I am quickly becoming obsessed with making goals and am flirting with the danger-zone of over-planning and not getting anything done. But it is the second day of the New Year, so I’m still in the safe zone, right?

Today was New Year’s Day observed, which meant I had the day off work and since Johnny was working from home, that meant the day was all for me.

I slept in (yay!), had a home cooked breakfast with the man, ran off to meet another friend for coffee and to talk about our year ahead, had lunch with one of my truest, most amazing friends, made it to CrossFit (deadlifts, hang snatches, and overhead squats, oh my!), and am now enjoying some writing time. This year rocks already.

Put Your Goals Somewhere That You Can See Them

In following my track record of making goals and achieving them, the sure-fire way for me to fall flat on my face and not get something done is to write out a set of goals and then hide them. Sure, this works really well when cleaning my desk and I find my goals stacked between that book I didn’t finish and that notebook that has pages left unfilled (surprise!). And even though when it happens, I’m usually surprised by how many of those goals I actually accomplished. And while it’s been proven that the very act of writing down goals increases your likelihood of achieving them, it’s hard to be unintentionally intentional.

So this afternoon I went through my goals for the year and picked three things that I want to make sure I carry with me through the year. They are my goals, mantras, and things that could be roadblocks between achieving my goals this year.

From there, I wrote down five or six things for each category on index cards and literally pasted them to the wall of my office.

I used the red light/green light approach to organizing these three categories:

• Goals on green cards, as that’s where I want to go.
• Mantras on yellow cards, as I’ll probably be stalled when I need to remember them.
• Roadblocks go on pink cards, as those are things I need to stop doing. (more…)

There are two kinds of end of the year/New Year blog posts to write. The first is a reflection of the previous year – everything you did, everything you didn’t, what you’re proud of, and what you’re not. And the second is a laundry list of “do’s” and “don’ts” for how to make the next year rock much harder than the last.

And then there’s a third, which doesn’t reveal anything about the writer but gives you, the reader, a map of how you can stick to your resolutions for the first time ever.

Why New Year’s Resolutions Don’t Work Out

New Year’s Resolutions are like plans – you write them for how you’re feeling (usually fat) at that time (post-holidays) for the future (that has yet to be written) – and they never work out. They look great on paper, but horrible in execution because they all lack one thing – foresight and the understanding that you have to sacrifice something to accomplish what you need (and the ability to adjust to continue the momentum).

Instead of resolutions or plans, I make goals. I did this unknowingly as I entered 2010 and consciously as I entered 2011. I met the three goals I set in 2010 but not all of the goals I set for myself in 2011. While all of this past year’s goals looked great in December 2010, by mid-2011, an imbalance between work and life happened and parts of those goals were prioritized while others were not. Plus I set too many goals.

I don’t feel like 2011 was a failure, but just plain weird. In the Christmas letter John and I sent to our family, I summarized the year as one of “change,” and by God, if that isn’t true.

2011 started with a lot of oomph, passion, and excitement as things were set in place that I had been working hard towards achieving in the previous year and a half. But I got burnt out early, outgrew that opportunity faster than I imagined, and a new opportunity revealed itself and I jumped on it. If 2011 was a shape it would look like a giant “U” with a big, deep dip in the middle.

A New Template for Plotting World Domination in 2012

Earlier this week, my husband and I spent the evening working through Benny Hsu of Get Busy Living’s 2011 Year in Review Worksheet. What I like about his template is it focuses on how the previous year ended so you can reflect on what you’re proud of, what you accomplished, what you learned, what didn’t work, and where you’d like to see yourself in the future.

Benny’s worksheet helps you see where you want to go by reviewing where you came. It’s similar to racing a car – they say that you should look at where you want the car to go, not at the wall that you don’t want to run into.

Goals, plans, and strategies are the same way – look at where you want to go, not where you don’t want to go. (more…)

Today is the last day of November which means that all of the men who grew ‘staches for Movember can finally shave, we all flip our calendars and freak out about the goals we have left to meet in 2011, and it is the end of National Blog Posting Month. This is my second year at posting one blog post every day for the month of November and – woah – what a month it’s been!

Goals and Milestones

On November 1st I made six goals for myself to keep this month. Here’s how I did:

1. Post at least one blog every single day

By the time I publish my recap, I’ll have published 27 blog posts in a month with 30 days. I skipped three days; one was because I was out with friends and forgot and two were because it was the first week of my new job and I was tired.

This weekend I read Om Malik’s list of lessons he learned from ten years of blogging and he shared something Doc Searls said: “Blog if you have something to say and respect your reader’s time. If you respect their time, they are going to give you some time of their day.” And while there are a few blog posts I wrote this month that I categorize as “throw away” posts (meaning that I could have gone without writing them because I was too exhausted from life, uninspired, was unwilling to write, or had plain and simple writer’s block), every single post that I wrote and published went live before midnight and that’s an awesome accomplishment.

2. Stick to the content calendar

Who was I kidding when I wrote this? My blog is the place where I can write about “life according to Laura,” and this life says that content calendars are great, but mostly irrelevant for whatever I’m feeling right here and right now.

Screw that.

Okay, okay, so I probably stuck with the content calendar 30% of the time, like today and this recap. I’ve had this recap blog post planned for an entire month

3. Be fearless

Yep, did that, but not without hesitation.

4. Increase traffic

I totally nailed this goal and my traffic for the month of November 2011 was up 56% from November 2010. I’m proud of achieving this goal.

5. No epic blog posts

I made sure not to write or publish any “epic” blog posts this year. Epic blog posts are essays or articles that could honestly be a senior-level college thesis. They include a very strong point of view and research to back that up. And they take a lot of thought to write and a lot of time to edit. Epic blog posts should not be cranked out in 2-4 hours, but days or weeks.

While I technically didn’t write any epic blog posts this year, there were three blog posts that were about timely subjects and I wrote them a day or two in advance. The problem, you see, is that NaBloPoMo isn’t about writing everyday, it’s about posting every day. So there were a few nights where I cranked out that day’s post, published it, and went straight to writing the next one. That was a little hard, but it sure was fun to relax and not write the next night.

Small victories

Oh, and the best part about not writing epic blog posts is I’ve been listening – to what you’re responding to in my posts, to what other bloggers are writing and asking about – and I’ve put all of those ideas in a queue and I’m very excited to dive deeply into those topics. So get ready.

6. Read one new blog every single day

I’ve been reading a lot this month, but I haven’t been commenting as much as I wanted to. Why? I quit my job and started another one. Oh, and I’ve been blogging. A lot. So suck it. It happens.

Milestones and big announcements

• I came out as a writer, a real writer (and my first writing professor responded to it)
• I quit my job
• I started a new job
• I started a new weekly-roundup series
• My husband became an artist
• My friend launched his daily art project
• I started a Facebook page for my blog (Toss a girl a like?)
• Yesterday, I published my 100th blog post on lamiki.com

Bragging rights

• 500 Words or Less – I wrote a blog post about something that a writer said at an event and he wrote a response back. That was pretty awesome.
• Hipster Generation of Entrepreneurs – I I wrote a response to the New York Times article about the Entrepreneurial Generation and I was quoted in an article on GeekWire in response to the same NYT article – big win in my world.

Blogs I had the most fun writing

• Happy Thanksgiving Eve – I had the most fun writing this post and telling you not to listen to every other blogger and Tweet during Thanksgiving (Okay, ‘fess up, who stayed online all weekend?)
• Picturing My True Identity – Because who doesn’t love sharing photos of themselves from high school?
• That Blog Post About my Cats – Even though cats may rule the Internet, being a cat lady is still does not. This was one of the most creative posts I wrote and, let’s be honest here, I have cats, two of them, and they’re pretty awesome.

So long, NaBloPoMo, we’ll meet again!

I had fun this month. And while I really think that the 2010 NaBloPoMo experiment was my breakout year, I kicked ass this year and I’m emerging from the 2011 NaBloPoMo season as a better writer who is pretty damn good at blogging. And as a result, I know you and myself a lot better. Thank you for being with me on this journey.

What’s next? Not a new blog post on Thursday, December 1st, but you will see a new post this weekend.

Stay tuned boys and girls. And thank you for being here with me.

Photo Credit: Lorena Cupcake

It’s 9:55pm on November 1, 2011 as I start this post and my mind is blank. This is actually hilarious since I’ve been writing my inaugural NaBloPoMo post all freaking day.

This is not a good sign.

Today is November 1st and the start of three very big things: National Blog Posting Month, Movember, and the great paleo challenge.

As though I didn’t need more ‘new things’ to juggle…

National Blog Posting Month

Last November I embarked on a month-long journey to post one-blog post every single day for thirty days. I did this on a dare form an amazing and awesome blogging buddy.

The plan was simple, I laid out some goals, and I was good-to-go.

But what I didn’t know was how much I’d learn about myself through the process of writing. (You can read the recap here: When Creativity Flows, Don’t Turn Off the Faucet.) And over the past year, I have become an even stronger writer, communicator, and individual. And a lot of that was due to the routine of writing – and publishing – every single day.

For my sophomore attempt at National Blog Posting Month (NaBloPoMo), here’s what’s changed:

New blogging buddy

Anthony is still blogging, but he’s trading up from NaBloMoMo to participate in National Novel Writing Month (or so he says).

Meet Ms. Melinda Moseler, my NaBloPoMo blogging buddy! For background and bragging right, I helped inspire her to start her personal blog and made her fall in love with Twitter. She and I have been writing together at Jolkona for almost two years. At Jolkona, She and I have a dual writer/editor relationship that most hermit-writers dream of. You know the kind where you write something, one reviews it, and somehow figures out how to pull that point that makes your article, your blog, or even your media pitch that much stronger. I do that for her, and she does that for me. It’s pretty awesome.

In other words, she rocks.

She’s also based on the east coast, has accepted the fact that I blog late-at-night.

I am so exited to have her with me on this journey this year! Here’s Melinda’s first NaBloPoMo post: It’s National Blog Post Month!

New goals

Setting goals last year kept me on the ball and off of the ledge of despair. So here’s what I’m shooting for:

1. Post at least one blog every single day – this is required.
2. Stick to the content calendar – but I have permission to be inspired and write on a whim.
3. Be fearless – write what I think, say what I mean; this is my blog after all.
4. Increase traffic – I want to have more views this month than in November 2010.
5. No epic blog posts – still want quality, but there is no time for quantitative research-based articles. Those will have to wait.
6. Read one new blog every single day – I’ve been slacking on my reading list, commenting, and connecting with new bloggers, want to try and work that in this year.

There’s one big giant difference between this year and last year, and that’s the fact that I have a fulltime job. Sure, staying up until (cough) 2am will not fly this year.

Though I am a better, stronger, writer who knows how to kick out a blog in no time…when I’m focused. So we’ll see if those two elements can work together or not.

Mustaches and Going Paleo

Right, so this month is not just about blogging. I’m officially a mo’sista for the team that John is leading for Movember. He’s doing some really cool stuff to raise money and awareness for men’s health, like sell some of his artwork and donate the proceeds. (Here’s a preview; I’ll write a more substantive post with the story this week.)

Also, I’m going paleo. Yes, the hunter-and-gatherer, eat-like-a-caveman diet. Again, I’ll go into more details later, but this is altering my behavior so it’s going to be rough. I promise not to try and eat my blog late at night when I’m trying to crank out a post and all I want to eat is sugar, bread, salt, and bacon.

That’s right, bacon is not paleo.

What’s that you said about bacon?

I’ll go into detail about that later. For now, welcome NaBloPoMo! I’m very excited to see you again!

Are you participating in NaBloPoMo? Leave a link to your blog and help me with my sixth goal!

Photo Credit: KalebColeman

I am starting my own business.

That’s right, a business and I have no idea what it will be yet. I’ve mentioned this to a few people, how I want to start a business but I haven’t had that idea that strikes like a bolt of lightning and makes me say, “holy shit, this is it!”

Actually, that has happened, but I’m still ruminating on it.

There are two things I’m obsessed with: 1) building things, and 2) movements.

The first I know quite a bit about from positions I’ve had over the years. And the second is a relatively new passion that was born out of the love I have of being the voice that connects brands with their customers and from watching organizations like the Girl Effect and Movember harness their communities and ignite a wave of action.

It’s pretty incredible.

So while I research and learn what exactly those two things mean – What do I enjoy most about building things? And what exactly is it about movements that totally draw me in? – and how they’ll work with each other, today, I’m officially coming out as an entrepreneur in training.

I don’t know when I’ll land and settle with an idea that I will want to build, execute, ship, and implement, but it will happen. It’s going to happen. And it will probably happen way sooner than any of us think it will.

And I’m bringing this blog (and you!) with me along the way.

Photo credit: tubb