I spend more time than I care to admit absently minded flipping through social media liking quotes that just make me want to stand up and clap.. or dance… or say YASSSSSSSS! Neil Gaiman is behind a good deal of these quotes.

The other week- my childhood best friend sent me this quote and I was allllllllllll YASSSSSSSS! I love this quote. It’s such a positive way of looking at the new year. It’s goals, but they are not super specific and they are SO nice and empowering!

(Related: A couple of days after my friend sent me this- she shared a memory on FB where I sent her the exact same quote 4 years ago. Crazy, right?)

I’ve been thinking about goals/resolutions for 2018- some like get healthy- are pretty much always on my list. But other things- like increase my Instagram following are def new.

 

So, I’m breaking it all down for 2018:

 

Personal:

1. Continuing to be involved and making time for my nieces. I love my nieces (just in case you can’t tell from my blog posts and Instagram) and I def want to continue making time for them in 2018.

 

2. Love. I have really been on the fence about including this in my actual written out for the world to see resolutions. I am single. I am pretty happy and content with my life, but I would be lying if I said that I didn’t want to one day meet someone. Not because my life sucks without a man. Not because I feel like you have to be involved with someone to have a life. But because I feel like I want to share my life with someone one day.

 

3. Getting healthy. I have changed some things over the past couple of years- I rarely drink soda, I eat out a lot less than I used to, I wear a crap ton of sunscreen, and I try to be active in some way every day. This year, I’d like to start eating more fruit (grapes, oranges and blueberries) & incorporating some weight training in my day.

 

4. Doing what makes my heart sing for a living. Many of you know that I love books, love social media and love to blog. While I’m not exactly sure which way to go to combine my love for all this exactly- I would love to spend more time figuring out a way to incorporate what makes my heart sing with being able to make a living.

 

Bookish Goals:

1. Reading 75 books in 2018. 75 is a lot less than I normally read. However, I decided that setting a goal at something that was reachable, yet still provided a bit of a challenge was better for me. It gives me freedom to spend days playing with my nieces. To take care and love on my kitty cats. To spend days swimming at the pool. To have time to THINK about the books.

 

2. Listening to more audio books. I’m picky about my audio books. But I want to try to find some more to listen to.

 

3. Supporting libraries. I have 2 libraries near me. One is in my hometown with a librarian that really gives librarians a bad name. The other library is better, but still not my fave. However, I’m needing to start using libraries more as I don’t get every book I want to read for review and my shelves are getting a bit full- ok a lot full.

 

4. Reading books from my own shelves. Everyone I know has books on their own shelves they haven’t read. While I don’t know the number- I’m going to be happy if I can read 10 this year from my own shelf.

 

Blogging/Social Media:

1. Getting my Instagram followers up. Over past few months, I have really begun to enjoy Instagram more and I would like to increase my following to 600 by end of 2018. I am at almost 450 followers now- so I’m hoping that is doable.

 

2. Getting back to Twitter basics. I LOVED Twitter so hard for many years. Even when other bloggers were complaining about Twitter, I was still loving it. The past year, though, Twitter has become less of my happy place. Partly because Instagram is all shiny to me, but also because of other things. But I’m ready to get back to basics- tweeting, sharing pictures, and having fun.

 

3. Completing some courses I have signed up for. I have signed up for some paid/unpaid courses and I need to finish them.

 

4. Working on Pinterest. Over the summer, I had my first taste at a pin of mine going viral ( please note: viral for me. For others, 1.5k re-pins is probably a slow day) I would love to re-create that magic! Also getting more effective at scheduling out content and doing some live pinning!

 

5. Getting my blog all shined up. I want to have content scheduled for 3 -4 weeks at a time consistently, to have an editorial calendar that is easy to keep up with, and to have graphics that are eye-catching.

 

6. To find (and nurture) my tribe. A few years ago, I made the mistake of trusting some bloggers. These bloggers acted all nice to me at first and then started showing their true sides. It took a long time to disentangle myself from them and I’ll be honest- because of how they acted- sometimes I find myself being almost hesitant at times to reach out to others, to join in things. I’ve been lucky that through some trial and error, I have found small tribes in my various sections of social media and bloggers that I can trust. But I would like to add more people to my tribe- or maybe break my tribe down in sub-sections (Instagram tribes, Pinterest tribes, etc) I also want them to know that I support them like crazy!

 

*What are your goals/dreams for 2018?*

 

Happy Reading and Bookishly Yours,

T @ Traveling With T