Five for Eleven: My Goals for 2011

Its mid-January, meaning it’s time for one of my only guarantees with this blog journal– my goals for the upcoming year. 

How exciting! Every year, rather than pick a New Year’s Resolution I pick five goals I want to work on. But first there’s always the crappy feeling of going back over my prior year’s goals and seeing how awful I did. Here is a review of my 2010 Goals with a grade on how I did.

2010 Goals:

Giving Everyone a Break from Me!

GRADE: C.

We still had our New Year’s Eve Casino Night, though we had our lowest number of attendees and raised our least amount of money – ever.

We still had Team Force but overall participation was way, way down. We had our lowest number of Team Force members (12) and only five people stayed overnight.

We still had fundraisers, and successful ones (see Highlight No. 8 on my top 10 moments of 2010), but they were mostly put on by Stephanie, Lis, Erik, my Mom and myself.

Overall there were fewer Johnsonville parties, fewer family get together’s, and fewer game nights. We did have Randy & Nayheli’s wedding, but isn’t it a must to attend a wedding?

Though participation was down, I still organized basketball, organized Team Force, organized Randy’s bachelor party, organized Lis’ party and organized holiday gatherings and still I heard grumblings that I was asking too much of the family to get together on a regular basis. Will I learn this year?

Exercise! Exercise! Exercise!

GRADE: F.

I played basketball from January to April. I’m officially removing this from my list of goals as every year it’s the one goal I never, ever accomplish. The End.

Write a Book!

GRADE: D.

I wrote an outline for my book about Lisy’s Battle with Leukemia. I wrote about two chapters of the book. I stopped. This is something I hope to accomplish in the near future. If it’s not about Lis then maybe stories of hope. I just gave a speech at the Relay for Life Kickoff and had two people come up and tell me their story. I think I can do this!

Teach Lukas to Catch

GRADE: C.

It’s just not in him. I’m thinking maybe Baby Brother will be the athlete. Ahh, who am I kidding? This family doesn’t grow athletes. I played sports but I never succeeded. Randy was the lone “athlete” playing a few minutes of varsity basketball. Lis’ dad played semi-professional soccer but doesn’t everyone in Brazil play semi-pro soccer? Anyway, Lukas will start Little League in the upcoming months. He can hit well, and we’ve limited the bat throwing after he KO’d a mom who thought it was wise to sit behind a bunch of 5-year-olds during practice, but he still needs to learn how to catch.

Celebrate Lis’ Five-Year Anniversary!

GRADE: A+.

I struggled for the first eight months of the year on if I should do a party. She said she didn’t want a party. I didn’t want to try and organize everything and then have a couple of people show up. I didn’t know if I should get a venue or just do something small. After Randy’s wedding I thought nobody would come out for a party, just months later. Then in conversation with someone from my church whose daughter is battling cancer I mentioned Lis’ fifth-year of remission and he said, “We’ll be right there celebrating alongside of you.” It was then I thought, “I really need to do this.”

The fifth-year is a huge milestone for any cancer survivor. I wouldn’t feel good if we just let it pass like it was just another birthday.

And to my surprise the party went off without a hitch (see Highlight No. 1 from my top 10 of ’10). We had 80 of our closest family and friends show up at our church. Lis was completely surprised and even cried! She doesn’t do that. In fact I think I saw her cry once, okay make it twice, the six months she was fighting cancer. Her family sent a video message from Brazil that was heart-warming (and subtitled in English by our good buddy Shandy). Stephanie, Erik, Mom, Karen and Harry did a great job of getting it all organized while I was trying to hold up the surprise. It was awesome!

2011 Goals:

I tried to not repeat goals from past year’s as if I failed to do it once why try to fail again, right? Here are five goals for 2011. The first three I have had in my head for months now. The last two came in the last couple of days. One after I embarrassed myself at a get together at my house a couple days back. The last after a client was upset with us and asked me to call him back after I figure out what I’m trying to sell him.

Increase Church Involvement

We’ve done well these last couple of years. We ended last year with an impressive streak attending church for about 3-4 straight months without taking a day off. We continue to participate in church activities and this past year I started doing the scripture reading and offering. Lis and I are also in the process of becoming church members so overall we go into 2011 on a roll. Still I feel there is more for me to accomplish, and my Pastor agrees. I don’t know what it is. I would like to work with the youth. For some reason they all enjoy me and think of me as the “fun guy” at church. Geez, I should just get out before they really get to know me. Pastor said that he’s got a list of ways that I can use my so-called talents or gifts.  Hopefully he knows, or maybe I should say He know, what they might be as I don’t have a clue and hopefully by this time next year I’ll have some of it figured out.

Find My Inner Handyman

Sure Erik and my Dad are the handymen of the family. Sure Lis does most of the hammering and nailing around here – well I do some nailing, after all she is pregnant…Hey Oh! – but I’d like to use what small portion of manhood I still have to figure out how to be a handyman of sorts. I would like to redo my garage (add insulation and drywall) and make my own little “Man Cave” or office. I need to fix the fan in our bathroom and there are other little projects around the house that I’m sure Lis has a mental notepad full of that I can accomplish. Will I be able to get off my butt in 2011 and do some work around the house? Be strong Kevin, be strong!

Get Snipped

I’m not looking forward to this but the time has come for me to get snipped – and it needs to happen soon. We had talked about me having this procedure for a couple of years now and well…we’re expecting our surprising third child in April so let’s just say that we didn’t talk about it too seriously. But now it’s time for me to have the first operation of my life and end our run at three. I like three…my favorite number.

Clear Out the Negative

I struggle with this. I feel like half of my brain is full of negativity. I get upset easily. I get frustrated easily. I get down easily. I let little things that people do or say bother me. I can be cynical or a critic of people and their views on life. I think it’s time to make baby steps and get these things out of my life. I don’t know what those little things are but hopefully throughout this year I’ll find a way to clear out those things or at least don’t let them bother me too much. It’s kind of a vague description of my goal but if you notice me no longer commenting on your Facebook status updates then take it personal. Oops…still working on it!

Become an Insurance Person

I know you’re all asking, “Wait, aren’t you already an insurance person?” Yes, when people ask the dreaded question of “What do you do for a living?” my answer is the dismal, “I’m an insurance agent.” It reminds me of a line from one of my favorite movies “Grosse Pointe Blank” when Martin Blank, a professional killer, says “I don’t think what a person does for a living necessarily reflects who he is.” I agree. I feel like when I tell people I’m an insurance agent they’re going to assume that I’m boring and that I’m looking for a sell. I preferred answering the “What do you do?” question better when I was a part-time journalist. That always seemed to peak people’s interests. But insurance, who likes an insurance agent?

Still, as much as I may not like it, this is becoming my career and it’s time for me to like it. It’s time for me to actually put some focus into work. It’s time for me to make it my career. It’s time for me to know and believe in what I’m talking about, what I’m attempting to sell. I know it sounds silly but I’ve always just worked my 9-5 (8-5, 9-6…whatever) and left work without thinking much about insurance. I know, “Why would you?” But there are so many little ins and outs of every policy that I don’t know about and often I’m stumped feeling like someone that doesn’t know what I’m doing. And I’ve convinced myself that I don’t know what I’m doing.

Other than fantasy football and baseball drafts I’ve never studied for anything. Actually that’s wrong. After I had failed the insurance test twice and finally re-took the class three years later I studied. And surprise, I passed it on the first try the second time. Imagine that. I think it’s time to start studying the policies. As boring as it sounds it might make me feel like a better person, employee and instill more confidence in myself and work.

My so-called career got a jumpstart on the first day of 2011 when the small agency I was working for merged with a bigger agency, which was bought out by the third largest independent agent in the country. The office has a front-desk person, a personal lines department of five and a separate commercial lines department. We have meetings in rooms with almost sound proof glass. After working in back-to-back “mom and pop” offices it’s a nice change of scenery. Plus I only have to do personal lines!

Other than the 1 hour, 25 minute commute to and from work (that’s about 3 hours a day if you’re counting at home) this new agency seems to bring a lot of opportunity. Not let’s see if I can take advantage of this opportunity.

There you have it five highly attainable goals right? Well check back in 11 months and I’ll tell you how I did.

Past Goals: 2010; 2009; 2008; 2007.

Advertisement