I just graduated from nursing school at age 35 a few weeks ago! I say this not to toot my own horn, but to motivate others that you can absolutely change your career and go back to school later in life. If I can do it, so can you! I have two kids too. I drove for Uber for the two years I was in school to pay the bills.

I start my new job as a nurse next month!

• Easy goal: hike 1,000 miles this year (up from 750 last year)
• Harder goal: cut ultraprocessed food out of my diet
• Hardest goal: see every human I run into as a person who deserves to live without bad feelings from me. This is hardest (for me) in traffic or politics.

Goals! My favourite :D

Right, my first long-term goal is to get my garden ready for the spring. I only just moved in here, and the garden is pretty barren to say the least. But I have all the winter (southern hemisphere) to get it going.

After that, just getting all my spinning out of the way. I got a spinning wheel, and I’ve been spinning up my own yarns. There’s an artist collective store that I might even sell them in too, so that would be neat.

And like everyone else, just improve my own routine. Cutting out Reddit as the time sink that added nothing to my day to day is something I’m sure lots of people are doing right now, hahaha!

I’ve been putting together a proposal for a community garden. The location I want is absolutely ideal, just an unused corner of lawn boardering a hospice/care home just behind our village main street. Its near the play ground and across the parking from the native bush reserve.

I’m running into some hurdles with how the location is classed as it is listed as bush even though this corner will not be replanted. This particular corner has been unused for years and not a part of the dog running areas or sports fields. The concerns I was told was about wildlings spredding from the garden but my plan is to implement a banned plants list including everything on the regional plants of concern list as well as plants known for their invasive nature like mint, borage, and foreign wildflowers. The goal is to grow more food staples for the community, educate on backyard gardening with talks on composting, wormfarms, saving seeds, and setting up a garden. I’m really hopeful but not convinced I’ll get the location. We’ll see 🤞

My other project is setting up a community workshop to share the building with our toy library. Its a huge space and the council wants it to be productive. I think a workshop with vetted members who can have 24h access and open memberships with set access times would be ideal. Still sorting approval and then funding but the goal is to have the garage basics that can be hired out as needed and some in-house workshop staples like a lathe, larger table saw, and mitre saw. I would also like it to have some community robustness staples like a large freezer with frozen meals, a washer, and dryer set up, maybe a spare fridge and a generator or two.

Besides that just updating the toy library catalogue with images to make it easier to navigate and adding a spot for missing peices so I can look for replacements in the 2nd hand shops and dump.

I need to lose 50 lbs. Went through a medical event and was on steroids, which did a number on me. Dieting doesn’t work, what works is exercising. But I’m not sticking to it… yet. I lose some, then slack off on the exercise. Sigh…

I’m trying to keep up with exercise and learn to love my body. So far the exercise is consistent, but the latter is much harder. I’m trying to learn Finnish, but it’s been very slow without anyone to talk to. I might end up paying for tutoring

I want to finish my PhD! my almost final draft with results is currently being reviewed by my committee. With any luck, I’ll be able to defend and finish next semester. It’s taken me 6 years and by this time the topic is already stale and other research has passed it by. But I’m working full time as well, so there’s only so many hours in the day.

I need to lose weight! My work is in food manufacturing, which has been better for the wallet than the waistline! It’s frustrating because I’d been doing really well until a couple of years ago, when I injured my foot and couldn’t do all the walking and exercise I used to. Then my foot got better but menopause came right along, and I just can’t seem to regain my previous form and fitness. I’ve been trying to take a “baby steps” approach to exercise and diet, but with the kids, my work, and a husband with permanent ongoing illness/disability I seem to always find an excuse to not stick to a plan. At the moment everything happens in fits and starts.

I am working in a Leadership and HR certification for my company. It has been way more grueling than I expected but I have learned a ton. We covered 300 pages of material last week. 3 more weeks to go.

I’m also trying to stay on top of a workout program I’m doing as well. Balancing the body when the mind is getting worked has been a key to success for me!

I’ve been working on general health and strength training since my daughter was born. I don’t want to be the dad that can’t keep up with his kids.

I feel that accountability and goal-setting threads make me put more effort into what really brings me happiness so here goes:

• Continuing focused Korean language learning.
• Maintain a healthy amount of time on the internet (1-2 hours a day for entertainment).
• Get back into reading! I’m so behind my 25-book reading goal for this year so I have a lot of catching up to do.
• Finally get a job after waiting so long for a permit.

I’ll give myself a month and see what I end up doing c:

I have been trying to deal with procrastination. I get things done, but sometimes I think that I can greatly reduce stress/haste and improve quality by getting started early. Slowly have been starting to do that.

What a great community idea! Hope it will be an inspiration for many <3

Hope my post fits in with this :)

main one i set for the year is a yearly reading goal. last year it was 35 books and i read 39, so this year it’s informally 40. currently i’m at 21, so making very strong pace!