My writing friend, Amy Weinland Daughters, posted this hilarious spoof on the goals we set and the ones we actually achieve. I acknowledge my recap post will be somewhat like this. It won't really interest my readers (no offense if you skip it). I'm primarily writing it for personal reflection on my year's goals.
Exercise: I do believe tracking helps me stay committed to exercise. I'm not a huge walker. Many people put in 10,000 steps a day. I'm far too sendentary, but don't see that changing any time soon. Still, I try to get my treadmill time (or outdoor walks) in every morning. I exercised on 90% of the days (327/365) this year. My mileage declined when I got a new and more narrow treadmill. It declined further after I fell on that treadmill. Still, I walked over 400 miles and averaged 1.25 miles. As I threw out my 2024-2025 planner, I noted that in 2024 I consistently walked 295 out of 366 days (81% of days) for 472-1/3 miles (ave. 1.6 miles). Of course, that was when I was trying to lose weight for my son's wedding.
Purging: I'm a hoarder. I've always admitted this freely. However, I really had hoped to be more successful in my purging efforts. There are so many negative emotions associated with purging. While I enjoyed going through the minutia of past letters and school files, the actual process of getting rid of many items was draining. My year-end total was 102-2/3 hours. I only worked on purging for 51% [186/365] days. On those days, I averaged 37 minutes/day. It is better than nothing, but still feels like diddly-squat. Now that my husband has reduced the estimated time we have left living in this home, I'm wishing I had been far more diligent. May was a total wash, as was December. February was my most productive month (24 hours of purging in 25/28 days).
Fasting: My goal was to fast every Monday in 2025. I only missed the Monday of the spring break trip and the Monday of our 35th anniversary, but I made up for those dates by fasting on another day in those weeks. At the beginning, I started slowly with partial days (fasting until 2 p.m., then 4 p.m., then 6 p.m., then 8 p.m.). But in February, I aimed for mostly full days. By the end of the year, I had fasted 54 days (21 partial days and 33 full days).
I am not well-suited for fasting. It was difficult in the usual ways, but was also difficult emotionally. It seemed like the full day fasts left me overwhelmed with despair rather than trust. As I poured out my groanings over difficult situations in our family/friends' lives, the focus on the darkness of our tunnel drowned out the consolation of the light God offers. I think, in my clinical depression, I struggle with staying positive and observing the light more than the darkness. I'm a glass half-empty kinda gal.
Struggles with our prodigal, family tensions, the loss of my mother and subsequent new love my father is fixated on, health questions, the state of our world... it gets to be too much. I think I would have done far better if I had spent my fasting time in singing scriptural promises rather than outlining the various weights and burdens we carry. If I had it to do over again (and I'm not planning on this rigorous fasting in 2026), I would have taken more of the approach I used with my 2023 prayer project. I would incorporate scripture, pray for requests but also praise for answers, and spend more time focused on God's enduring attributes than on the encompassing obstacles before us.
Writing: I'm not sure I kept accurate records for correspondence. I mostly charted letters sent by snail mail or from my personal email. By not recording letters sent from my author email, I know these stats are incomplete. In all, I mailed 21 letters or packages (sometimes with my book), and sent 51 personal emails.
The biggest victory was resuming writing projects after a stroke of luck with my first goal in September of just putting in 20 minutes finding markets. I wrote and submitted 2 pieces in September (1 of those was published in a digital magazine). I spent 12 hours writing on 13/30 days in that month. In October, I worked on writing research for 100 minutes. I worked on 2 separate projects on 15/31 days for a total of 11.5 hours (8786 words). In November, I spent an hour on writing research. I participated in the Rabbit Room's Poem-a-Day challenge, completing 20 poems from the 30 prompts. Plus, I started a non-fiction book project, working on 22/30 days for a total of 23-1/3 hours (24,867 words). This was nowhere close to the 50 thousand-plus words of Novembers past, but still an accomplishment. Then, as soon as Thanksgiving hit, I petered out to 1 writing day and 1 day reviewing the non-fiction work to date.
I set out to fast and pray, and to purge hoarded belongings. I suppose I met those goals, but wish I had done far better. If only I had known, at the outset of the year, that my husband hopes to move by fall of 2026. Yikes!
For the coming year, I'm not setting hard and fast goals (quantitative goals). At the end of 2025, I read an outstanding essay on Substack by Suleika Jaouad, called "Against Resolutions." The author argues that rituals are more effective than resolutions. "Where resolutions chase outcomes, rituals attend to process." Resolutions lead to all-or-nothing thinking. Michael Bierut said it is like walking a tightrope, where peril increases with each step, until you become convinced you'll never make it across.
The author ends with this observation, "That's what ritual gives me now. Not a guarantee, not an outcome, not a transformation on a deadline, but a means of staying in motion without hardening, to keep my balance without gripping so tightly... no grand reinvention here--only the patient work of showing up, again and again, nudging myself millimeter by millimeter toward the person I'm becoming."
While I think I've already been focused on ritual, this year I am leaning into 3 words (not an annual word, but a word progression):
WATCH 🠊 WITNESS 🠊 SPREAD
WATCH, as in the sense of expectant anticipation. I want to watch for the return of Christ. I want to watch for God's intervention in our lives (and especially in the life of my prodigal son).
"The end of all things is at hand; be ye therefore sober, and watch unto prayer." - 1 Peter 4:7
"Therefore let us not sleep, as others; but let us watch and be sober." - 1 Thessalonians 5:6
"Continue in prayer, and watch in the same with thanksgiving." - Colossians 4:2
"Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man." - Luke 21:36
WITNESS, as in what you see when you watch. I want to witness God's moving and transforming power.
"Fear ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will shew to you today." - Exodus 14:13
WITNESS, as in give a testimony of the gospel's power transforming my life. I want to seize more opportunities (whatever He gives) to share my faith.
"Shew how great things God hath done unto thee." - Luke 8:39
"And with great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus: and great grace was upon them all." - Acts 4:33
"And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death." - Revelation 12:11
SPREAD, as in disseminate God's Word into the world. I started this year's devotions adding a book by Cheryl Ford, called Triumphs of the Heart: The Pursuit of Joyful Living. In one of the first sections, she considers the watchful heart of Anna in the Bible. From this chapter, I found my verse for 2026:
"But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumphal procession in Christ and through us spreads everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of him." - 2 Corinthians 2:14
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