2017 Outlook

As the final set of questions in Anoushka Rees' list of bullet journal prompts, this is my outlook for the year ahead. The last three weeks were recaps of 2016 and covered a bit of everything--career, relationships, goals, self-analysis and development--and this week is a bit of the same, but more as a peek into my vision and hopes for the year ahead. Let's get started!

1. What do you want the overarching theme for your 2017 to be?

I thought of having a word of the year, and I believe it was Grind. So my theme for 2017 would be around-the-clock grind time. lol I have so many fears and so much reluctance about turning 30...in two days!...that I was determined to make this the best year of my life in response. I had to admit to myself that I'm afraid of getting old and I do have an issue with age, which was hard to do because I always thought that I was okay with it. No, in the grand scheme of things, 30 isn't old at all. But it's old to me, and I'm struggling like hell with it. So instead of running from it, I wanted to give myself the best 30th year that I possibly could in order to counter that fear. I'm ready to have what I want and I'm tired of feeling like I'm waiting on it to just happen to me, so I'm going to do what I need to do to make it happen. I hate the word 'hustle,' don't really like the word 'grind' either, but it does inspire me lol, so that's the year's word and theme.

2. What do you want to see, discover, explore?

I know this is a cheesy answer, but I want to see, discover and explore more good in the world. 2016 as a whole seems to have deeply shaken my faith in humanity, in the underlying bit of optimism I've always had, and my belief in the direction I thought we'd be going in. There's a reason why books and movies set in the future are always so negative, so apocalyptic, but I always dismissed them as works of fiction. The more hatred I see spewing in the world, however, the more I wonder if life isn't going to imitate art someday. Hopefully it won't be that dramatic, I mean it more in terms of the manner of how uncivilized things seem to be becoming. I'd love to see more light and good in the world we live in. Who wouldn't, though? I know it's a rather vague answer and I do have other answers to the question, but this desire affects me the most as to how I interact with the outside world, and I'd be much more comfortable interacting with a safer, more tolerant and inclusive world. But again, who wouldn't? 

3. Who do you want to spend more time with in 2017?

I want to spend more time with like-minded individuals. I've always found it so inspiring to be around a bunch of business-minded people because the gears in their minds are always turning, they're excellent to bounce ideas off of, and I love the environment. Of course I'd like to spend more positive time with my family, but I'd also like to expand my horizons and get out a little more. 

4. What skills do you want to learn, improve or master?

I'd like to learn more advanced website, app and graphics design because while I know a bit about graphics and website design, I wouldn't say I'm confident in said knowledge yet. I know nothing about app design though and I'd like to create an app someday so that's something I definitely want to learn. I want to improve and eventually master things relevant to improving my blogs--photography and product photos, website design so I can add a few more features to the site, and of course, improving my reviews and the way I do them. There are tons of things I'd like to improve, but one thing I'm learning--the hard way, obviously lol--is not to overdo things. I'd like to master a schedule. lol 

5. What personal quality do you want to develop or strengthen?

I would like to redevelop a quality I lost a few years ago, which was the ability to just listen to someone speak. I was in a relationship a few years ago that felt very much like a dispute between lawyers towards the end of the relationship, so I was doing more listening in order to speak, to dispute what was being said. I also speak to a lot of people who don't really allow the other person to speak, so I had to start cutting in the conversation if I wanted to be heard. Unfortunately, I think doing that so often got it stuck in my head, because now I do it quite often. I can't stand when people cut me off and never allow me to speak, so it drives me nuts when I catch myself doing it. I do it in casual conversation a lot now, almost unconsciously, and I want to kick myself every time I hear it because it's such an ugly habit. The mix of listening without speaking and listening to speak caused it to stick with me, and it's something I'm trying to get myself back out of doing. I used to be a really good listener and while I can still listen without speaking, it wasn't always this hard for me to do and I hate it.

I would like to think that my communication skills are improving but I'd like to get better at them. When I can express myself calmly, clearly and without sounding overly biased it can really help in conversations where middle ground and a calm attitude are needed. I also know that when I can express myself with thought to the other person's perspective, I then open the door to being understood myself, which is really all I usually want. As I try harder to be more aware of what I say and how I say things, I realize how helpful non-combative conversational styles can be and I can learn what 'combative' is to those I'm around. While on the subject of awareness, though, another quality I'd like to strengthen is my self-awareness. I'm a big advocate of self-therapy if possible and to me, it requires a heavy ability to be impartial and understanding to how things look and feel to others. Being able to evaluate your words and actions from someone else's eyes is a great and often underlooked quality that can't be developed or strengthened without being self-aware.

6. What do you want your everyday life to be like?

I want my everyday life to be happier, more peaceful and more productive. Sometimes when I'm stressed, I can escape through working on something but many times, especially if I'm going through a stressful period, I become anxious and a bit scatterbrained so I can't get anything done. I'd like to be more productive on a regular basis whether I'm stressed or not. Speaking of stress though, I'd love....LOVE...if my everyday life was happier and less stressful. It would significantly and positively affect my health on so many levels if my everyday life was a bit happier. I'm not entirely sure how to make that happen, but I'm trying to figure it out.  

7. What habits do you want to change, cultivate, or get rid of?

The number one habit I would love to just get rid of is smoking. If I could wake up and never want another cigarette again, I would be just fine with that. It's become more of a crutch to me than anything else and I really do detest the habit. So if that habit and all of its cravings, odors and dependencies could jump off a cliff, I'd sleep much better at night.

I'd like to cultivate being more at peace with things that anger me because truth be told, I'm a bit of a hothead. I could blame it on my Irish blood and having a family full of hot-tempered people, but I won't. I just have a bad temper. I have little patience, no tolerance, a very low threshold for stupidity and my main trigger is people being shitty to others. These things create what can be a Molotov-level temper, which I've worked hard to get control of over the years. I try really hard not to immediately go from 1-100 but everyone has their breaking point and once I've hit mine, its game over. Despite this though, I'm actually a really good mediator and peacemaker. Contradictory as shit, right? LOL I usually have a good handle on it nowadays, but that's more in the way of how I express it to others.  It hasn't changed how it affects me internally, and I'll carry an argument around with me for days or even weeks sometimes. It just sits in my stomach like lead, and many of my health issues are triggered or worsened by stress so if I'm not careful, I could trigger several things at once just by being angry for a little too long. I would really love to just be more at peace and not so easily bothered by certain things anymore. I wasn't sure it was a habit, but I'm in the habit of angering easily so I'd like to cultivate a different response. lol

8. What do you want to achieve career-wise?

By year's end I'd like to have my food truck up and running, or at very least with an inked-in opening date. I'd also like to have taken RRNT to the next level, which to me would be cultivating a small audience and being able to interact with them as well as finding my niche with the products I review. I'd like to be on a roll, so to speak. If by some miracle I am able to achieve both of these things, that'd be fabulous.

9. How do you want to remember the year 2017 when you look back on it 20 years from now?

When I look back on this year 20 years from now, I would firstly and most importantly like to be alive and mentally sound because if I'm not, this question really doesn't matter, now does it? lol But seriously, when I look back on this year 20 years from now, I would like to see that this is where the ball got rolling and I was able to reverse a lot of issues that plagued generations of my family. Wow, that got deep real fast. Let me explain. My family and generations before it have always been poor, in bad health, and plagued with life-threatening illnesses. Everyone seemed to escape the more serious illnesses in their 20s, but the 30s came about with a vengeance and it was only recently that I realized how close I was to that invisible deadline. I don't want the same fate for myself because I've seen just how dangerous some of these illnesses are, and I already have a list of health issues to deal with on my own. So there's that. Financially speaking, I've always wanted to be the one to reverse my family's status and clearly doing it in my 20s wasn't in the cards for me. I would like to see that I was able to move things in a different direction for my family when I look back on this in 20 years. 

10. What is your number one goal for 2017?

My number one goal is to move out of the bubble of stagnancy I've been in. That bubble of stagnancy encompasses so much of my life and I would love to see what things would be like if they were moving more steadily. Again, I'm not quite sure how to make this happen for myself because of the reasons why the stagnancy is there, but I'd love to find the loophole. Like I said, I want this to be the year. Admittedly, a lot of this reason is to counter my fears and reluctance about entering a new decade of my life, but urgency reasons aside, it's still important to me. I can't make things happen for myself if I'm in the bubble of eternal stagnancy, so this year my main goal is to find the needle.

And that brings this little series to a close. I hope you enjoyed reading these posts; I certainly enjoyed figuring out my answers and sharing them with you. I wish I hadn't sounded so angry or sad for many of the answers, but the truth is that 2016 was a pretty bad year for me, and both of those emotions were rather dominant for me for a good majority of the year. I'm happy with the direction I'd like to move in, it's simple but I'm rather simple, so it works for me. What does your 2017 look like based on these questions? What question from this list would challenge you the most? See you soon!