Summary
Quarter 2 is over, (as per the Gregorian calendar) and I have been crunching numbers harder than ever. I was very excited (and somewhat anxious) to see where I stand against my goals.
And before we jump in, a bit of background-
I have broken down life into blocks or projects. At the start of 2024, I wanted to focus on the below projects. As life went on, a few projects went on hold, while a few projects pivoted in their goals. This method helps me to know for sure, that I am no longer the same person as I was in 2023.
I have already written about my goals (here) and Q1 review (here) but a brief overview of the projects and their goals I was planning to achieve by the end of 2024, would be okay. Though explaining goals in the middle of the year may be a redundant step, I found out (now) that it is imperative to check if you are on the right track. Startlingly I found that I was not measuring my progress in one project altogether, more on it later.
- Lifeatworks –
- Want to close the tasks planned such as life events, tasks for family, etc. – I track this through a task manager through Notion
- I want to be a good friend, connect with my friends, and share life updates. (for at least 85% of the year)
- Wordsmith –
- Want to be a good writer by publishing posts/stories/experiences on my website- my goal is to publish at least 50 articles this year
- Bookworm –
- Want to read at least 12 books this year, capture learning through detailed notes from the books
- HealthisWealth –
- Maintain the weight to less than 65kg
- Regular exercises and meditation practice(for at least 85% of the year)
- Journaling –
- Capturing life’s events each day by maintaining a daily journal (for at least 95% of the year)
- Entrepreneurship = paused for the year
- Want to bring in robust, foldable, affordable, lifestyle wheelchairs for locomotive disabled persons
I’d like to keep the goals for the career project, private
If you compare the scores of Q1 and Q2, you’d find not much of a change in the scores. For me, Q2 was the toughest quarter ever since I started tracking my habits 2 years ago. I’d even go ahead as far as calling this quarter, a quarter of resurrection.
In May’24, I fell seriously ill. I had to let go of tracking habits for 10 days. Once my health was better, it was hard to get back on the bandwagon with every habit dangling in the red zone as per my weekly review reporting. I was wondering if it would even make sense for me to try to put a lot of effort into habit tracking again. But when I touched my pad for reading, I felt the connection. I knew it would be hard but I decided to give it all in. Since 19th May, I have not missed my single habit even for a day and I am mighty proud of myself for that streak.
Now let’s get into the particulars-
What went well
- No drinks in this quarter
- Average weight in the quarter has reduced to 67.8 compared to 69.2 kg of Q1 average weight
- I have been able to do the exercise 81% of the time, compared to 78% times in Q1
- My waking up consistency has improved to 85%, compared to 78% times in Q1
- Additionally to the below habits, I have been keeping a very up-to-date monthly financial tracking. Each spending and each earning is tracked. I know it is a very tedious and manual process but I am very proud of myself for keeping track of all the $
Ratings – 1 = Red, 2 = Amber and 3 = Green
What can be improved?
- Though my reading consistency is as it was in Q1, the results need improvement. What I mean is, I should have completed 6 books by Q2 but ended up completing the 6th book only 60%. My gap during the time of sickness did slow me down but I will not yet give up on this goal. I do believe that I can complete 12 + books this year.
- Journaling – in Q1, it was only 7 days where I had missed journaling but that ballooned up to 26 days in total in Q2. Meaning, that 19 days I missed to write a journal in Q2. Leaving aside the 10 days, where I was sick, I still missed 9 more days. Though now the consistency is back, I will not have much of a chance to miss journaling this year. I wanted to write for 95% of the days this year. That came to 347 days (leaving 18 days for missing the journaling this year) I have missed already 26 days, and almost a month is gone without writing about the day. I shall not let the ball slip any further in this area.
- Even though without a completely going nuts on my diet, I was happy to see that my weight has reduced a bit over the Q2. However, I can’t be so lucky for every quarter. I must follow a good diet to achieve my target weight this year.
- My writing a blog consistency has improved from Q1 to Q2 but I need to bring in more efficiency to achieve the results for this habit.
- I meant to write 50 articles for rollingtales but I could only manage 17 so far. Currently, the 27th week is going on as I write this. So I have already missed 10 weeks of the year. I have not published a single article in May’24. Shocking!
- My blogging has a process. Draft writing, editing, adding pictures, and then publishing. I may be writing the blog fast ( hence the score improvement) but the other pieces of the process are taking longer time ( hence the drop in the number of articles published on the blog). I need improvement here as well.
Ratings – 1 = Red, 2 = Amber and 3 = Green
- Now, as I mentioned in the above section, yes I am doing really well-documented $ tracking but I don’t have any goals for this practice. I should have a goal of saving x lakhs per year or growing the investments by y%. I need to spend some time to plan for a financial goal for the remainder of the year.
- As I was doing my review, I realized that the project life@ work had 2 parts. One part was closing tasks related to life and the other was being a good friend. For this goal to be achieved, I must call my friends regularly. I had completely missed tracking this part till now. But to make amends, I have added a new habit in my habit app called “call a friend”. Hopefully, I will have better results to show by the end of Q3.
- Weekly reviews- I have missed the weekly reviews for 5 weeks in the quarter. I didn’t get a chance to course correct. As you can see I was in deep red for all 26 weeks of the year but slowly, slowly the scores (captured through the habit app) improved and I am out of the red zone. I aim to be in the green zone by the end of Q3.
Ratings are in %
Memorable moments of the quarter
As I wrap up this quarter’s review, I can’t help but reflect on the top 3 of the awesome moments captured in the quarter.
- Mitul’s first birthday – my son Mitul turned 1 on 26th Jun. I had planned a birthday party for my family members. I was able to plan each task successfully due to the life@works project and its taskmaster. There is nothing left to surprise.
- First ever in-person talk at Persistent Sys company – I have been giving motivational talks for close to 2 years now but all opportunities were always over teams or Webex. On 31st May, I got an opportunity to deliver a talk in person in front of a room packed with people. I enjoyed the experience. I will always cherish how persistent company made my family feel special throughout the day.
- Google Pixel watch 2 – I bought my dream Google Pixel watch. I love the watch and in various ways, I can customize it. It has been very helpful for me to track my health and exercise.
As I close Q2 reviews, I am proud of the progress I made from Q1 to Q2 however with half the year already gone, I need to be more focused than ever. I want to find out that I am very close to my year goals when we meet again for Q3 reflection.