Hai Beautiful!

Let’s Plan!

I’ve made it no secret on here that I absolutely love to plan! I will plan anything out, from physically listing out my daily tasks down to the half-hour or even making sure I at least know a rough sequence of events for a holiday, I find comfort in having a plan.

So when it comes to making goals, why do I always struggle?

It truly took me so long to make this post (as you may be able to tell since I haven’t posted properly on here in weeks). I’ve been so mentally run down and just in such a chaotic headspace that I had been trying to take each day as it came let along trying to figure out where I was even headed in the future.

It eventually came to a point where I just couldn’t take each day as it came. I needed to know where I was heading or I would become lost. Lost in the chaos of my own mind and I most certainly wasn’t going to let that happen to myself.

So, I pulled my camera out and filmed a video. I sat down and forced my brain to come up with three goals. Three easy and simple to achieve goals that I could dedicate my time towards this year. I had three (can you see a theme here?) very simple criteria for creating these goals. I’ve detailed them below.

1. The goal has to be something I have started working towards that I have not yet achieved.
This means that I can’t be adding anything new just for the sake of setting a goal. Since 2020 was such an unpredictable and chaotic year with all choices and freedoms taken from us in the name of safety, I have to expect the same from 2021 and must make my goals according to this assumption. Keeping them realistic and within my own control.

2. Will not add any extra stress/ work to my already hectic schedule.
Some of my already existing weekly tasks include: a full-time job (5 days), training (2x weekly), seeing my boyfriend on the weekend, climbing (1x weekly), as well as my blogging and youtube commitments plus sleep and any extra creative activities.
I can’t be making goals that are going to add to this already hectic weekly schedule; plus I want to keep the stress-induced meltdowns to a minimum.

3. The goals have to relate to the overall growth and progression of this blog, my shop and my overall creativity.
I have personal growth goals, career growth goals and now I have goals that will help me grow creatively. Goals can be set for different purposes, namely to better yourself in a certain area and that is exactly why I want to narrow these set of goals to only my creative side.

Breaking up goals into themes reduces the pressure put on yourself to achieve more than you can handle. Therefore reducing stress and returning back to my second point.

Now, with some guidelines fresh in my head, I started to write out the three things I wanted to achieve before the end of 2021 and the best way to do so.

Goal 1: Draft blog posts more often.

Simple? Not for me and my brain that just refuses to do anything that doesn’t involve staring mindlessly at a YouTube video for several hours, even if the task at hand is due in that moment.

So to combat this really horrible case of procrastination and what I’ve effectively called ‘The TikTok Compilation Binge’, I am planning to set at least half an hour of my time aside each day to add to a blog post in any way possible.

Goal 2: Create and add more content to my shop.

I have this dream to make bookmarks and sell them on my blog, and to tell you the truth, I am soooooo close to doing it!

My first bookmark will be Helena-themed due to the high demand from the one I made Claire L. Smith. I will post the listing to my shop which you can find by clicking on the Shop tab in the menu bar or by going to jasperandspice.com/shop.

If you have any ideas or requests for bookmarks that you’d like to see me create (keep in mind I create bookmarks by hand and with paper as a medium), drop them in the comments of this post and I’ll have a crack at it!

Goal 3: Have a creative journal session at least once a week.

When I say I love journaling videos on YouTube, I mean that I love journaling videos on YouTube and literally use them to set the mode for myself when I get in a creative space.

I would love to show my journaling sessions and creations in a video like the talented creators I watch but for the time being I just want to create. Much like anything else I want to do, it is currently scheduled in my calendar, just not at the best time… My schedule still needs some tweaking.

Well, there you have it! My three highly realistic creative goals that I am determined to stick to in 2021. Here’s to hoping that you see updates on these throughout the year.