Two thousand and nineteen. A year of tremendous personal and professional growth! From a recommendation from my friend Jess, I decided to use Ink + Volt to do some reflection on 2019 and some goal setting for 2020. I enjoyed the process and found the questions thoughtful and insightful. It prompted me to look back over the year and take in everything that happened.
In 2019,
I read 48 books through my Goodreads challenge. I will set the goal at 48 again in 2020 because I barely made that goal this year (I finished 2 books, ~ 300 pages on December 31…).
I did 275 workouts, including workouts with my trainer on Future, swim workouts, yoga sessions, and more. I expect this will stay consistent as well.
I traveled A LOT more than normal. I made it to Lopez Island, Lancaster and Philadelphia, PA, New York, San Francisco, Iceland, Copenhagen, and Rome. I’m thinking a lot about the carbon costs of my air travel so I’m planning to travel less in 2020, but I hope to make each trip meaningful. I am currently thinking about a trip to France in April and have no other plans!
I finished the biggest work project of my career thus far, an extensive partnership with Mount Sinai Hospital in NYC. I had the privilege of visiting the hospital in October to see the results of the work - I was so proud!!
I ate many extremely delicious meals. I had the great privilege of eating at noma in Copenhagen, but I also had many exceptional meals around Seattle and also during my week in Rome.
I only had one comical mishap during the goal-setting process: One of the questions was “what do you want to leave behind in 2019?” I interpreted that as a question about legacy…. in the sense of “so and so left behind a library, a wife and three children, an award-winning collection of poems, etc.” Without a library with my name on it, I decided my best response was “many great memories of gatherings and food.” Once I learned what this question actually was reaching for - the things you want to discard from the previous year - I realized my response was the exact opposite of my intention. Oh well - goodbye to my good memories!!
Part of the Ink + Volt process involves setting a yearly theme and a series of goals/intentions that you’d like to achieve over the course of the year. Using that system, I’ve come up with a few new goals for 2020. Some of them are immediately actionable in my life and others are more about the philosophical direction of my life.
Refine my diet: If you know anything about me it’s that I love food. Food is an essential part of my life. It’s what I earn money to eat, what I travel to find, and what I look for in a career (eventually). But I know I have some vices… the worst being sugar. I have such a weak spot for pastry and candy. I believe in eating everything in moderation so I would never cut any of these things out of my life completely, but I want to take a step back for a few months to observe what I’m eating in order to understand just how much sugar I’m eating. A few Swedish Fish in the afternoon is a fine treat… several dozen during a movie night is too much. The other thing I’m watching is my gluten intake for the month of January. As many of you know, I’ve had a variety of gut issues over 2019 including a delightful bought of E. Coli. I’m going off gluten to hopefully give my gut a rest from extra processing. As I said before, I have a soft spot for pastry… so not being able to eat ANY gluten is extremely challenging. This is something that I’d appreciate your support on - if we’re out to eat or going for coffee and I look like I’m going to pounce on a croissant, give me a reminder and encouragement - “you’ve done great so far, keep it going!” As of now, I’m 5 days in and I’m not dead.
Bring people together around food: This is a joint goal - A) I want to increase the size of my social circle by gathering friends with frequent dinner parties and socials, and B) bring them together around food that I’ve learned to make. Oftentimes when I talk about my love of food, I will acknowledge that I enjoy eating more than I enjoy cooking. But increasingly, I’m interested in both sides of the process. I’ve had the good fortune of attending many phenomenal cooking classes at Book Larder and I’ve consequently purchased many great cookbooks there. In 2020, I want to actually cook from those books. I haven’t quite decided how to make this goal actionable or measurable - perhaps 1-2 new recipes per week? But I’m sure of one thing - whenever I make food I want it to be an excuse to bring people together. Old friends, new friends, everyone who wants to bravely eat something I’ve thrown together.
A side-branch of this goal is to increase my knowledge around wine and particularly the remarkably diverse world of natural wine. I am thankful to my parents for getting me the Wine Bible for Christmas!
Pursue brand: Over the last 2 years, through challenging and interesting projects at the foundation, many networking conversations with mentors, many nights spent googling fonts and colors, many daydreams of products I’d like to launch, I’ve realized that brand is something that gets me excited everyday and is a niche I’d like to pursue in my career. I like the touchy-feely stuff - the philosophical mission of a brand that can make it emotionally resonate with you - and I like thinking through the tactile ramifications of that brand philosophy - touching on the logo, colors, layouts, product, pricing, packaging, delivery, marketing, and digital experience. To start the year, I’ve bought a bunch of brand books to put on the “business” shelf of my library and I hope to learn as much as I can about the processes and lingo that are used in that industry.
International work: Although I had a wonderful time in college and loved my time in New York, I was unable to study abroad because of my swim team’s schedule. At the time, I reminded myself that 4 years in New York was almost like a study abroad… the people, the languages, the amazing food, the art, the architecture. But in retrospect, it was not the same as a total immersion in an entirely different culture. Over the next few years, I want to chart a path that will give me an opportunity to work internationally. I’m not wedded to where, when, or how… but I will make it work somehow.
A side-goal is my continued learning in French. I’ve spent the last year working with a tutor to polish my skills and get as close to fluent as I can. I’ve made progress, but I still feel like I have a bunch of cogs in my brain that aren’t quite fitting together. I think my next step will be an immersion program to eat, think, and breathe nothing but French. Hopefully the cogs will slide into place and I’ll have a functional French brain!
All of these goals derive from my yearly theme - which I’ve decided is “Live Whole-Heartedly. Rest, Recover, Reflect.” When I reviewed my goals, I realized they were all about passion and engagement: I want to cook and eat more, I want to spend more time with friends, I want to dive deeper into the career skills that I’m excited about, and I want to live abroad. To me, that meant truly inhabiting myself and engaging with the world as fully as possible. In order to power that lifestyle, however, I know I’ll need more rest - sleep, stretching, and alone time. I included the word “recover” to incorporate health, athletics, and diet - it’s important to me that I’m treating my body right. And last but not least, I included the word “Reflect” because I really want to make sure that I’m living intentionally, reflecting on my actions and my path forward. I will schedule check ins with myself - take myself out for a coffee (and pastry!) - in order to track if I’m on track to meet my goals and whether these goals are still meaningful to me.
If you can’t tell, I’m excited and optimistic about the year ahead. I can’t wait to go on adventures and learn more about myself.
What are you working on in 2020? Reach out and let me know :)