With the start of a new year, I take the time to set my focus for the coming year. I believe that by being selective about where I direct my energy, I can achieve results that are exponentially greater than if I split that energy across many different goals. I detailed my 2019 focus here (read that first if you want more context). Here is how I’m progressing. 2019 Theme: Long-Suffering 2019 Challenge: Fasting in the Wilderness No progress yet except a few potential backcountry permits acquired. 2019 Habit: Minimizing Digital Entertainment This habit has started out strong. I stayed under the threshold for 11 of the 13 weeks and my average so far is 2.27 hours of digital entertainment per week. I actually decided to adjust my 2 hours a week goal to be different for each quarter. Q1 was set at 3 hours per week, Q2 at 2 hour,
On Saturday January 5th, 2019 I did not finish the Gulch Countdown race, getting disqualified after ~27 miles. This is the race report. Goals I really didn’t have goals for this race, I was just out there to have fun. Part of me wanted to see how far I could run untrained though to see if it was going to be a good idea to attempt to go on a 93 mile run this summer. Make it to 6 laps (13.1 miles) – ACCOMPLISHED Make it to 12 laps (26.2 miles) – ACCOMPLISHED Make it past 50k -Not Accomplished Be the last man standing – Not Accomplished Successes What am I proud of from race day? Somehow ran the farthest I had ever run in a day, despite low training Did a great job implementing my pacing strategy Had a lot of fun meeting other runners and talking on the trail
Each year I focus my attention on a few named goals as a way to be more intentional about the pursuits I direct my energy towards. The way in which I do this has evolved over time and these release notes serve to document the current state of the process and changes I’ve made recently. Review Of v1.5 For v1.5 I made only a few minor tweaks. The yearly focus remained centered around the idea of focusing on single topic, which the challenge, habit & exemplar would all relate to. The full details of v1.5 are located here but the main three adjustments were: Introduced the concept of a Sabbath Cycle Vision item Specified difficulty progression by quarter for the habit Added details to the description about each item in the release notes I set my newest Sabbath Cycle Vision but don’t yet have feedback on it. The main item I have
With the start of a new year, I take the time to set my focus for the coming year. I believe that by being selective about where I direct my energy, I can achieve results that are exponentially greater than if I split that energy across many different goals. More details about the process are in this blog post and you can review the results from past years (2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 & 2018). 2019 Theme: Long-Suffering My theme for 2019 is long-suffering. This is the first full year of my newest sabbath cycle, of which overarching vision is that of preparing for my calling. That means my next six years will involve undertaking a lot of hard work, that might not always be directly rewarding or obviously contributing to the long term work I want to accomplish. With that in mind it seemed appropriate to start off by focusing my attention on
2018-2023 Sabbath Cycle Vision: Preparing For My Calling This is not only a new year, but it is also the first full year of my next sabbath year cycle. As such, before I define the focus for this year, I also need to define the guiding vision that will serve me for the next approximately six years. Technically my sabbath year started and ended mid-year, so I’ve actually had this guiding vision in place for six months already, since July 2018. As I reflected on the exemplars I’ve learned about the past three year, and the period of their lives in which they accomplished the great things they are known for, they each had their biggest impact later in life. Franklin negotiated the treaty with France his 70s. Muir founded the Sierra Club in his 60s. Liddell only lived to be 43, but those final years are the reason he
At the beginning of 2018 I wrote about my focus for the year. I’ve posted a few updates throughout the year (quarter year, half year & three quarters) and now is the time to do a final review. 2018 Theme: First Principles Lifestyle Self Grade: 7/10 In terms of relevance with theme, this year provided plenty of opportunity. I ended up making two major job decisions and we made one where-to-live decision. Each of those provided an opportunity to evaluate our options based on first principles, what we wanted to achieve. I think we did a good job drilling back into the heart of the matter and figuring out what we wanted and why we did. The difficulty is even knowing those things, the decisions aren’t easy as everything is a trade off. 2018 Challenge: Profile 12 Families (w/ Kids) Living Intentionally Different Self Grade: 1/10 I failed to make any significant