Looking Back and Planning Ahead

It's January of a new decade, which means many people are sharing #oneword, a yearly theme, top 5 posts/tweets/photos, or resolutions. During the past few years, I jumped on that bandwagon too, but this year, I may be a bit extreme with my themes and goals. 😳Since it's a milestone teaching year for me (30 years as an educator!) perhaps it's appropriate that I'm going a bit overboard for 2020. But hmmm, it's a bit perplexing that my word/theme for the year is clarity. Does that mean I still don't know what I'm doing??

My zig-zag post from January, 2019, alluded to the same feelings of uncertainty though, and since I didn't make much progress there, I hope my focus on clarity will shed a light on what's missing or unclear.

I consider myself pretty introspective, and I believe my inward-looking habit really started during grad school, around 2004. My very first reflection post was as a guest on a blog for new teachers. I shared my 20-year reflections, and re-reading it now, I'm still satisfied with what I learned. (I wonder why the quotation marks and apostrophes are now weird symbols?) Looking back at my reflections from last January, which include ideas from multiple years, it seems like my quotes, ideas, belief statements, and reflections all align...so perhaps I'm a bit more certain than I feel. But I want to know where I can focus my attention and how I can improve my life, home, and work.

By the way, my 2019 #oneword of heart worked really well, but I was about 70% on my 19 for 19 goals. Home improvements, travel, volunteering, and becoming ISTE certified were the wins. On the other hand, I did not complete 12 blog posts last year, I didn't get anywhere close to a month of all activity rings closed, and the bedroom closet is still a mess.

So this year, I've created my own happiness project with monthly themes that all focus on clarity. Self-knowledge is my goal for January, and I have plans to gain clarity on my personal value statements and actions. My future monthly themes include clarity with relationships, work, health, and home. In addition, each day I plan to read, write, walk, drink a lot of water, and record a video or take a picture for the 1-second a day app. These small goals are part of my 20 for 20 goals. To help with these daily habits, I'm going to re-read Gretchen Rubin's Better than Before book, AND I made a Glide app to help me track my habits. (#nerdalert and as I said, a bit extra this year. And did I mention I found a clarity color palette, too?)


And to wrap-up, my 2019 highlights were:

  • work: creating our Digital Learning Radio Step-In podcast series, plus all of my self-work surrounding equity, diversity, and inclusion (which continues!)
  • self: big furniture purchases, traveling to Philadelphia, visiting the Grand Canyon, attending the Krewe of Boo parade in NOLA
  • service: teaching an adult ESL class each week

Looking forward to more clarity in 2020!
Always learning.
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