I haven’t created a life plan in a few years. I used to do this pretty consistently, but when COVID hit it felt like a lot of stress to think about the future. I still had personal goals I’d work toward, but nothing overly planned out. This year, I want to get back into the habit.
My new year's resolutions for 2023:
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Brand: Create a personal website, publish a newsletter every 2 weeks, blog weekly, and network with 50 fintech operators
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Read: Read one classic book per week
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Fitness: Do something active every day, do 40,000 push ups
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Health: Never eat after 8pm, drink tea daily, sleep 8 hours
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Finance: Buy a rental property, add one income stream
Personal brand
Last year, I started investing in my personal brand. My goal was to start building a reputation for myself as a subject matter expert in payments. I wrote >50 articles for Lithic’s blog and started a newsletter which has gained 1100 subscribers.
I want to double down on that this year by creating a personal website, publishing my newsletter more consistently (every two weeks), blogging weekly (about anything, just to form a habit), and networking with 50 fintech operators.
Reading list
I decided to make my own version of Lex Fridman's reading list. I've adapted it a bit and added a few of my own. To help with my writing habit, I’m going to brain dump my thoughts about the book I read that week in the notes section of my blog.
Fitness
During 2020, I gained a ton of weight. Maybe it was the stress, my eating habits, drinking wine on the weekends, or a mix of all three. But I hated myself so I decided to get back into shape. So far I’ve lost about 27lbs and I’m almost at my goal weight.
This year I want to try to squeeze a little fitness everywhere I go by doing something active every day and doing 40,000 push ups (like 110 per day). I had thought about doing a challenge with my Peloton, but then I sprained my ankle and had to pivot to push ups.
Health
I read a Twitter thread about ways to lose weight with healthy habits and it included a lot of obvious tips that I already knew, but I had totally been slacking on since becoming a dad. This year, I want to stop eating by 8pm every night, drink tea daily, and sleep at least 8 hours per day. I’m going to give myself grace on this one because consistent is better than perfect.
Finances
For the last few years, I’ve had my finances on autopilot. Two times a month, my paycheck got funneled into different accounts for expenses, savings, and investments. But the economy has changed a lot over the past year (i.e. food prices are up, stock returns are down, etc.), so I’m re-evaluating how I approach our household finances.
I’m redoing my budget, increasing our emergency fund, and looking into diversifying my income with a rental property and an additional income stream. I don’t know what either are going to look like right now but I’m going to start talking to a realtor and maybe experiment with monetizing my newsletter in the future. TBD, not sure if that’s the right move but I definitely want to make at least $5000 extra this year to dip my toes into the “passive” income arena.