Goals (Summer 2018 Edition)

originally shared here on

Back in 2011 when I started this blog, I wrote a post that outlined some short and long-term goals that I had for myself.

I came across that post while re-doing this blog, and I thought that establishing some new goals was a worthwhile task.

For the past few years, I've been using an analogy for setting goals that I like to call "the swimmer's approach", which I came up with while watching triathletes swim during a race.

When you're swimming a fairly long distance, there are times where you need to put your head down and swim hard, and there are times where you need to lift your head out of the water and make a plan to head in a certain direction.

The key here is to combine both as efficiently as possible. If you're just heads down swimming hard all the time, you'll likely start veering off course considerably. Conversely, if you are spending all your time looking off into the distance, you'll never get there.

So today, I'm focusing on getting some new goals. Here's what I've got:

Short Term Goals (by August 15)

  • Completely unplug for a week and enjoy time with my wife
  • Take Charlee to a place she's never been before (like a new splash pad or the science museum)
  • Come up with a sales strategy around our long-term support plan for JMG
  • Finish the Siri integration with my weight tracking app
  • Watch 3 movies on my Plex server
  • Walk around the block without crutches (0.5 miles)
  • Write another blog post for this site

Medium Term Goals (by December 31)

  • Set a budget for marketing at JMG and launch a campaign
  • Close a large sale
  • Merge Rob's project management app (Triangle) with my sales and marketing app (Gil) and give it an awful name (like Trian-Gil)
  • Get the average subscriber count for Constant Variables up to 100 per episode
  • Get version 1.1 of mncraft.beer released
  • Watch 30 movies on my Plex server
  • Go for a 1 mile run
  • Brew my first batch of beer

Long Term Goals (by July 1, 2023)

  • Run another marathon
  • Build up a 6 month emergency fund for the JMG
  • Move to Wisconsin
  • Have an event with one of our businesses
  • Have another kid
  • Finish watching all the movies on my Plex server (currently, I'm at 600+)

Now, it's time to start swimming.