How to Set Goals for 2021

Am I being really wild by suggesting goal setting for 2021?

I think if 2020 taught us anything, it’s that life can change in a second. Your goals can shift from getting a big promotion to just staying afloat in the matter of a week or two. It’s always good to have things put in perspective and I feel like this year has taught us that too. Things can change; our lives will change; and sometimes, we’re not in control of those things.

But that’s ok.

Here’s my dirty little secret: I did kind of hit one of my goals for this year. In early January, I set a goal of having 2 additional clients by the end of the year.

This year, I grew my business from 1 single client in February (I started my contract with them in late February and the pandemic hit 2 weeks later) to 7 total clients in December. These are clients that I work with on a month-to-month basis.

I didn’t necessarily set out to meet this goal; I didn’t really even think of it every day. I just did good work; I kept going; I journaled my feelings; and I went to therapy. That’s about it. On the way, I was sent referrals from clients, past mentors, and more.

It always feels a little selfish when I say that, despite some hiccups, I’ve had a really great year professionally. 2019 was an extreme “down” year for me, at least for my career. But 2020 has been… amazing. For the first time in my husband and I’s marriage, we have disposable income. We can fix all the things in our house we’ve been meaning to fix! We can splurge occasionally! We can buy Christmas presents without scrimping and saving! It’s kind of wild, to be quite honest. Because while all that is happening, we aren’t able to travel, or go out to restaurants, or celebrate in anyway.

All this is to say: I think it’s totally possible to set and meet goals in 2021, even when things still feel so up in the air. You can both plan for anything and set goals for your own growth at the same time.

Here are my tips for setting goals in 2021.

1. Keep things broad.

Focus on the bigger picture. Normally when it comes to setting goals, I try to keep things larger. Instead of SMART goals, things something larger, more overarching. This might mean setting a goal of establishing a daily routine, rather than saying “I’ll do XYZ every single day.”

Here are a few broad goals:

• Buying a planner and checking in every month.

• Creating a daily routine that works for you.

• Finding an exercise you love by November.

2. Now more than ever, keep goals realistic.

Are you going to save 1 million dollars, meet the Queen, and travel to all continents in 2021? Probably not.

But will you be able to meet some smaller goals. Absolutely.

One thing about setting goals is that you should always focus on what is realistic. What are you actually able to achieve in 12 months?

Maybe you want to go freelance in 2021 or 2022; a great goal to set would be to start networking throughout the year, emailing contacts, and building up your LinkedIn profile.

Maybe you do want to travel more in the future; a good goal in 2021 would be to work on your savings account, research places you want to go, and follow accounts that help you do that. We still might not be doing much traveling in 2021… but we can dream about it, definitely!

3. Your goals should reflect growth.

Your goals should be about growing as a person—not becoming a better version, not about punishing yourself.

When we think of “New Years Resolution”, we often think of weight loss. But I want to encourage you to think about this differently: will losing weight make you happy this year? Will it help you grow as a person? Or would it be more beneficial to focus on the things you can improve in your life? Finding an exercise you love, making more nutritious choices about your food… these are all things we can control and that can help improve our lives, without putting the onus and focus on deprivation and punishment for our bodies.

As well, setting goals that are restrictive in nature—”no more THIS” or "less THAT”—are found to be ineffective. These are the goals that people tend to fall off track with. It’s really easy to do that, because we don’t like to be restricted or to feel like we’re missing out.

Final Thoughts

What goals are you setting in 2021?

For the sake of transparency, my goals for 2021 are: to work on establishing a better work from home routine; to clean up my bookkeeping (it is a constant source of frustration); to release at least 2 paid products; and to begin adding working out to my daily routine again.

Inspiration Sunday: Making Magic

I read an article this week that I wanted to find to link here—but I can’t remember what website I read it on (it was one of the biggies!), or the headline. I only remember the basic gist of the article. It was: for a certain percentage of the population, we’ve been doing “fine” through the last 7 months. We put in the work, we persevered, we weren’t falling apart, we supported other people, we put our heads down and worked. And now, we’re absolutely breaking down.

I don’t know about you, but I fall into that category. When lockdown first began in Oregon, I remember telling my therapist, at my last in-person session: “I feel like I’ve been waiting for chaos my entire life and now it’s here and it feels fine.”

7 months on, I can tell you: I don’t feel fine.

April and May were tough months, but nothing, nothing, compares to September. It’s normally one of my favorite months, but this year it felt like a black hole. I tried to keep my head above water, but it eventually became impossible. Most days, I just wanted to hibernate, to stay in bed and not get out.

Maybe that’s why I’m so intent on making October better. Today is Saturday, the day before this post will actually go live, and I’ve tried to do things to cheer myself and Forrest up. I let him pick breakfast (pumpkin pancakes), and lunch (Subway sandwiches), we watched the new animated Addams Family movie in bed, we baked cookies, we watched Scooby Doo on TV.

That is to say: I’m trying to find ways to see joy in things again, just like last week. But in many ways, I’m trying to create memories for Forrest that are more than dismal. I try not to imagine what his memories of this time period will be like when he’s older; I comfort myself by saying, it’s probably for the best that his memories will be super fuzzy.

Here are a few little things we’ve done recently to ✨ make magic ✨ at our house.

• Putting up some new Christmas decorations that I impulse bought a few weeks ago.

• Getting takeout perhaps more than is appropriate.

• Making robots to put on the fridge.

• Making snowflakes to tape on the window.

• Making elaborate dinners. Or making not elaborate dinners, like pizza pockets.

• Letting Forrest create recipes (like “banana bake”, which was basically bananas on graham crackers with melted peanut butter)

• Playing records and having a dance party

• Trying new things (like cashewmilk ice cream)

There are lots of little ways to make each day special, even if you’re feeling an overwhelming sense of dread. (And trust me, I’m right there with you.) It’s a tough time. We’re all doing our best. I know you are too.

Thanks for reading!

10 Things I'm Excited for This October

Happy October! Happy Blogtober!

What a month September was, huh?

I know I’m not alone in this, but it’s been a rough start to my favorite season of the year. But as I’ve been saying recently: happiness is now or it’s never. It is possible to find joy right now. And for me, joy is very much about this season that I love so much.

That’s why, despite everything, I decided to move ahead on Blogtober. It does feel a bit frivolous to be blogging right now; there is so much going on but at the end of the day, my work still has to exist. I still have to eat and pay my bills and finish all the things I started. Part of staying sane right now, for me, is staying grounded in these things, that are ultimately so much in flux.

Today’s blog post is all about the things I’m excited for in October: the things I look forward to every year, the things on my bucket list, the moments where I will dig deep to find the most joy. I hope this, if nothing else, gives you a moment to break and breathe.

1. Celebrating Halloween in a new way. 

Danny and I always say we want to have a Halloween party for Forrest—but every year, we become overwhelmed by the trick-or-treating, the costume, the school stuff. This year, Halloween is on a Saturday, but we know we won’t feel comfortable taking Forrest house-to-house or even to a trunk-or-treat event.

The other options are an at-home Halloween party. We’ve been considering doing an Easter egg hunt style Halloween where we hide candy for Forrest for him to find in his costume. We’re still toying with this idea, but ultimately, we’ll be celebrating Halloween in an entirely new way as a family and that’s exciting to look forward to.

2. Finding new things to do this Autumn. 

When I wrote this list and this blog post, it’s September 13; right now, we are 1 week from the start of the McKenzie River Fire (also called the Holiday Farm Fire), as well as multiple other fires in Oregon. Outside my office window, the sky is completely yellow, swathed in smoke. I haven’t seen the sky, or the sun, in a week now. It’s hard not to feel claustrophobic and depressed about it.

But I hope by the time that this blog post goes live in October 1 that we are seeing some relief from the smoke and claustrophobia, that the fires are at least partially contained, and that we do have the ability to go do new things this Autumn season!

I had fantasies of taking Forrest to the Spring Creek Holly Farm along the McKenzie River, going hiking on the coast, and more. These are things we started doing in quarantine that gave us something to do while being socially distant from other people. We hiked Sahalie Falls, visited the Raptor Center, went to the butterfly center in Elkton… I’m hoping we can keep doing these things.

3. Cooking & baking 

I love to cook and I love to bake. I recently bought a slew of new cookbooks and have been slowly working my way through all of them. It makes me happy to have something I can do each day—plus, tons of leftovers for easy lunches for both Danny and I. Nothing makes me feel cozier than baking either, even if I had the clean up process.

4. Decorating outside

Another item impacted by the smoke! However, we’ve been working on getting the outside of our house cleaned up. Neither Danny nor I are green thumbs and we struggle to keep the outside of our house looking, well, nice. But I’m determined to really decorate and make our outside area cute this year.

5. Carving pumpkins

I don’t care if we make it to a pumpkin patch this year. But carving pumpkins makes Forrest and I bought happy. I will carve a grocery store pumpkin, I don’t care.

6. Making our home cozy

Quarantine turned us all into homebodies, so it goes without saying: making our homes comfortable and cozy and adaptable for how we live has been huge. I’ve ordered both of us new office chairs; I’ve spray painted so much furniture that I gave myself carpal tunnel but like, in my finger if possible; and I’m considering painting an archway on our wall because I’m just that trendy.

Most importantly, I’ve been trying to find ways to make our home super cozy. We’re in for the long haul here, clearly.

7. Taking socially distant day trips

Please let me be able to go to the coast or the mountains just once this Fall. It’s all I ask.

Like I said, we have loved exploring Oregon this summer. Packing up the car with some supplies and a cooler with sandwiches and water has been more fun than anything else. It definitely helped relieve my stress and Forrest has some great memories.

8. Wearing scarves again

I just want to wrap myself in flannel. Please. Let me wrap myself in flannel.

9. Autumn-scented everything

I’m lighting a pumpkin waffle scented candle, I’m setting up my diffuser to have orange and clove oil, I’m using my fireside body spray. I will smell like a carnival and Autumn leaves, this is the point I’m at in my life.

10. Starbucks seasonal drinks

Controversial: I don’t like pumpkin spice lattes. I find them really sickly tasting. Plus, they’re so oddly orange? But salted caramel mochas??? Gingerbread lattes? Peppermint mochas?? I’m here for this.

Where Can I Learn New Skills?

Welcome to the Diversifying Your Skills series! Learning new skills in your life and career can be really rewarding—but challenging at the same time. What does it mean to realize you’re missing a skill for your career or, worse, life? How can you best learn new skills? I’ll be answering those questions and more in this weekly series. You can read past articles in this series here.

In my final article of this series, I want to focus on a specific aspect of diversifying your skills: when you’ve come to the conclusion that you need to learn something new, where do you actually go to learn it?

Primarily, I think most skills are best learned from doing: if you want to learn to be more patient, you simply have to work on it everyday. If you want to learn how to make better graphics on Canva, you should work on making graphics everyday and getting feedback. However, there are some really great places to learn skills that are more high-level. Let’s talk about them!

1. Khan Academy

Khan Academy is a great place for kids to learn extra lessons about math and science. But if you’re an adult, there are some great courses as well for Computer Programming, Economics, History, and more. I love doing Khan Academy courses to brush up on basic skills—prime example, when I was working on my books recently, I did the personal finance lesson to help brush up on some things I forgot. Khan Academy is free for users, which makes it even better.

2. Skillshare

Skillshare is another great option and it has 2 tiers: a Free account, which gives you access to all the Free classes; and a Premium Account, which gives you full access to everything. I have a free account at the moment and I love it—I’ve taken great classes on using my DLSR (something I want to get better at!), marketing, and more. All for free.

However, if you want to upgrade to Premium, it does seem worth it to get access to more classes.

3. Lynda

Lynda is owned by LinkedIn now, which should tell you everything you need to know about it: if you need new skills with a business or tech focus, then Lynda is the place to go. Back in the day (2013, I think), where I worked at the time had a free Lynda membership for employees, so I would spend my days doing courses on Microsoft Word, Excel, everything that employers were suspicious of me having experience in. (Side note: one time an interviewer fully interrogated me about “when” I learned to use Microsoft Excel. Like, 3rd grade computer class? For older people, it seemed bizarre that I just knew how to use Excel because it always existed for me! But I digress.)

Lynda is a paid subscription, but you can get a free month to test it out. A standard plan is $29.99, but if you pay annually, it works out to $19.99.

Should I Outsource or Learn?

Welcome to the Diversifying Your Skills series! Learning new skills in your life and career can be really rewarding—but challenging at the same time. What does it mean to realize you’re missing a skill for your career or, worse, life? How can you best learn new skills? I’ll be answering those questions and more in this weekly series. To read the previous posts in this series, click here.

A few weeks ago, I had a great phone call with a rep from the company, Bench; what they do is basically super easy, efficient bookkeeping for entrepreneurs and small businesses. It’s like Quickbooks, but slightly more millennial (and way easier to use). While I decided to pass on Bench (just for the moment!), it was a conversation I needed to really think about: do I want to learn to do this better (that is, bookkeeping) or do I want to outsource this?

It’s a question for the ages. Even if you’re a regular employee (not a freelancer, solopreneur, or business owner), you’ll eventually have a moment in your career or your life where you have decide if you want to take the time to learn to do something yourself or simply outsource it.

A simpler way to look at it is this: do I want to delegate this task or add it to my plate?

Again, a question for the ages.

This kind of decision making is so common in life; you have to decide how much you want to take on personally, if it’s worth it, if you want to do it, if you can afford to ask someone else to do it.

Here’s the real question though: how can you make the best decision?

When it comes to your career or your life, there is also a benefit to diversifying yourself and letting yourself gain that knowledge. But weighing it against other factors that are just as important is big. In this blog post, let’s talk over some things to think about when it comes to deciding between outsourcing or learning it yourself.

Do you have the time to commit?

Ultimately, one of the biggest decision making factors is time.

Do you have the time to learn this new task?

Are you motivated to learn?

Are you dragging your feet and avoiding it because you have too much on your plate already?

Only you can know if you have enough time to learn a new aspect of your business or career or life. Only you know if you have the time to take it on. If you hate the idea of bookkeeping, or if you simply don’t know when you’ll make the time for it, then outsource it. If you’re already buried beneath work, or if you’re already pretty far ahead in your career, then adding a new skill that might lead to burn out might not be top priority.

A few other time-focused things to consider:

• Is it your busy season? If so, now’s not the time!

• Are you in the middle of a big transition? (Think: new baby, new house, new job, etc.) If so, now’s not the time!

• Are you struggling with your task list already? That’s right; if so, it’s not the time!

Are you outsourcing out of fear?

There is nothing wrong with outsourcing certain tasks. However, ask yourself if you’re outsourcing out of need or fear of learning something new (or because you’re convinced you won’t be good at it/do it well). 

It’s ok to ask for help, but it is important to recognize when we delegate or outsource out of a fear of failure or avoiding something we aren’t sure if we’re good at.

Here’s an example: I hate Facebook ads. Whenever clients ask me to do Facebook ads for them, I outsource this task; I recommend someone else or just ask them not to ask me to do it. I’ve been passed on for other freelancers because of this.

The truth is, I know Facebook ads aren’t that scary. I’ve done them before! It’s not that bad! But I find the process of learning too overwhelming and I fear I won’t be good at it. Managing budgets has never been my strong suit. I know I avoid learning about Facebook ads out of fear of failure. And that’s no good.

It’s my goal in 2021 to take a few courses in Facebook ads and to get better at this aspect of my job.

If you outsource, are you giving that person all the information you need?

This isn’t a time where you get to micromanage someone! I said what I said. If you end up delegating a task, but then you micromanage and obsess over how that person is doing it… listen, maybe it’s you.

When it comes to outsourcing, here are a few things to consider:

• Make it easy for that person to do their job. If you’re hiring them, making sure they have everything they need to be successful is really the bare minimum in terms of your job.

• Don’t be horrible. We’ve all had jobs where we were micromanaged and picked at until we were miserable. If you delegate a task to someone whose job it is to do that task, then they’re an expert. If you’ve spoken to them, vetted them, and learned about them, then you know that. So leave them alone. Let them just do it for you!

Your choice isn’t forever

The most important thing to remember? If you choose to outsource now (your bookkeeping, your taxes, your house cleaning, whatever), it’s not forever. You don’t have to commit to never learning that thing, or never doing that thing again.

You might take it back on when you have more time or after you can take a course. You might give yourself a few years. You might never take it back on. But it’s not a forever thing. You can always change your mind!

3 Fun Things to Prep for Autumn

I will probably write something equivalent in every blog post I write for the next month, but: this is a really challenging time for everyone, especially here on the West Coast. Things have been challenging and difficult for months now, but it feels like things are compacting, right? Getting tighter. More restrictive. In the words of my mother-in-law, “I’m sick of this shit.”

I recently read a tweet, however, that said something like this: it’s possible to feel just as happy drinking your coffee and watering your plants as it is to go on a dream vacation. Joy is joy, and however you’re able to feel it, let yourself take a taste of it and really feel that joy. 

You know what brings me joy?

Wait for it…

Autumn.

I knew you would know, especially if you know me. I love Autumn. I love pumpkins. I love the anticipation of the season, helping Fo pick his costume. I love everything about the season.

That’s probably why this is so hard right now. It’s chillier outside here in Oregon, but only because the smoke is literally blocking the sun and keeping the air colder below it. We can’t go outside—so no apple picking, no pumpkin patch visits, nothing.

But that won’t stop me from finding joy in this season. I can be just as happy buying a pumpkin from the grocery store, decorating my house with what I already have.

So, without further ado, here are 3 fun ways to prep for Autumn. I hope they bring you a little joy!

1. Decorate Your House

I love decorating for Autumn and Halloween. I know it’s not the most popular holiday to decorate for or season to decorate for, but it’s growing in popularity. And, quite frankly, it’s really fun. Nothing makes your house feel cozier.

I have a good stockpile of my favorite decorations and I try not to buy a ton every year. However, I did buy a new, shallow wooden basket for our coffee table and some fake mini pumpkins to fill it. It cost $9 in total—which is a steal, to be honest.

Doing little things to bring you joy is important. Get out the candles, find some little pumpkins, and go wild.

2. Bake Some Cookies

It goes without saying: baking makes your house smell good.

Candles help too. But there is something about the smell of baking cookies.

My favorite recipe right now is the TikTok cookie recipe: 1 cup peanut butter, 1 cup brown sugar, 1 egg, 1 tsp of baking soda, and 1 cup of chocolate chips. It’s just so… easy. We make these a lot for Forrest—he’s always in the mood for a cookie and he’s been holding steady at 31 pounds for a year and a half now, so we need him to bulk up—and they make the house smell good.

But whatever cookie you choose, this is a great way to get in the spirit, forget the world for a little while, and have some fun. Plus, you get cookies at the end of it.

3. Have a Movie Night

I’m working on a list of Autumnal-but-not-spooky/scary/Halloween movies to watch with Forrest… because one of our favorite things to do right now is have a movie night. Make hot cocoa, pop some popcorn, put on a movie, and snuggle up under a blanket. It’s so cozy, so fun, and requires $0 and next to no effort.

If you don’t have a go to list of movies to watch for movie night, let me help you out. Here are a few of our favorites:

• The Nightmare Before Christmas

• Home Alone 2 (I know this is a Christmas movie but Forrest loves it)

• Lego Movie 2

• Coraline

• Fantastic Mr. Fox

• Isle of Dogs

• Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

Monthly Journaling: 30 Journal Prompts for September 2020

Ready for a short and sweet post? Good!

Today, I wanted to share 30 journaling prompts I’m using in my bullet journal this month. These are great, general prompts to get yourself in the habit of writing every single day. You don’t have to choose just one to write every day—you can pick one or two. Or you can just follow the numbers and take your time. Whatever works for you!

I hope you find these prompts helpful. Make sure to follow me on Instagram for more journal prompts!

Do You Need to Learn New Skills?

Welcome to the Diversifying Your Skills series! Learning new skills in your life and career can be really rewarding—but challenging at the same time. What does it mean to realize you’re missing a skill for your career or, worse, life? How can you best learn new skills? I’ll be answering those questions and more in this weekly series.

When I first started freelancing, I knew there were a few skills I had that set me apart from other freelancers or would simply make me an appealing person to work with. They were the fact that I was organized, knew how to set up and run a project, and was an expert in my field (even if I don’t always feel like an expert in my field). However, there were a few skills that I knew I didn’t have.

That meant I had to learn them.

These skills are important to freelancing, and really to any job, but I just didn’t have them; they included things like networking, bookkeeping, and client management. Learning these huge, new skills took time, effort, and dedication. But I knew I needed them.

As time has passed, I’ve realized that constantly learning new skills, or adjusting what I already know, is a major part of my life and my career. There will always be things we don’t know. But not knowing isn’t an excuse not to learn, not to try, or to give up.

If you’re reading this post, then you’ve probably asked yourself “Do I need to learn new skills right now?” at least once. Let’s break down why learning new skills for our lives or career isn’t a failure, what learning new skills is super valuable, and what else I’ll be covering in this weekly series for September!

What It Means to be a Lifelong Learner

Learning doesn’t stop the moment we turn 18. Or the moment we graduate college. Or when we’re 10+ years into our jobs.

We’re all constantly learning. (And if someone isn’t learning new things every single day, or just refusing to learn new things, well, then, I have some feelings about that and I’m sure you do too.)

On the internet, it feels like everyone is an expert. No one feels like a beginner or someone who is just learning. Influencers position themselves as experts on things (parenting, skincare, home decor), but are they really? You should always question someone who says they are, unequivocally, an expert. Why? Because even experts (and at this point in my career, I’d say I’m expert-level in my knowledge of 2 things: blogging and social media) admit freely that they are learning new things every single day.

Being a lifelong learner means staying curious about things, even unrelated to your career, or hobbies, or life. It means asking questions when people talk to you (because you want to know more and learn!); it means reading articles, seeking out new information, talking to people about solving issues.

Being a lifelong learner doesn’t mean you’re in school all the time; it just means that you’re always trying to improve your knowledge, your outlook, and your life.

The Value in New Skills

When I had my son, I didn’t know how to breastfeed. Even 4 weeks later, visiting a lactation consultant, I realized that part of the reason I never successfully latched my son was because no nurse during our 7-day hospital stay explained to me what I was supposed to be doing. They always just said, “Ok, let’s try to latch him” then just watched my struggle and not know what to do for 20 minutes before sighing and holding out a bottle. (This did wonders for my self esteem!)

There is always something new for us to learn. Something that other people can teach us. When you see someone struggling, there is always a question if you should say something. If you see a new mom struggling to successfully latch her new baby, should you say something? (I’m on the side of YES you absolutely should!) If a new coworker doesn’t know how to use the coffee machine in the break room, should you show them? Yes. If you would want to be taught these things, you should be willing to help others.

Sometimes, learning something new can feel frightening, difficult, or overwhelming. Or sometimes, we end up learning a new skill that invalidates lots of our old ones. (For example, I know Hootsuite like the back of my hand—but because it no longer offers a full suite of scheduling tools to free subscribers, I don’t recommend it or even use it. Working with small businesses has taught me that scheduling tools are far too expensive and it invalidates a lot of my agency-level knowledge.)

Always think of yourself as a lifelong learner, someone seeking value in learning new things; there will probably never be a point in your life where you know everything.

What Comes Next?

So what now?

You know you need to learn new skills—either for your job, or your hobby, or something you want to achieve.

So where do you start?

I’m glad you asked! This month, I’ll be sharing a post every weekend about learning new skills: what skills you need for freelancing, the best places to learn new skills, and much more. I hope you find it valuable! Don’t forget to sign up for my newsletter going out at the end of the month for exclusive content.