2017 is in the books. Good or bad, it's gone and now it's time to focus on 2018 and beyond. A verse that I have tried to model my life after for the past few years is Luke 2:52 - "And Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man." This verse gives us a solid four pronged foundation to begin to look for ways to build or increase ourselves just as Christ did. We can follow His pattern and set goals to increase ourselves in wisdom (intellectually), stature (physically), and also with both God (spiritually) and man (relationally).
Intellectual
My intellectual goals have focused on my professional career. While I'm still uncertain as to what all I will pursue in 2018, I have come a long way in accomplishing many of the goals I've had previously. I love where I am in my career, where I work, and what I believe I may have the potential to do there. But I also want to have a major impact on the people around me and my community now and possibly more in the future. I pray that God's plan becomes more clear over the next few weeks as Brittnee and I move forward in our life the way He desires. No matter exactly what I do, know that whatever it is, you'll be getting my best!
Physical
My physical goals have shifted greatly over the years. I went from going through the motions of fitness and getting soft and gaining weight, to cleaning up my diet, to setting some extremely high fitness goals. My eating has at times been better, but also lacked the willpower at others to turn down foods I knew I didn't need. I have been forced to back off some of my more ambitious (borderline dreaming) goals. I wanted to break a 20 minute 5k which is hard at 180+ pounds. I wanted to become more competitive and potentially elite in OCR racing but the time, money, and travel that takes is more than my life can handle right now. I have recently changed to a style of training that I previously thought was crazy - more total body workouts. I have attempted to take a ton of different workout strategies and blend them to what I need and want right now.
My current goal is to hopefully drop a few pounds of fat but overall is to maintain my current body weight and strength ratios while building a solid cardio based. Lifting super heavy just asks for injury and time is an issue for me so I have an intense semi-total body routine that I try to get in each morning. An abbreviated version of that plan is below:
Monday/Wednesday/Friday
- Supersets for chest, back, legs, and shoulders, abs
- I'm currently doing alternating light/heavy sets for a total of 4 per exercise
Tuesday/Thursday
- Supersets for triceps, biceps, forearms, and calves
- Same style as the other lifts
Monday and Friday are speed work for running. Tuesday and Thursday are either tempo or long runs depending on the schedule. I could probably write an entire post of fitness lol.
Spiritually
For the first time in I don't know how long, I have not purchased a new devotional book for the year. I know that any other goal I have will be useless if I don't grow spiritually so here's the game plan there...for now anyway.
Since agreeing to help teach and grow a young adult Sunday school class at church, I have been challenged greatly to study that material plus read all the other stuff I try to read. So I thought why do that? Focus on what you must get in and then add in the extras as you can. Each morning now, I will begin by reading the full passage for our weekly Sunday school lesson from God's word. I believe this will help me more as many devotionals focus on a verse or two and I think reading more of the Bible can only benefit me spiritually. Then I plan to spend 15-20 minutes reading the commentary and study questions with each lesson. This morning quiet time is the one time of day that rarely gets interrupted. That's why I have chosen it for my most important time growing with God. I still plan to read a devotional at lunch and/or in the evening but there are so many interruptions then that I cannot allow my best study time to get bumped out.
Find your best time to get quiet and alone with God, be it 5 minutes or an hour. Find a small group to do life with, be it a Sunday school class, bible study group, or whatever. Find a church to worship with. The spiritual walk of a Christian was never designed to be done alone, you need someone walking with you! Which leads to the next point.
Relationally
As I've looked at myself over the past year and assessed strengths and weaknesses, I was somewhat surprised and somewhat brutally honest with Britt when I told her that my weakness is that I don't do enough with friends to have fun. I have forced myself to go to bed so early to be up for quiet time and workouts, turned down lunch invites to work or study, and spent time doing other worthwhile things, that I have neglected time to just relax and have fun with friends and family. Yes, I've had vacations and some good times but I haven't made people a priority. I have spent a lot of the past few years investing in myself, which I do believe is important. But now, I plan to do more in 2018 to share the good things and good times with others. I want us to be more intentional about going out friends, having friends over, heck just talking to people and embracing this tricky thing called life together.
Basically, I've been blessed to get my life on a good track over the past few years and want to strengthen the things I've been doing instead of making some wild resolution for the new year. I love my career and want to excel in it by using what I learn in the banking industry to help others. I love working out and staying in shape and want to find the right balance between fitness and family. I love God and want to learn as much as I can about His word and be prepared to share its content with others while living my life in His will. And I have some amazing people in my life that I haven't spent enough time and made enough memories with. So here's to 2018 and all the challenges and opportunities that it contains!
Intellectual
My intellectual goals have focused on my professional career. While I'm still uncertain as to what all I will pursue in 2018, I have come a long way in accomplishing many of the goals I've had previously. I love where I am in my career, where I work, and what I believe I may have the potential to do there. But I also want to have a major impact on the people around me and my community now and possibly more in the future. I pray that God's plan becomes more clear over the next few weeks as Brittnee and I move forward in our life the way He desires. No matter exactly what I do, know that whatever it is, you'll be getting my best!
Physical
My physical goals have shifted greatly over the years. I went from going through the motions of fitness and getting soft and gaining weight, to cleaning up my diet, to setting some extremely high fitness goals. My eating has at times been better, but also lacked the willpower at others to turn down foods I knew I didn't need. I have been forced to back off some of my more ambitious (borderline dreaming) goals. I wanted to break a 20 minute 5k which is hard at 180+ pounds. I wanted to become more competitive and potentially elite in OCR racing but the time, money, and travel that takes is more than my life can handle right now. I have recently changed to a style of training that I previously thought was crazy - more total body workouts. I have attempted to take a ton of different workout strategies and blend them to what I need and want right now.
My current goal is to hopefully drop a few pounds of fat but overall is to maintain my current body weight and strength ratios while building a solid cardio based. Lifting super heavy just asks for injury and time is an issue for me so I have an intense semi-total body routine that I try to get in each morning. An abbreviated version of that plan is below:
Monday/Wednesday/Friday
- Supersets for chest, back, legs, and shoulders, abs
- I'm currently doing alternating light/heavy sets for a total of 4 per exercise
Tuesday/Thursday
- Supersets for triceps, biceps, forearms, and calves
- Same style as the other lifts
Monday and Friday are speed work for running. Tuesday and Thursday are either tempo or long runs depending on the schedule. I could probably write an entire post of fitness lol.
Spiritually
For the first time in I don't know how long, I have not purchased a new devotional book for the year. I know that any other goal I have will be useless if I don't grow spiritually so here's the game plan there...for now anyway.
Since agreeing to help teach and grow a young adult Sunday school class at church, I have been challenged greatly to study that material plus read all the other stuff I try to read. So I thought why do that? Focus on what you must get in and then add in the extras as you can. Each morning now, I will begin by reading the full passage for our weekly Sunday school lesson from God's word. I believe this will help me more as many devotionals focus on a verse or two and I think reading more of the Bible can only benefit me spiritually. Then I plan to spend 15-20 minutes reading the commentary and study questions with each lesson. This morning quiet time is the one time of day that rarely gets interrupted. That's why I have chosen it for my most important time growing with God. I still plan to read a devotional at lunch and/or in the evening but there are so many interruptions then that I cannot allow my best study time to get bumped out.
Find your best time to get quiet and alone with God, be it 5 minutes or an hour. Find a small group to do life with, be it a Sunday school class, bible study group, or whatever. Find a church to worship with. The spiritual walk of a Christian was never designed to be done alone, you need someone walking with you! Which leads to the next point.
Relationally
As I've looked at myself over the past year and assessed strengths and weaknesses, I was somewhat surprised and somewhat brutally honest with Britt when I told her that my weakness is that I don't do enough with friends to have fun. I have forced myself to go to bed so early to be up for quiet time and workouts, turned down lunch invites to work or study, and spent time doing other worthwhile things, that I have neglected time to just relax and have fun with friends and family. Yes, I've had vacations and some good times but I haven't made people a priority. I have spent a lot of the past few years investing in myself, which I do believe is important. But now, I plan to do more in 2018 to share the good things and good times with others. I want us to be more intentional about going out friends, having friends over, heck just talking to people and embracing this tricky thing called life together.
Basically, I've been blessed to get my life on a good track over the past few years and want to strengthen the things I've been doing instead of making some wild resolution for the new year. I love my career and want to excel in it by using what I learn in the banking industry to help others. I love working out and staying in shape and want to find the right balance between fitness and family. I love God and want to learn as much as I can about His word and be prepared to share its content with others while living my life in His will. And I have some amazing people in my life that I haven't spent enough time and made enough memories with. So here's to 2018 and all the challenges and opportunities that it contains!
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