Checking in on My 2018 New Year's Resolutions
I’ve never really been one for New Year’s Resolutions. As someone with ADHD (and the executive function struggles that come with it), goal setting has always been a challenge for me. I either:
- Get overzealous, set a ridiculously high goal for myself, and abandon it within a week,
- Set a vague goal and immediately forget about it, or
- Don’t set a goal at all.
As such, after breaking every New Year’s Resolution I’ve ever set before February 1st, I kind of gave up on them altogether. Besides, why wait until the first of the year to change your life? It’s a pretty arbitrary date anyway.
My attitude changed a bit this year, though. I started bullet journaling halfway through 2017, and it’s become a great way for me to visualize everything I want and need to do on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis. My bullet journal is full of lists: lists of movies to see, lists of things I need to do for the day, grocery lists, you name it. So what was one more list of things to accomplish in 2018?
Any expert in goal-setting would tell you that I went about this all wrong. Most of my resolutions are pretty vague and I only really checked in with my list once or twice during the year. But I didn’t want some huge, unattainable goal like “Get elected to the US Senate” or “Release a #1 single” hanging over my head all year. I just wanted to set some intentions for the things I already planned to do in 2018, and for the most part, I think I acted with those intentions in mind.
So how did I do? Well, you be the judge.
Buy a corset and wear it...somewhere.
Thanks to Instagram (and more specifically The Lingerie Addict), I’ve become much more interested in fashionable underthings. I never really saw the point in fancy underwear before - if no one’s going to see it, why bother? But something shifted in the last few years, and more often than not I’m dressing for myself. I want to wear things that make me feel good and sexy and all the things you’re supposed to feel as a Real Adult Woman. For some reason, at the top of this year, this meant wearing a corset out in public.
Buying a corset proved unnecessary, as I was able to dig the corset I wore as Prostitute #1 in my high school’s production of Les Miserables out of my parents’ basement. By some miracle it still fits after 10 years. Despite this revelation I haven’t quite mastered the “underwear as outerwear” concept, nor have I had an appropriate occasion to. Maybe I’m not quite there yet. But when I get there, at least I have something nice to wear.
Give a kickass performance at Harmony Classic.
My chorus, Sirens of Gotham, qualified for Sweet Adelines International’s Harmony Classic contest for the first time this year. When I wrote this list, we were in the throws of preparing our four song package for the contest in October, while simultaneously preparing for our annual Regional Contest and searching for a new director. Needless to say, it was a lot. All I really wanted to do was give the best performance I could in St. Louis. I wanted us to put something on stage that we could be proud of, no matter what score we received.
Reader, we won the whole thing.
Compete at Regionals with The Leftovertones.
In 2017, I started my first barbershop quartet, with some of my fellow (or former) baritones from my chorus. We had always planned on competing, but as I learned in those first few months, quartets are hard work. Still, we stuck it out and crossed the Regional stage in May, giving a great debut performance. And while I’m taking some time off from quarteting for the time being, it was an amazing first quartet experience.
Also our outfits were dope as hell.
Kick ass in Digital Marketing class.
In an effort to boost my career and learn a new skill, I signed up for General Assembly’s Digital Marketing certificate course late last year. I don’t really know what I meant by “kick ass” when I wrote these resolutions, since the class was graded on a pass/fail basis, but I finished it, put together a pretty solid final presentation, and got a little more clarity on what I want my career to look like. Most importantly, I realized that I definitely want to go back to school for a graduate degree. I’ve already signed up for a GRE prep course in 2019, so I’m on my way.
Get more career clarity by networking.
One important thing I learned in my digital marketing class is that your objectives should be specific and measurable. This goal is neither of those things. While I did attend several networking and career development events throughout the year (TEDxBroadway! BroadwayCon Industry Day!), I didn’t really push myself to go out on as many coffee dates or pick as many brains as Early 2018 Charlotte would have liked. And that’s okay! I still talked to a lot of people, did a lot of research on my own, and have a better idea of where I’d like to be than I did when I wrote this goal.
Publish two pieces a month, either on my blog or another site.
In 2017, I decided to put some more energy into my freelance writing and started pitching sites I admired, to moderate success. I wanted to keep that momentum up by pitching more and just putting more of my writing out there at the start of 2018, and for the most part, I did that. I published at least one piece 8 out of the 12 months of 2018, and at least worked on things to be published during the off months. It’s still a bit difficult to keep a prolific output when you’re working full time, have a very time-consuming hobby, and, you know, want to see your friends occasionally. But I think I put some good stuff out there this year (which you can read on my website) and I’m ready to write more in 2019.
See all the Best Musical Tony nominees.
This was...not my best year, Tony-wise. I only managed to get to two of the four nominees (The Band’s Visit and SpongeBob SquarePants), thanks to my busy schedule. Here’s to making more time (and budgeting more money) for theatre in 2019.
See all the Best Picture Oscar nominees.
Five out of nine ain’t bad? Do my repeat viewings of Call Me By Your Name count for something?
Read 20 books.
For the first time since signing up for Goodreads in 2011, I actually finished my annual reading challenge! Twenty may seem low for some people, but this doesn’t count the numerous plays I read for work. I’m reading constantly, and this year I just decided to make more time for books. Of the twenty, I highly recommend The Pisces by Melissa Broder. It was a big year for human-fish romances.
Go on at least one friend date a week.
When you’re single, it’s so easy to get so wrapped up in the dating scene that you neglect your platonic friends. At the end of 2017, I could feel that happening, so I decided to dedicate more time in the New Year to my friendships by making plans with a friend at least once a week. For the most part, I stuck with it; looking back on my calendar, the few weeks I had without friend dates were when I was sick or out of town. As a result, I’m feeling much more confident in my friendships and feel like I finally have a good network of people I can call in New York and elsewhere. Being a part of the barbershop community is definitely a boost, but even outside of that I feel like my friendships are stronger than ever.
Finish a draft of The Angels of Tulsa.
I first started working on The Angels of Tulsa in my Playwriting Workshop junior year of college. It’s a comedy about three wholesome Christian teenage girls who just happen to perform exorcisms with their pastor in their spare time. I only got about halfway through it in the workshop, and then quickly had to move on to other projects. I’ve returned to the script dozens of times since graduating, but I hadn’t sat down and really tried to finish it in earnest. With the help of my writing group, I did just that this year AND submitted it to the Austin Film Festival’s Playwriting Competition. I didn’t expect much from AFF, but in September (on my birthday, no less), I learned that it had made the Second Round! The comments I received were super encouraging, and I know I can do more with this play. So here’s to an even tighter version in 2019.
Launch a podcast maybe?
Hahahahahahahahahahaha.
Overall, I’d give myself a solid B on these resolutions, which is A-OK with me. It’s not worth beating myself up over missing half the Oscar nominated films - after all, I had things to do. I’m going into 2019 feeling more confident and more like a Capital A Adult, and that feels very good. Of course, I haven’t started writing any resolutions or goals for next year, and I’m honestly not sure I will. But I’m going to keep growing and doing cool things, all while attempting to get to bed at a reasonable hour. Here’s to more sleep in 2019.