2018 Goals: Doing my thing
I like to think I approach everything I do with a passion. Whether it be my goals, work, my family, my lifting, whatever it may be, I give it all I got. Is it perfect? Nah, but I don’t do shit that’s not worth doing for one reason or another.
This past year
These were my goals for 2017. Notice, I’m not worried about resolutuions. I’m not going to wait for some arbitrary date to roll around to change something I’m doing or start doing something new. If I’m going to do it, I’ll just do it.
Flying - I did lots more traveling, which means more flying. I’m finding that the actually flying I’m ok with, but I still have anxiety ahead of time, I don’t know what that’s all about, but maybe I’ll fix that this year too. I traveled a lot for work, but also had a great time traveling for fun, like a wedding in Paris, France which was totally awesome!
Learning - I’ve gotten better with Elm, learned some Elixir and I’m currently knee deep in brushing up my Haskell. I even learned some more R and brushed up on my Postgres/PostGIS skills. I hadn’t used PostGIS in a while and wanted to keep it fresh.
Blogging/Writing - 2017 also marked the release of my second published book, Introducing ArcGIS API 4 for JavaScript. This was originally a self-published book, but I was approached by APress to pick it up. The main reason for this was so that I could get affordable print copies out there. I had been asked about print copies in the past, but I had trouble finding a way to make that affordable. I’m not blogging as much as I would like and that just boils down to time. But this site is my main blog.
Videos - I’ve been doing more Youtube videos this past year, so expect that ramp up in 2018. I actually did one month where I did a video a day. Not easy, but a great learning experience. I also released a couple of video courses via Packt, Using ArcGIS Online and Building JSAPI Apps.
Health - I was pretty steady for the first 6 months of the year in the gym 3-4 times a week. Progress was ok, but around the 6 month mark I wanted to see if I could go to the gym every day. So I started going every day. I’ve pretty much gone every day since. Except for days they’re closed or when I travel, but even when traveling, I was hitting the shitty hotel gyms. I’m doing more of a powerlifting style, a conjugate system wtih 2 heavy days, 2 speed days, and accessory rest of the days. I feel great, my lifts are up and I’m digging the volume.
2018 and shit
Blogging
This blog isn’t going anywhere. I’ll keep writing, even if you don’t keep reading. I’ve had people hit me up about blog posts I totally forgot about thanking me for something, so I’m glad people find it useful. I’m considering a marathon like I did with the Youtube videos where I do one month of Quick Tips daily. That could be fun!
Writing
Writing a book is hard. Maybe I’ll do another one this year, but want to try some other smaller things first. I am going to be doing a FREE chapter for the Introducing ArcGIS API 4 for JavaScript book that will cover some newer features that come out after the book was published. I have some ideas for some smaller ebooks too, mostly free stuff.
Videos
I enjoy making Youtube videos. I’ll be making more. I don’t really have a quiet spot to record at home, so my recording time is limited to when I can find some quiet time. But I’ll take any suggestions for topics people want to see, maybe a mini-series of videos! Maybe I’ll do a Udemy course on something, you never know.
Health
I’m going to keep pushing and pulling as much weight as I can in 2018. I’m not going to be making progress like I did in my 20s, but I can still put some of the young guys to shame in the rack, so I have no plans to change this up for now.
Misc
I want to get better at some other programming languages. I’ll keep learning more and more JavaScript and TypeScript, that’s a continual process. But I want to really bring my Haskell game up, learn more Idris. I started on some Rust shit earlier this year and really liked it, so that could be on my list for 2018. I’ve got some Postgres learning material I haven’t finished yet, so that’s definitely on my TODO list.
All in all, I’m going to keep working at getting better in everything I do. I haven’t been using all my tools at my disposal as much as I used to. I use Evernote all the time, but I used to use Trello a lot, and I’m a fan for using it as a task manager and Kanbanflow to help estimate and schedule my tasks.
I’ve got some other ideas for projects to work on in 2018, but I need to finish up some prequisites first. I’ve also been dabbling in my some non-geo projects to see how useful they are, but that might be a post for another day or another blog.
As usual, you can sign up for my newsletter to keep up to date with my latest projects and posts!
Thanks and keep kicking ass!