2021 Goals: Midyear Checkpoint

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Speaker 1: Hi. This is Laura Vandercamp. I'm a mother of five, an author, journalist, and speaker. And this is Sarah Hart Hunger. I'm a mother of three, a practicing physician and blogger. On the side, we are two working parents who love our careers and our families. Welcome to best of both worlds. Here we talk about how real women manage work, family, and time for fun, from figuring out childcare to mapping out long term career goals. We want you to get the most out of life. Welcome to best of both worlds. This is Laura. This is episode two hundred and three, which is first airing in late June of twenty twenty one, which is the end of the second quarter, or possibly the beginning of the third quintile in Sarah's system. We're reasonably into the third quintile, though, aren't we. I define the third quintile is the entire time that the kids are off from school during the summer, So yes, we are well into it by now, although I guess it's regional depends on where you live. Yeah. Yeah, we have just finished school as this is airing. My school goes till seventeenth, eighteenth of June. We don't start until I think it's like September eighth this year, so it's just well, because there's Labor Day, we never start before Labor Day. And then Rashashana is right after Labor Day this year, and so we have those days off as well. So I mean, it's a long way in before we start in September. But anyway, sad to think of September when it's only June. Now we're going to be doing a mid year goal check in, so excited about that. But before we talk about that, I want you to go listen to another podcast, Best Slide Plans. I know a lot of people also listen to Sarah's other podcasts, Bestlaid Plans, and recently there was a special guest which was, oh, yes, we decided to do a well. I decided to do a Planner of Matchmaking, and I felt like Laura was the obvious first victim since she has been using a spiral note book for her quote unquote planner for quite some time, and I thought she might enjoy thinking about an upgrade. So it is a fun episode. I give her several options to choose from. We will have to update in the future. As to what she's actually using, because that is yet TBD as we are recording this, but it was really really fun. So if you want to listen to Laura on Bestilaid Plans, it is the June thirteenth episode and we can try to link it up if we remember. Yeah, yeah, So Sarah recommended four excellent planners for me, and so you'll just have to stay tuned to find out what I wind up choosing and using and turning myself into a well planned person as a result. But speaking of plans, we're going to talk about our twenty twenty one goals and how they're going and how any modifications we are making, or maybe we forgot what our goals were for twenty twenty one and we started fresh. But anyway, Sarah, what are your when you do your goal process, especially when you're doing a midyear check in, like what are you actually doing? What are you making lists of? So I wanted to go back and actually at my yearly goals, like what had I decided to do in twenty twenty one, knowing that by the time the sayers, half of the year sadly is over, and so I want to see if it's realistic and kind of where I am in terms of reaching those and if anything needs to be tweaked. I'm not really looking to add a bunch of things because really, like you know, you made a yearly goals list. Of course I'm going to add things to the month or whatever things comes up, but that's not really my purpose of like when I do like a mid year review. So primarily I went back to those lists, and I think, partially inspired by you, I kind of divide my goals up into two sub areas of my life. I have a family list, a blog and podcast lists, a real work list, and a personal list, so we can decide how we want to do it. But I can go through basically things that are like already accomplished, things that I maybe don't even want to do anymore, and then a couple of things I've decided to try to add in as unexpected things came up. Well, let's talk about what you've done, what has gotten checked off in the first half of twenty twenty one. Yeah, so, as you predicted, potty training Genevieve was a nice make check. There are no more diapers in the younger household. Well, that's for DEA's all right for day exactly one nightly diaper is used, but I can. I can hang with that for a while. I do not care. So yeah, that wasn't as hard as I maybe thought. I did accomplish having mommy days with each kid. I did that in March so that during their respective spring breaks they had different spring breaks, so instead of doing everything as a family, I did dedicate three days to one each kid mommying. So that was good. What else did I have checked off here? Well, my habits. I've been kind of consistent with those, like my headspace and duel lingo most days, and going outside most days and reading, So I just put checks next to that because I don't see those things changing. I was able to check off a better organization process for our podcasts. I just feel like I now have like a good like active spreadsheets going. I have a good, easy way where I store all my questions. They're not just stuck in my email inbox. I don't know why it took four years to figure that out, but I did, and I did. I was able to check off going to a virtual meeting. I wanted to go to one meeting this year, although in retrospect. I hate virtual meetings. I mean, like it's not it's you mean a conference, not Sarah's in like six meetings a day. No, I went to a virtual multi day conference. But the problem was, well, number one, I personally found it really hard, if not impossible, to decide to dedicate a weekend to that while I'm home, and it happened to be over one of Josh's call weekends. So the question was, like, do I hire childcare all day long so I can watch videos that are like technically being recorded any way that I could watch later. So no. So of course, now it's been like a month and a half since and I've watched like maybe twenty percent of this conference, and it's just like the whole part of the point of the conference is like blocking off time where you're out of the workplace and out of your family place to focus on the content of the conference and network with the people there, and like basically none of that was achieved with this virtual conference. So I don't think I'm going to have that as something I want to do often unless there's some compelling reason anymore. But I guess I can check it off. You did it well, now you know I mean, and sometimes these things are about figuring out what isn't really worth it and knowing and then you release the mental space of it. Do you have a duo lingo streak going? I have to ask no, No, I've told you I don't like streaks. I had one for a while and then I like, sometimes I don't like to do it. I don't always do it on weekends. I'm going to guess that I've done it. I don't know two hundred of the last two hundred and forty eight, you know what I mean. Like, so I'm pretty good with it, and I will end up building streaks because sometimes I'll do it like twenty thirty days in a row, but then I let it laps and I'm like comfortable with that. Same with headspace. I never have streeks. So I have a little streak story here. My daughter was doing duo lingo and had a streak of one hundred and seventy five days. Perhaps there's a little bit of a genetic interest in streaks there, But she had arranged a streak freezer thought she had for a particular day, and we had bad Wi Fi where we were and when we were traveling recently and it didn't go through or something, and so then when she opened it the next time, her streak was at zero, and she, oh my god, it was so tragic. I mean, she was balling and I felt so so bad about the whole thing. But now she's just angry. She so she went from balling to unhappy and to angry. And now she has told me she's on a duo lingo strike, not a duo lingo streak, it is a dual lingo strike, and she will have nothing more to do with the app. So this is the downside of streaks for those of us who are upholders. If we then lose the streak through something we didn't intend to, it can really be a thing. This is why I don't like streak. Yes, yeh, I felt really bad in that situation to oh, well, I guess it. We live, and we learn, We'll find some other way to practice Spanish. Sorry all right, but is too funny. There's so much psychology there. I mean, like, did you learn any less Spanish if you practice three hundred and sixty four days three hundred and sixty five And I know they have streak freezes anyway, So then it's like then it becomes really dicey, because like, if you set up a streak freeze and you didn't practice, you don't you didn't really have a streak. I mean, I'm sorry you didn't. You just set up a streak freeze on a game. That's true, there were there were no streak freezes in my running streak. I will point that out. Yes, because real streaks don't have freezes. I'm not even saying real streaks are great, but like the duo lingo streaks are are questionable. Yes, all right, well then it's her strike, all right. So those are the things you've done. Is there anything you've decided you don't want to do anymore that you've you know, removed from the rest of your year or of your goals as you're pairing these down, Yes, I would say yes. So one it is that I wrote time block plan on there. I don't really feel like I need to change the way I do my I think I'm really efficient and like it's not like textbook time block planning, but what I do is sort of a version of that, and I just I don't feel the need to like formally change it. So I'm just going to not care about that, and then oh, I pivoted with my fitness. So I was doing the another mother runner thing, but I honestly felt like I was just getting slower and slower and it was annoying me. So I just to switch to like a more speed focused running program. And I'm doing like the Daniel No not yeah, Daniel's running formula like red Plan or something. My husband he is like a he like ran, you know quickly, like like he's went one races and stuff, and so he's like, if you actually want to get faster, this is what you should look at. So I was like, oh, and it actually I feel like it. It does work a little bit. And I also was thinking I might do like the add obsession again, and instead I discovered the Peloton workouts, which not the biking I have. No, I just don't want to spend, but I do like their strength work and their bar and their yoga and they're greats and you can get those without having the equipment, right correct, you know, it's an app that costs basically the same as Beach Buddy did. It was like and I canceled that one. So it's like twelve dollars a month for full access to everything. It's it's really nice. I like it. And what are you doing to get faster in terms of the running up? Yeah, So the current phase I'm in, it's like there's like different parts of it. There's four workouts a week. Two of them have like built in speed work, and I set my garments. What really disciplines me, Like if I'm going too slow during the speed sections, It'll start saying too slow, too wow, and like the current and it repeats, so I'm able to see if I'm making progress. And I was like really excited because yesterday my workout was three miles at tempo. So you do like ten minute warm up, then you try to run a mile with your watch yailing at you, and then you get a minute to like break, like take a walk of recover, and then you do another mile a minute walk recover, then cool down. And when I first started the program, I looked back at my garment and I like, wasn't able to meet the target, And yesterday I was. It was hard, but I was able to meet the tar. So it's nice to actually see like some progress. The target is not that I'm still like very slow compared to like my version of in shape, but I don't care. I'm like happy. That sounds great. Well, let's take a quick ad break and we'll be right back to hear more about Sarah's goals. Well, we're back doing our mid year goal check in. Sarah just said that she is getting faster meeting her tempo speed run goals with her new program. Anything else that's that's been changed in the course of the year, No, those are the main changing ones, you know. I put on there that I the quintessential goal that I always am like, nevermind is like, oh, I'm going to throw together an ebook and I don't know, I still don't know. It's okay. If you don't want to do anything, you don't have to do any I know it was going to be like the best laid plans, like Highlight one. So I set the bar really low. I was just going to be like, let me just like look at the show notes and basically put together or like some stuff. So listen, if somebody wants to write that form now, I'm totally kidding. I don't know, We'll see. I'm not entirely convinced that I will do that. Well, you could hire a virtual US think about it for a set number of hours and have that person kind of pull it together, and then you'd go in and edit it a ghost written e book, maybe just throwing it out there. It's true, it's possible. Well, we will see, we will see. But otherwise, pretty much everything that I wanted to do is either in progress or I still want to do it, And this looks fairly manageable. I actually think. I was like, I kept it till like four or five things in each category, which I guess adds up to a lot. But the categories do feel pretty separate, so I think, and then what's coming up in the rest of the year that you're still looking forward to? So it's mostly stuff that just needs to be finished. Oh well, I want to hear what I'm not looking forward to. If we still haven't finished our estate planning. Still, it's so boring. I just I anytime. I mean, my husband was like, maybe we can do it on our time away, but then wo would you want to know? No? No, no, So we didn't. But then if we're not doing it, then then when are we anyway, So that should at some point, but we should, We totally should. And it's half done. And it's like half paid for whatever. One of my things was to try to do like a date weekend every quarter, so that's like in progress. We well, it's not really in progress, so I don't think we did anything with the first quarter, but I will count what we just did as the second quintile, and I'm going to try to do it for the rest of the year. And then my newsletter goal that's kind of a fun one. My goal was twenty five hundred subscribers by the end of the year, and I think I was at seventeen hundred at like December, and I'm at like twenty one twenty three, so I feel like that's kind of like in target. Yeah, anyone listening to this, go subscribe now, let's get her up over twenty five hundred. It's or at least don't unsubscribe. She sends a nice monthly update on her life, new things that she's excited about, and he check ins, and I think that's just a fun extra Sarah blogging. But that is the secret blog. Yes, maybe I need to reveal some more secrets and tease them. We'll see, we'll see. And that's pretty much. I mean, I have some work projects, I don't need to talk about the details, but they're like in progress. They're cooking, and I feel like they're on track. And oh, family playdates I wanted to do like outdoor playdates, pandemic friendly playdates with multiple families. And I think we've done too if I really think about it. So I just want to do one more and then I will have met that goal. Yeah sounds good. Well, so far our successful year. I just hoping that the rest will be too. So the way I did this is just a lot of my stuff is ongoing. There are several big things that need to be accomplished this year. Professionally, my main goal is writing Tranquility by Tuesday. That is my next book, which will be about probably the back to school sort of August September twenty twenty two, so stay tuned for that. My writing plan. I did the research over the course of the year. I did a pilot project in the fall and then the bigger project in the spring. Had many people follow these nine time management rules, talk about how they worked in their lives, you know, rate give themselves a time satisfaction score before and after. You know, see the difference. It's exciting, is self help helpful, Let's hope. Anyway, I've got all my results, and so now I am writing the book, and I've set myself a timeline over the summer. Each week I do one chapter, not for the weeks where I'm on vacation or have limited childcare, so it's a steady but manageable chunk through the summer. And on the weeks when I'm writing, I try to do most of the draft Monday or Tuesday, or if it's a shorter week, you know, Tuesday Wednesday, and then edit on the other days. And that tends to be pretty sustainable for me. I can crank out, you know, a five thousand word chapter draft in a week fairly easily. So you know, do nine chapters plus an intro and a conclusion that way, and I'll have a book by late August. So far, so good. I mean, as I'm recording this, I've only done the intro in chapter one. But I have in fact done the intro in chapter one, so I feel like this should work. I mean, things can always go wrong, but it's not my first rodeo, so I do feel if I can stick with this schedule, and I should be able to stick with the schedule, I will have something at the end of the summer. Just good. I'm super excited for this one because it seems like it's more It's like, it's like, I love all your time focused stuff, but the fact that there's like a research component to it, I think is like adding another dimension. So in a way, it's probably like already more done than some of your other works where you had to like come up with it. This is more like, Okay, I've I've actually discovered some stuff, like how do I like describe it and communicate it? But yeah, it's gonna be awesome. Yeah. No, it reminds me of I know how she does it that way that that's true. I was doing research a lot of timelog analysis, but then once I had that, it was, you know, put in. Writing the book itself was fairly straightforward. It was it was collecting the data that was more the big part of it. And it's also helpful because I feel more relaxed in a writing schedule like this because I know that there is a time for future chapters, so I'm not feeling like, oh, I'm behind, I should be writing chapter six or something. I think, No, No, I know when I'm going to be writing chapter six and that's not now, so I don't need to worry about that. Like I know, if I stick to this schedule, I will finish in time. I have extra space at the end, so I don't have to I really like the idea of sustainable pacing, which is that you set a minimum bar, like I do need to write a chapter a week, but I don't need to write more than a chapter a week. And I think what happens is a lot of long term projects is people overshoot at the beginning and then get burned out or can't keep going, or something else makes them fall behind. It's harder to show break up. You are so much better at doing measurable steady progress, not going over what you can sustainably do, but never going under a certain amount either. So that's in progress. My main personal goal is to finish the house, which is also in progress. Everything is ripped up right now, it's really something looking in there, and then sell this current house and move in the course of the rest of the year. So that's you know, another one that's just big and going to happen, but very big, you know, moving on with that. But then I wanted to add a new goal, which I don't think I mentioned as much earlier, but asking more from my kids. And this had started to come up because you know, we had a childcare change recently. We had also gotten weekend childcare again, and then that person I knew it was a limited time thing. She was trying to get a different sort of professional job and so she was not going to be available and so that ended too. And now that we have the dog, like the housework has increased. I mean it's just the dirt comes in, I don't know what it and things need to be picked up because he'll chew it if they're on the floor. So anyway, long story short, there are needs of things to do, and the question is will do I hire more help for these things or can I distribute some of this to the other members of my household who are old enough to be shouldering more of it. And so, I mean, I have a fourteen year old and eleven year old who's almost twelve, a nine year old who's almost ten. Those are ages where you can start doing some of those things. So like I'm obviously not going to leave the fourteen year old with the baby all day on a weekend or anything like that. But could he watch his six year old little brother for an hour? Yes, he can do that. You know, could the kids sweep the kitchen floor where the dirt has gotten tracked in from the backyard. Yes, and they should be doing that instead of mommy doing that. And then you know, I don't necessarily need to hire more of the cleaning service coming in to do it, or have a babysitter for small spots of time on the weekend. So that's the goal. Wish me luck because it's always, you know, a matter of continuing to ask for what you need. And I don't think our guests. kJ del Antoni, Sorry I always say your name wrong. But kJ talked about in her book How to Be a Happier Parent that there's a difference between getting your kids to do chores and getting the kids to do chores without being asked. And a lot of people think that, oh, I should be aiming for the second one, like they should be doing the chores without being asked, which may never happen, and then you'll just be resentful because the stuff isn't getting done because you think you shouldn't have to ask. But if you just ask, it will probably get done. And so if you can decide that that's not as good, and that's fine, But if you want the work done, you can also just decide that I'm going to keep asking and that's what's going to happen. So I'm kind of sticking with that and wish me luck on getting this all done. There was actually a recent Mom hour episode How to find Out that was a lot about this, a lot about how we like underestimate what our kids are capable of, and how summer tends to kind of like be a time when it sneaks up on us that like, hey, our kids are a year older, and in some cases, because the last couple of years were so weird, they felt like they just missed like they were thinking they still little kids, and they like didn't do you know what I'm saying, Like that it kind of snuck up on them in a way, and that you know, our bigger kids are capable of probably a lot more than we think they are. Yeah, so there we go. Well, we'll be working on that goal for the rest of the year, probably for the rest of the time I have children in this house. But we always love doing our goals. We'd love to hear about your goals. If you're achieving big things this year, things that you thought you would that are checked off, great things that you've added to the list, or things that you you know are no longer interested in. Those there are all great things. Feel for you to reach out to us and let us know. So now our question, Sarah, why don't you read this one? Sure, she writes, she thought we might be interested in this very planning scheduling centric question. She writes. My company is allowing summer flex hours this year. I can choose to flex a half day every other week on a consistent weekday for the months of June, July, and August by working four nine hour days in advance of the flex. This cannot be used during holiday weeks or weeks where I'll be using PTO, and I do have a few long weekends planned. I was initially thinking about doing this and using it every Monday morning. Every other Monday morning, I could start the week off with a long run or bike ride and make headway on my reading project for the year or in peace. I like the idea of flexing a morning instead of an afternoon, as mornings tend to be slow and meeting free to begin with, I could easily get through my work in an afternoon and my backup person wouldn't need to do much. I might be the overthinking the logistics of this and was hoping you could weigh in. If this policy was working for ten hour days with one full day off per week, it would be a no brainer for me, or even for nine hour days with half hour of flex day every week. But this is every other week half day with quite a few exclusions, she said, I'm looking at the calendar and thinking this is requiring a lot of coordination and planning for what will probably amount to like three free Monday mornings. Also, I have six weeks of PTO each year and I've only used four days so far, so I have plenty of time I could just schedule off without needing to coordinate longer days prior would it be totally crazy to keep with my regular schedule? Am I overthinking this? What do you think? Yes? I think this doesn't apply to you because you have all this PTO to use that it would make sense to just use that first before committing yourself to this uber structured like longer day thing during your summer. Now, one thing I think we should both give you credit for is I love how you thought about how you would use it. Like the idea that you're going to like schedule these nice fun mornings for yourself and read into a bike ride. You can keep that, but instead of plunging it into this structure stag just schedule a PTO day. You could schedule one every week and not make a DNT in your six weeks with PTO for the summer. Yeah, especially if you already have some of the stuff scheduled. And yeah, don't take half a day. I'm Monday, take the whole Monday. And if you were only going to be getting three of them, like take those three Mondays as PTO and like throw two others in there too. That's five days of PTO. If she's got thirty of PTO, Like, you're not going to use all of that by the end of the year if you're not careful. So definitely, yeah, don't overthink this. I mean I want to give a shout out to this company that is at least thinking of trying to do this. Now many kinds of work, it's like what on earth, Like you could just you know, take a half day off and make up the time later, like things are flexible anyway, particular people who've been you know, working from home over the pandemic. I assume that this is a very structured like somebody has to be in this chair dealing with certain things, like because she's got a backup if she's not there. So it's in this case it is a set like hourly in a place kind of job. And so her company is thinking, well, how could we be flexible given that our workers are hourly in a chair doing a certain thing that needs a backup if someone isn't there, And this is a great idea, like saying, okay, well you could choose you know, half days off and do longer days than others instead of saying it has to be five eight hour days each time. So shout out to them for trying. But yes, in her case, she should just take the PTO. Yes, I feel like they're trying to make summer fridays, but in like a bed in like an overwrought way. But yes, I guess you're right. They get a little credit because they could do nothing they could do next, but they're trying. So love of the week. So readers of my blog well know. I went on a shorts rampage slash tangent trying to decide if I can still wear like dune them cutoffs. And I decided, and my readers validated that, especially in the land of South Florida and probably in some other regions. Why the hell not? Somebody wrote, I think the cutoff age is late sixties, so I have plenty of time. And I I ordered the egg old loose fit denim shorts that I read about on I believe, I don't even know anymore some fashion blog. I'm sorry that I don't remember which. And they're great. I really like if I wore mom on vacations, and I am wearing them with my like birkenstocks that I bought that are basically the same shoes I had in the mid nineties, And so I honestly feel like my outfit is something I probably would have worn as a teen, and I don't. It's fine, that's fine, why not? And the nineties are back, The nineties are back. Who we live through them the first time? We'll celebrate them again. Yeah, I have not been so successful on finding shorts that like. I just do not like the way I look in shorts. So maybe I should just admit this and wear skirts or jeans for the summer, but I keep tryings are hot, yeah, but skirts are good. Yeah, skirts would probably be good, but you know, you can't really wear skirts to an amusement park, and so then it's like, you know that kind of activity. I don't know, a skirt. You could wear an athletic skirt that might be really cute. Maybe, I don't know. It's a long topic of why I never like wave shorts look on me. But I tried ordering some and they've come in the mail, and I really reminded me that I really need to go to stores to try on shorts like this is you're going to have to return everything. Well, this is a good point to shout out Lannie in Linder and her company. She said her business is booming right now, so that's I'm not saying to necessarily use her as a consultant. It sounds like she's got lots of people working with her. But she said she's going to have a blog post very soon about shorts alternatives, so maybe that'll be a good thing to look at. Yes, probably what I should be doing. Well. So my love of the week then I'll do something that is clothes as well, but is not really summary my American Giant hoodies. So I heard about American Giant on the Frugal Girl blog. People want to go check out the Frugal Girl. Kristen writes about all her money saving hacks, cheerfully living unless and you know the thing is, so she's very frugal, as one would be with the name the Frugal Girl. And I went and looked at these hoodies and they're one hundred and eighteen dollars. I'm like, huh, So, if the Frugo Girl is willing to pay one hundred and eighteen dollars for a hoodie, it must be really good. And you know what they are. They're really good. They're nice and thick, they are warm, they are sturdy, And so I bought one in black this winter and was wearing it a lot, And so I wound up with a credit for them because they got caught in that whole usps ridiculousness of shipping and so stuff didn't showup what it was supposed to, so I got a credit for them. So I wound up getting a second hoodie that's a nice pink one. That they were doing spring colors. So I'm still wearing them now because it's June and in Pennsylvania it's still cold in the morning or at night in June. Actually that will happen for the entire year, but so you get a lot of use of your hoodies. For those who do not live in South Florida, or maybe you live in South Florida, but you get cold and air conditioning and you're like, what should I wear? You could go get an American Giant hoodie and yes, it is one hundred and eighteen dollars, so you could definitely find a cheaper hoodie. But I think they were really good, So shout out to Kristen for talking about them and forgetting me to get one, and I'm really happy with it. Josh actually has one that I bought him for a birthday gift and I totally got the idea from Kristen as well. There you go, thank you, thank you. All right, well, this has been best of both worlds. We've been doing a midyear goal check in. We will be back next week with more on making work and life fit together. Thanks for listening. You can find me Sarah at the shoebox dot com or at the Underscore shoebox on Instagram, and you can find me Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. This has been the best of both worlds podcasts. Please join us next time for more on making work and life work together