year are to get the kitchen clean and keep it clean. I hate it when dishes stack up, it's absolutely my least favorite chore. If I can keep on top of those, I can keep the overall kitchen in a decent state.
Health
So now that I have some actual medical history, I know what I need to work on for myself. Number one is reducing sugar intake (and I *know* how much better I feel when I do this, it's just very much the difference between instant and delayed gratification and eating is one area in which delayed gratification is not something I really can get into). Number two is to start walking again. Not hugely, not some massive exercise plan, just getting out of the house and walking around. I'm thinking of downloading Pokemon GO again, as that had me walking on a regular basis, and it's been proven to me that I need to have a game in my life, so why not have one that actually has me physically moving around? The other possibility is Jurassic Park or whatever the dino one is, or the HP one, but I don't do HP because JKR is gross. I'll probably download both Pokemon GO and the dino one and see which one catches my fancy more. I'd love to just do little walks every day (maybe morning exercise? it would probably help with my memory issues, too), but I'm going to set my goal at 3x a week to start. For sugar intake, I'm actually going to shift the goal to eat vegetables at least 1x per day and cold oats at least 3x per week. That's a hell of a lot of work, but once I get started, I will have more energy, which will both make it easier and give me energy for the other stuff on this list.
Fandom
Being in a fandom for a long time is nice for things like this, because my goal is simply to remain in said fandom (MDZS/CQL). I'd sure also love to be inspired to make stuff, and so far so good on that front this year, but honestly, just being in the fandom, nominally interacting with it via tumblr and discord is enough for me, really. I'm going to set my goal at creating 20 fanworks, since that was what I did last year (which was a real low for me) and I've already done… 2? 3? At least 2 this year already. I'd love to say at least one of them should be a written fanwork but I do not want to tempt fate and just writing on a regular basis would be a step up in that area.
Music
This should be easy but is actually difficult. I currently have three ensembles I play in, with rehearsals on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays. The Wednesday group is my forever ensemble. I like them, they play great music, the conductor is a good guy, and I just… will play with them as long as they let me. The Monday group pays me, though it's an hour drive to and from rehearsal. (They pay mileage at a $.20 a mile, which isn't great but is still a far sight better than the other groups, which require me to pay dues in order to pay.) It also has summertime gigs (also paid), so it is the way I stay in shape over the summer. The Tuesday gig is an orchestra, which I ADORE playing in and really want to do! But the director is… hm. Well, he's not great at communication, and he doesn't have a really great network and this group is on the verge of falling apart. I absolutely adore playing in an orchestra and I would really love to play with one, even this dumb one, just for the experience of playing that repertoire again. But three rehearsals a week, particularly three days in a row, may be too much. The orchestra is also an hour's drive, and while I like to drive, and play in an orchestra, between the late nights and the work stress and not being to do anything except work and rehearse on those nights, it's… a lot. So we'll see how it pans out, but I am a little on the fence about it. I think with music, my goal is just to stay in shape all year long and be able to play duets with my brother over Christmas again. The rest will work itself out somehow.
Money
Money goes second to last because I wish it wasn't as important as it is, and I'd like to bring it down in importance in my life. So last year we started a debt management program. I'd gotten into a habit of juggling credit cards when I was consulting, which works for consulting because there's a lot of money involved and also expenses, so more than half of my meals were basically free to me. It does not work if I am not consulting, and the debt racked up over the last 3.5 years and the interest rates are just staggering, making it impossible to pay the stupid things down. So we are in a plan that lowers the interest rates in a way for us to pay them back more easily and we are AGGRESSIVELY paying them back. I expect to get through roughly half the debt this year and half the debt next year, and my budget is conservative because I hate surprises. I am weirdly excited to be debt free (except the mortgage); I've never been entirely debt free in my adult life. I cannot imagine what it would look like. But also, I'm also at the age where I should be aggressively contributing to my retirement fund, and I can't do that if I have massive debt to pay down. So I am looking forward to watching those balances fall, which I have been enjoying this year already. ANYWAY, goal for the year is to pay off at least two of the balances (which is currently the expectation in my budget plan).
Work
Ugh WORK. The implementation is moving along. I'm not inspired to do a lot of these things, and my interest waxes and wanes and in general, I'm just not happy doing a lot of the stuff. It's too many meetings. I don't know how anyone can get work done with 20-30 hours of meetings per week. It's just too much. But it's plugging along, and I still have my eye on the prize, so I expect I will be thrilled once we actually go live. Goal for the year is to survive, honestly. I cannot possibly add even one more stressor in my work life.
Lucky sauerkraut spell
I had the thought this year of keeping my lucky sauerkraut spell. I write it new every year, because what I want is truly a product of a specific moment in time, so the spell is an interesting way to look back at a year, as well as a great, forward-thinking meme on its own.
This year, I wrote out stickies with thirteen things I wanted in the new year (Health, Wealth, Wisdom, Whimsy, Fun, Laughter, Joy, Happiness, Kindness, Opportunity, Love, Luck, Creativity). I copied them twice, put one set on the cover of the crockpot and the second set on the body. I only had 8 to start, but started to add more, and decided to get to 13 stickies, because I was repeating the spell once an hour for 13 hours.
For the spell, I took one deep breath and blew out all the negative energy (and stretched). Then, with hands on the cover (without burning myself!), I drew down power with an inhale, and on the exhale, infused it into the food, thinking of the thirteen things in whatever order they came to me. I did that twice. Then I repeated the spell below:
We celebrate the coming of the new year.
A new change to be happy, healthy, and wise.
A new chance to review the abundance of the universe,
in creativity, in material wealth, in the kindness of its inhabitants.
A new chance to make a difference in the world,
to spread joy, kindness, and acceptance.
Here's to an amazing 2023.
sperrywink had a really rough year and decided to do a forward-looking post instead of a backward-looking one. As my memory is garbage, I too am thinking this would be a wise decision! I'm very bad at documenting what happened in a year. It's too long, I can't remember last week much less last January! So yeah, if people want to know what's happening with me, it's gonna be through my cold reads, because if you listen to them in order, it really would be a year in review because I talk about all that shit.But I am going to steal Sperry's idea and do a forward-looking meme too! Lucky sauerkraut is all about looking forward and pushing good thoughts into the future to bloom when you get there. Sperry went by general life area, which I think is great, though my areas are a bit different to hers.
Home
Okay, the house is a bit of a mess after the holidays. Just in general, I do not have enough energy to keep up with managing a household plus all of my other activities and I'm not ready just yet to give any of them up for that purpose. I am willing to cut back on Stardew Valley, though, which is a dumbass stressor to add to my piles of stuff and not nearly enough fun to make up for it. So if I give that up (like I have the last two days), it turns out I have a lot of the free time I was looking for to do my fannish activities. Hopefully that will also include chores, which I do around my fannish activities, usually (in a sort of "fun thing for one episode/chapter/whatever and then do chores for 15 minutes" way). I indulge in a cleaning service once per month because while I can usually keep most stuff relatively tidy, I don't do the bigger stuff that has to be done - cleaning bathrooms, wet-mopping the kitchen floor, etc. and I just... don't want to. I'll pay for it, it's 100% worth it. So my goals for the year are to get the kitchen clean and keep it clean. I hate it when dishes stack up, it's absolutely my least favorite chore. If I can keep on top of those, I can keep the overall kitchen in a decent state.
Health
So now that I have some actual medical history, I know what I need to work on for myself. Number one is reducing sugar intake (and I *know* how much better I feel when I do this, it's just very much the difference between instant and delayed gratification and eating is one area in which delayed gratification is not something I really can get into). Number two is to start walking again. Not hugely, not some massive exercise plan, just getting out of the house and walking around. I'm thinking of downloading Pokemon GO again, as that had me walking on a regular basis, and it's been proven to me that I need to have a game in my life, so why not have one that actually has me physically moving around? The other possibility is Jurassic Park or whatever the dino one is, or the HP one, but I don't do HP because JKR is gross. I'll probably download both Pokemon GO and the dino one and see which one catches my fancy more. I'd love to just do little walks every day (maybe morning exercise? it would probably help with my memory issues, too), but I'm going to set my goal at 3x a week to start. For sugar intake, I'm actually going to shift the goal to eat vegetables at least 1x per day and cold oats at least 3x per week. That's a hell of a lot of work, but once I get started, I will have more energy, which will both make it easier and give me energy for the other stuff on this list.
Fandom
Being in a fandom for a long time is nice for things like this, because my goal is simply to remain in said fandom (MDZS/CQL). I'd sure also love to be inspired to make stuff, and so far so good on that front this year, but honestly, just being in the fandom, nominally interacting with it via tumblr and discord is enough for me, really. I'm going to set my goal at creating 20 fanworks, since that was what I did last year (which was a real low for me) and I've already done… 2? 3? At least 2 this year already. I'd love to say at least one of them should be a written fanwork but I do not want to tempt fate and just writing on a regular basis would be a step up in that area.
Music
This should be easy but is actually difficult. I currently have three ensembles I play in, with rehearsals on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays. The Wednesday group is my forever ensemble. I like them, they play great music, the conductor is a good guy, and I just… will play with them as long as they let me. The Monday group pays me, though it's an hour drive to and from rehearsal. (They pay mileage at a $.20 a mile, which isn't great but is still a far sight better than the other groups, which require me to pay dues in order to pay.) It also has summertime gigs (also paid), so it is the way I stay in shape over the summer. The Tuesday gig is an orchestra, which I ADORE playing in and really want to do! But the director is… hm. Well, he's not great at communication, and he doesn't have a really great network and this group is on the verge of falling apart. I absolutely adore playing in an orchestra and I would really love to play with one, even this dumb one, just for the experience of playing that repertoire again. But three rehearsals a week, particularly three days in a row, may be too much. The orchestra is also an hour's drive, and while I like to drive, and play in an orchestra, between the late nights and the work stress and not being to do anything except work and rehearse on those nights, it's… a lot. So we'll see how it pans out, but I am a little on the fence about it. I think with music, my goal is just to stay in shape all year long and be able to play duets with my brother over Christmas again. The rest will work itself out somehow.
Money
Money goes second to last because I wish it wasn't as important as it is, and I'd like to bring it down in importance in my life. So last year we started a debt management program. I'd gotten into a habit of juggling credit cards when I was consulting, which works for consulting because there's a lot of money involved and also expenses, so more than half of my meals were basically free to me. It does not work if I am not consulting, and the debt racked up over the last 3.5 years and the interest rates are just staggering, making it impossible to pay the stupid things down. So we are in a plan that lowers the interest rates in a way for us to pay them back more easily and we are AGGRESSIVELY paying them back. I expect to get through roughly half the debt this year and half the debt next year, and my budget is conservative because I hate surprises. I am weirdly excited to be debt free (except the mortgage); I've never been entirely debt free in my adult life. I cannot imagine what it would look like. But also, I'm also at the age where I should be aggressively contributing to my retirement fund, and I can't do that if I have massive debt to pay down. So I am looking forward to watching those balances fall, which I have been enjoying this year already. ANYWAY, goal for the year is to pay off at least two of the balances (which is currently the expectation in my budget plan).
Work
Ugh WORK. The implementation is moving along. I'm not inspired to do a lot of these things, and my interest waxes and wanes and in general, I'm just not happy doing a lot of the stuff. It's too many meetings. I don't know how anyone can get work done with 20-30 hours of meetings per week. It's just too much. But it's plugging along, and I still have my eye on the prize, so I expect I will be thrilled once we actually go live. Goal for the year is to survive, honestly. I cannot possibly add even one more stressor in my work life.
Lucky sauerkraut spell
I had the thought this year of keeping my lucky sauerkraut spell. I write it new every year, because what I want is truly a product of a specific moment in time, so the spell is an interesting way to look back at a year, as well as a great, forward-thinking meme on its own.
This year, I wrote out stickies with thirteen things I wanted in the new year (Health, Wealth, Wisdom, Whimsy, Fun, Laughter, Joy, Happiness, Kindness, Opportunity, Love, Luck, Creativity). I copied them twice, put one set on the cover of the crockpot and the second set on the body. I only had 8 to start, but started to add more, and decided to get to 13 stickies, because I was repeating the spell once an hour for 13 hours.
For the spell, I took one deep breath and blew out all the negative energy (and stretched). Then, with hands on the cover (without burning myself!), I drew down power with an inhale, and on the exhale, infused it into the food, thinking of the thirteen things in whatever order they came to me. I did that twice. Then I repeated the spell below:
We celebrate the coming of the new year.
A new change to be happy, healthy, and wise.
A new chance to review the abundance of the universe,
in creativity, in material wealth, in the kindness of its inhabitants.
A new chance to make a difference in the world,
to spread joy, kindness, and acceptance.
Here's to an amazing 2023.
For easy organization later:
no subject
on 1/3/23 03:13 am (UTC)