Goals: Not Just for Soccer Anymore

I love goals. I love planning things -- setting the vision, crafting strategies, breaking a process into pieces. I love thinking about what's possible, the big dreams, and then trying to imagine ways to turn possibilities into facts.

Yeah, and I love New Year's resolutions. Let's face it. The new year is a great excuse for making goals, and not just for people like me with our daily, weekly, monthly and annual goal lists. January 1 is the one time of year when the whole world gets in on the game. Fun times.



That's a snapshot of a week in my planning book. I developed a numbering system for the things I want to accomplish every day, day after day, and use that as a shorthand in my book. Some of these numbered things may seem silly -- for example, one of my daily goals is to clean something in my house for 15 minutes. But I have to put that on the list because if I don't, I might not ever get up from my desk. I tend to get sort of stuck here. Wrapped up in my work. One of the challenges of working at home is balancing the whole life/work thing -- you never leave the office, you know. It's always here. My goals have to reflect the ways I struggle for balance.

And then there's my project wall.
























Each white card is a manuscript which I've acquired. Again, because I'm a bit of a freak, I've developed a notation system to help me track where each manuscript is in the development and production process. The best ones are upside down with an X through them, because those are the ones I'm done with. They're not out of production yet, so they can't come off the wall, but I can more or less ignore them.

The delightful Miss Seven loves my office -- what little girl wouldn't love a room filled with colored note cards and pencil sharpeners and scissors? Two of the notes on my project wall were placed there by her when she was playing office with me. One reads, "everyone loves you well ... and people also like you very much." The other reads, "Hi TT, I (heart) you and I know other people do to." I think those notes will probably stay on the project wall forever. Just cuz. Y'know.

So, now that you've had a glimpse into my ordinary world of lists and planners and notation systems, maybe my decision to make some knitting goals for 2009 will seem more understandable. I'm a driven person, and knitting is where I usually let all that drop. I just forget it all and make my stitches, one after the other in soothing rhythms, confident that eventually I'll wind up with a garment. No deadlines. No obligations. No plans or goals.

Yeah.

So that's how I came to have project bags hanging off every doorknob, and I'm up to my ears in stash. Because I didn't worry about when I would knit different things, or where I would put the yarn. I just figured I'd get to it eventually, right?

That's not a system that works particularly well for someone like me.

So I'm crafting knitting goals for 2009. I have a rough draft of them posted on the sidebar of my blog. Still pondering them, and some of those goals may change between now and January 1, but they're starting to take shape nicely. I'll be focusing more on garments and less on socks. Finishing what's already been started, knitting what's already been bought.

What about you? Any knitting resolutions for the new year?