Jay’s August Update

So happy birthday to me! This month I’ve gotten a little older and hopefully a littler wiser. Lets check the progress towards the goals I sat at the beginning of the year.

Goal #1 – Financial – This year we wanted to increase our Net Worth by 10% and with the market being as friendly as it has been, we’re up a CRAZY 32.6% for the year! That’s insane and something that will probably never happen again in our lifetimes; I’m glad we were in the market when that happened!

Goal #1 – Exceeded!

Goal #2 – Health – I have not lost any weight, but I am told I’m skinnier. My belts definitely are snugger. This is going well, I just have a problem with derailing myself with snacks! Getting back into gym should help blast this goal out! On the bicycling front, my goal was to get to 50 miles by Thanksgiving. It looks like I’ll have that goal beaten by 2 months. In the last month I have gone past 20 miles, 30 miles, and 40 miles up to 42 miles in one trip! My Biking Buddy Heath 3-D printed a box and commerative coins to track these milestones. He’s working up to a Century (100 miles in a single trip, way more audacious than I am!), and I’m going with him up to the 50 mile mark!

Outside the Beltway means we rode from inside the Interstate 610 loop in Houston to outside of Beltway 8 (the second loop).

Goal #2 – Ahead of Schedule!

Goal #3 – Yoga – I had started on this and begun working on a decent 15 minute daily regimen of 8 minutes of yoga and 5 minutes of meditation. It was pretty good, then I got super busy and all of the self care is the first thing I cut, when it should be the last thing. I’m going to schedule it in my work calendar, hopefully that will get me back into it.

Goal #3 – Derailed!

Goal #4 – Reading – I absolutely skipped the last book. It was terrible; the kind of thing they need to give to insomniacs who don’t respond to strong drugs. The book is called “Measure What Matters” (by John Doerr) and was so bad I didn’t get past the 3rd chapter before I felt an aneurysm starting. I’m moving to another book that I’ve had on my shelf for years and haven’t read, but have always wanted to. It’s called “Die Empty: Unleash Your Best Work Every Day” by Todd Henry. I had the opportunity to host Mr. Henry at an innovation conference and was very impressed by his talk. I’m looking forward to reading this one.

Goal #4 – Still 70% Completed!

Goal #5 – Spanish – So this is bad; I have failed so miserably that when people rearranged the spanish signs in my house, I can’t fix most of them. That means I didn’t even bother to learn what is in front of me. I’m restarting this one. I’m very not happy with myself about it.

Goal #5 – In free-fall

So there’s my birthday update. I’ve really improved on my health goal, and I’m getting back into my reading goal. Financial goal is great; just Yoga and Spanish. I can work on this though. My health now has a routine (I bike 3 days a week, going to the gym 2), so I can put that on auto-pilot. Our finances are also on a schedule, and thus, auto-pilot. That gives me more time to work on the other 3!

Comments are closed.