Hey, did you have some coffee yet? Let’s go - I wanted to quickly update you on the 3 goals I set this year, and maybe hear about how your goals are going as well.

We should motivate each other and keep the momentum going by speaking about them each quarter - you in?

Here’s the original post, but I’ve just copy-pasted the goals below as well.

1. Health Goal: Red

Plan: Get back to Vitality Diamond Status

The original goal - do all our health checks for the year, and enough physical activity to earn the highest level. It’s not really about the status, but the active, healthy lifestyle. Build a solid morning routine of running and gym, then stack on other habits/routines on top of these.

Results after 3 months: Not good. Inconsistent results and routine.

Q1 has not been good. Here are some perfectly good excuses I have prepared for this review:

1. Jan - It’s post Dec lethargy. We go large in South Africa - Ke Dezemba Boss!

2. Jan - It’s my son’s birthday - need to plan a party.

3. Feb - Valentines + wedding anniversary. Happy wife, happy life.

4. March - Can I just take a break? I’m tired from Dec, Jan and Feb.

Anyway, is 1 April a bad day to commit to start exercising for the year?

To be brutally honest, I’m still figuring this one out. My work responsibilities and commute have changed. The gym workouts are adhoc, and the morning 730am jog is not 100% consistently done.

The poor performance here is noted.

Let’s check in again on progress after Q2…

2. Finance Goal: Green

Plan: Spring clean and redo budget to align to project goals

The original goal - We have many exciting projects on our wishlist. Travel to new places, fix up the house, spruce up the garden, etc etc. But, funds are limited. So we need to prioritize our top goals, and then align finances accordingly, dusting out cobwebs like those Kidloland and Amazon Prime Video subscriptions…

Results after 3 months: Some strong interventions and solid progress.

Muhammad Ali said “float like a butterfly, sting like a bee”. I’m not sure if it’s the perfect analogy here, but it kind of describes the 2 interventions very nicely I think.

I must say, one of my weaknesses is managing my finances optimally… This is why I am very proud of the spring cleaning efforts below- it’s a start to building discipline and a new, improved system that meets our family needs.

Float like a butterfly - I cancelled 3 subscriptions amounting to 1% of my monthly salary after tax. While this might seem like a butterfly flitting around the important stuff, it’s exactly small changes like this that will help build more discipline.

Sting like a bee - Sometimes you need need to deliver a knockout punch. I have a goal to eliminate some short-term debt by end of this year. To this end, I decided to go nuclear and sold my car to pump funds into this goal - so far, 40% achieved. The negative impact is minimal, thanks to great WFH policies at both our employers - my car was parked 5 days of the week. We are getting by fine with 1 car, and Uber is great in our area as a stop gap.

3. Spouse Goal: Green

Plan: Block out 5-8pm daily for uninterrupted family time to cook and eat dinner together.

The original goal - Work is intense, and I’m often working during this time. This goal will allow me to spend time more intentionally and improve the quality of our communication and relationship, in the same way our daily work commute helped us in 2019. This will have direct benefits to our son as well, and bring more harmony in the home. I will catch up on work 8-10pm.

Results after 3 months: Improved connection, alignment and happiness.

Before I set this goal:

I would usually be at my laptop when my wife arrived home from work.

Busy on a call, or typing some obviously critically important email.

I hate interrupting a flow state, so my thinking was - quickly greet her, and commit to finishing up within the next 15-30min. This is more efficient than context switching for 30min to family, and then back to work - that email must go out urgently!!

But with all this excitement, hustle and bustle around the house with my wife, son and dog, Aldo etc, it could get annoyingly distracting trying to avoid the context switch and finish up properly.

Especially when I am soooo close to wrapping up for the day and switching off. Arrggghhh!

This led to some additional tension at this time of the day - why can’t these people just let me finish my work? Then I’m all yours, guys…

As you can imagine, the above did not usually play out well, and is what led to me setting this goal in the first place. I was missing out on a special time each day and too dim to realize the opportunity cost to my family.

How is it working out so far?

Done or not, my laptop is shut by 5pm. Work can wait 3-4 more hours, unless there is a legitimate critical issue. So, blocking out time to be present is going very well.

On the Cooking and Eating front, I can say the eating part is going very well.

Dhivs is a great cook (her passion), and her Chicken Biryani is legendary in our social circles. In fact we are brainstorming a super low-quantity, high-ticket side hustle around this (DM me if you are in Gauteng and want in on the experience).

When it comes to me cooking though, all her instruction, advice, recipes etc seem to go in one ear and out the other. Similar to the conversations about taking out the trash... After a little berating at my ongoing incompetence we then settle into our usual kitchen routines and chat.

I assist with prep, and listen and engage intentionally during this time. Sometimes I need to chat about something and she will listen. My goal is to catch and respond to every single bid for connection during this window.

We try to hold each other accountable for handling bids and responses.

This routine has definitely seen an increase in the Connection bank balance of the relationship I feel. Happy spouse, happy house.

Friends, the concept of turning towards instead of away from bids for connection was a relationship game-changer for me.

There’s more great advice here in Steven Bartlett’s Diary of a CEO podcast with Dr John and Julie Gottman.

Both are clinical psychologists who have been studying couples for over 40 years, publishing over 200 academic journal articles and 46 books. No better people to take relationship advice from…

A bonus takeaway - for your personal and professional relationships from the video - Be Influenceable: “The only way to be powerful in a relationship is to accept influence. Be flexible. Be movable.”

In Summary

2 of 3 goals are going well - so not a bad 2024 so far in terms of personal goals.

The health goal seems to be more of a scheduling issue than anything else. Although my general weight and health is good, Vitality Diamond status requires all the relevant workout and assessment boxes to by ticked. I’m working on that, and expect to have a solid routine/schedule by the Q2 update.

Spouse and Finance goals are on track - need to maintain and continue to improve for the rest of the year.

Although I did discuss adding some metrics relating to Muhammad Khan’s personametry idea (See this post), there are some other massive goals I am chasing with the Scary Management Company.

So I’m parking it for now, and measure these goals mostly qualitatively, with a few (private) key metrics.

Next week, I’ll announce a new 90 day challenge on LinkedIn. Again leveraging the same mechanism I used to deliver the Playbook last year on 1 Nov.

The building of the Scary Management products in public is continuing and I’m really glad to have you on this journey with me for support and encouragement 🙏 

Thanks for coming along for the chat, friend - Enjoy your Easter Monday and let’s catch up next month for another coffee ☕️ 

PS: How are your goals for the year going? I’m very keen to find out and maybe chat a bit about it. Send me a reply via email or comment on the article itself.