I’m a big fan of setting goals and continuous improvement, but unfortunately life often gets in the way of making progress. And without progress, morale often declines, and you end up another year older without making any of the changes you promised yourself you’d make.
Cheer up, things probably aren’t as bad as you think. A year is a long time, and chances are you’ve made quite a bit of progress, you just haven’t taken the time to do a review. If taking time to do a progress review is a foreign concept, this post is for you.
A goal without a plan is only a dream
This quote (or a variation of it) comes from personal development and finance gurus like Brian Tracy and Dave Ramsey. And while I do not disagree with it, a review of your plan and progress is equally important.
I try to do a quick check-up on my annual goals throughout the year, but always set aside some time the week between Christmas and New Years to do an annual progress review. And while I’m often not feeling that productive during December with holidays, normal end of year work projects, and so on – taking a look at the year as a whole can sometimes lead to some positive results
For example, here are some of the things I found during my review…
- While I’ve not been that healthy lately, I’ve still managed to maintain my goal weight that I set at the beginning of the year.
- By making normal mortgage payments, plus applying a handful of additional principal payments a throughout the year, I’ve been able to shave almost $10,000 off my mortgage. This, along with appreciation and several updates have really helped to increase my net worth (you do track your net worth, right?)
- Continued investing in my 401K at work during a great bull market. If you’ve done this then I’m willing to bet you’ve seen some nice gains this year.
- Purchased and remodeled two rental properties, found renters, and am currently managing both properties.
- Purchased a new home, which goes completely against what I said I was going to do only 18 months ago. But it was a good deal, so I’m treating it as more of an investment since it instantly added to our net worth.
- Visited a new country with my family (Italy). It ended up being the best vacation any of us had ever taken. We still talk about it and are already planning what country we want to visit next.
- On a less positive note I spent over 150 hours in the air (almost 4 weeks worth of work assuming a 40 hour work week), buried a grandfather, and dealt with a flooded basement.
If you’ve not completed a progress review in awhile (or ever) take some time now to think about the past year. I find it helpful to pull up my calendar and look back at some appointments, trips, etc… to refresh my memory. I can almost guarantee there are some positive nuggets in there that you can use as motivation for the coming year. I’d love to hear what you find.