Update 6 on my new year’s resolutions
You can only improve what you track and measure. Therefore, I journal my progress for my 2020 resolutions.
250k goal achieved in february
- 25 books Well on track with 4 nice books finished thus far. Reading War & Peace does take me a little longer than I thought though. My estimated remaining reading time just doesn’t shrink and is still at 6 1/2 hours. I will have to put squeeze some less discerning books in-between.
- run 2 marathons, one sub 4h, one sub 3h Last Saturday I ran for 28k in uncomfortable weather conditions and on a steep path in Hangzhou with 800m elevation gain. This was probably one of my most challenging training runs so far, but I felt absolutely stellar doing it and even assembled a couple of cabinets after coming back. During the run it became clear to me that I am ready to run my sub 4 Marathon in April, and for the first time I started calculating how much below 4 hours I can finish the race on the 12th of April. If I can keep up my training injury free I am looking at a race time of 3.30 now. Fingers crossed!
My updated training log.
- visit Germany once Less homesick than I was after returning from Germany, but still have to keep this goal in mind for Eli & Jade.
- go on a bare-bones camping holiday with Jade & Eli
No update, it’s winter still and this is definitely something for summer, before Eli goes to kindergarten.
- sleep 7 to 8 hours per night, aim to be in bed by 9:30pm
I am doing well on my daily sleep target, and now focus on sleep quality more. After listening to the Extramilest podcast on nasal breathing, I will try taping my mouth at night soon. I am still looking for the right surgical tape, but hope that this technique might fix my dry mouth issue in the morning and, as Patrick McKeown promised, improves the quality of my sleep.
- use a scale to check my weight every day
Got my scale and a blood pressure monitor last week and have started to incorporate using both during my morning routine. It will take a few days/weeks to remember this step automatically, but shouldn’t be a problem do use both just before my morning run. The results are, as expected, rather boring, though I hope to see some improvements on lowering my blood pressure with persistent endurance training in the future.
- do not use my phone within 90 minutes of waking up or going to bed
I did slightly better last week, with not using the almost every morning and only using it twice or three times at night before bed. On a good day, I get up, out of bed and start exercising before looking at my phone in the morning. At night I now am more disciplined to read on my kindle instead of staring at YouTube or twitter. Again, deleting twitter has made this much easier and I am considering which other measures I can take to decrease phone usage in general.
- earn a promotion
I am fully back to work after the Corona virus crisis and last week was a busy and stressful week with some new responsibilities handed over to me. I am seeing this as a step in the right direction and will keep my motivation to work on that promotion. I realized that it has been no more than 7 months with Hooya now, and I can only really expect a promotion after fulfilling a full year. I am now looking forward to the next biz trip with the founder of the company to convince him of my hard work and effectiveness in making him more money. Trickle down economy is what I am hoping for here ;-)
- write weekly progress of 2020 goals every Monday 5am for 30 minutes + 30 minutes diary
Well, after now 6 updates like this, i still haven’t managed to write it at 5am once. Being a realist I am gonna change this goal to a more liberal Monday all-day schedule. Apart from that, I am happy in keeping up this progress report and help me focus on what I want to improve in 2020.
Last week has been a pretty good week in terms of fitness, career and sticking to my goals. I was very diligent on my running and put a similar effort into my work. Work was busy especially due to the some of the work that lay flat while the virus was raging. The weekend was equally busy with lots of distance behind me, and many pieces of furniture assembled for our new apartment. All that was missing for ultimate bliss was Eli, who is still on far away but save Shengsi Island with his grandmother. The little guy should be back with Jade and me next weekend and make us even busier, and happier.
To that effect, turn your goals into habits and progress will be noticeable and much more attainable.
goals now running family focus writing resolutions update resolutions2020