With the roller coaster of 2024 and its ups, downs, twists, and turns, I’m not sure how good of an idea it is to make predictions for another year. But here I am. A new year, and it’s pretty much tradition at this point that I outline a set of goals for myself on the first day of our lonely little planet’s next revolution around its star.

Despite all the downturns in 2024, I still managed to hit most of my goals. I suppose merely having something written down and sharing it with the world keeps me moving forward, a shining beacon in the distance that I know I can reach if I just continue charging toward it.

And that’s probably what I truly need for 2025—to build upon the life that I’ve pieced together for myself with sweat, grit, and little duct tape, not letting the foundation crumble.

Without further ado, I’ll just jump into my goals for the year, forever etching them into annals of the interweb.

Love or Something Like It

Oh, a new category for 2025!

Last year, I finally took that bold leap into online dating. I have thoughts—lots of thoughts about this wild and weird industry. But I’ll save most of those for another day. I’ve already met my first scammers and been ghosted. I’ve also made a good friend (we were not compatible beyond that).

Apparently being a 40-year-old guy with a real job and no baby-mama drama is a pretty desirable trait in the online dating world. It probably helps if you’re not a complete asshole either. Who knew?

I also have someone who I like, and I hope it turns into something wonderful. We’ll see how it goes.

Pinning down a specific goal here will be tough. For me, the long-term vision is to find my partner to spend the rest of my life with. But I know that doesn’t happen overnight. So let’s just say that my goal is to simply continue striving to be the best version of myself and searching for that person who wants to grow with me.

Health and Fitness

I accomplished most of my goals in 2024, but I’m still not 100% where I want to be. I’ve put in the early work to live a healthier life, building a foundation. So it’s all about the long game now.

• Drop down to ~185 lbs. and maintain it (I was 200 in October 2024). I feel like this will be a good maintenance weight at my age (40) and height (6’2).
• Keep all my numbers in check.
• Continue my daily walks of at least 30 minutes.
• Build an exercise routine for even better health and shape up some of this flabbiness.
• Eat even more vegetables.
• Feel great about my body.

Reading

I have officially set my Goodreads annual reading challenge to 35 books for 2025. It feels like a solid number for me. It’s not so easy that I can slack off and finish but not so hard that it feels like an overwhelming task.

And, of course, I will hit my seventh anniversary of reading every day this year. Can’t end the streak now.

I have already kicked off 2025 with Mistborn: Secret History. I look forward to finishing Era 2 of Mistborn, restarting The Wheel of Time series, and much more. My TBR is already around 30 books, so I have lots to catch up on.

Creative Pursuits

In 2024, I didn’t set out any specific goals. I just left it up in the air, saying I would do something. Let’s change that for 2025 and start with a single baby step: I will finish my painting of Twinkle, my youngest cat that I lost in 2023. Nothing insurmountable but gives me a direction to take.

Learning Spanish

Today, I will hit my 381st straight day of Spanish lessons on the Duolingo app. It’s going fairly well, but I need to kick this up a notch for the new year. I’m shooting for two specific goals this year:

• Keep the Duolingo streak alive for another year.
• Read at least one book in Spanish.

Personal Finance

I felt like I’ve been fairly successful in this area in the past year, but many of the goals were “safe” and not a real challenge. Sure, those are important, and I’ll continue doing them. But I also need to make it tougher on myself. New goals for 2025:

• Max out my 401K and HSA (of course).
• Make an extra principle payment on the house each month.
• Save up for a kitchen remodel.
• Double monthly investments in my personal brokerage account.
• Save for an additional three months of emergency funds.
• Stretch goal: hit half a million in net worth.

Garden and Food Forest

Once again, I’m late in planning the garden and food forest for the year. Mostly, I feel like I’ve been going through the motions, but it’s also been winter time. Not much to be excited about at the moment.

As usual, I have been saving for additional fruit/nut trees and bushes. I’ll have $600 set aside for new plants come time to plant. This year, the primary focus will be on finding trees that are a bit rarer because I already have most of the common fruit trees. So I have my work cut out for me in terms of research.

For the garden, the usual: tomatoes, peas, and greens. Again, I haven’t really planned well. The big thing for me is just having fun with it and growing something. It’s great exercise and cheaper, healthier food.

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Previous years: 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2013, 2009, 2008