This year's challenges felt far more...well challenging, some of that was from ongoing Covid issues, some of it was from challenges from things that happened to my family that were serious and unexpected and some from work changes. All in all though I'm pleased with what I did achieve and it was a useful structure to follow for the year, but I've got some different plans for 2022!
Here's a quick review!
1 - Complete 21 bike rides outside - erm...I only managed this once!
2 - Donate to charity / recycle 21 bags/boxes/items of stuff - This was better, depending on how strict I am - I definitely did 21 items!
3 - Go to 21 yoga or pilates sessions.- I kinda lost count, but I've checked on garmin and I did 20 sessions of Pilates and 3 of Yoga so achieved!
4 - Write 21 letters or postcards - I didn't do as well with letterwriting and we didn't really manage to go anywhere where postcard writing was feasible, but if I include Christmas cards I sent with notes in then - achieved!
5 - Complete at least 21 crafting sessions - either alone or even better with friends - I only managed 10, but 3 were in person with friends which was nice! Next year I'll buy myself another Craftadvent calender!
6 - 21 blog entries - either weekly summary or topic specific - Not achieved as only managed 6, but I did do lots of other writing!
7 - 21 sessions of mindfulness - Ideally I'd do this everyday, but I'm not great at always remembering, so this is a nice achievable target. - If I count using the headspace app to get to sleep, this was definitely achieved, but I need to do more active mindfulness ideally!
8 - 21 walks in lovely places - So I counted 14, but I think that some of the very long days on our Hadrian's Wall challenge probably count as more than 1 and I didn't count walks around the village with my neighbour and they were in lovely places, but didn't feel as count worthy! My absolutely favourite place was Malham, it was the first time this year that my ongoing headache/low level migraine actually went away for a bit before I started taking Amitrptyline.
9 - Leading/backmarking/coaching at least 21 run club sessions in person or remotely - So I lead/backmarked in person 19 times and developed I think 6 sessions for the summer mile training programme, so I am going to say this was achieved!
10 - Volunteer at least 21 times - Between guides, vaccine stewarding and parkrun I have achieved this, but hope to do a bit more in 2022, especially at parkrun.
11 - Meet friends for coffee/lunch/catch ups at least 21 times - a couple of these were on zoom, but excitingly most were in person!
12 - Read 21 books - I read 29, have been so happy to get back into reading in the past 2 years.
13 - Watch 21 new films - I think I probably managed this, although I've only written 12 down, however we did join Cineworld Unlimited and have actually seen 3 films (Dune, Ghostbusters Afterlife and No Time to Die) in the cinema which was great!
14 - Learn 21 grammar topics - despite studying English Language and Literature at University and attending a "grammar" school I never understand what people are talking about with tenses, first person etc to the level I want to, so I'm going to challenge myself to learn 21 new topics around this to help with my writing. - Nope...I don't think I was really engaged by this one
15 - Have 21 days where I complete a social media rest - i.e. don't check Facebook etc - messages from actual humans is ok! - Nope...I think I probably need to try a bit harder though and perhaps set myself targets during the day instead.
16 - Visit 21 new places (not countries, just different places that I've not been before, whether a restaurant, or a nice place to walk - my Yorkshire Wildlife Trust membership gives me lots of ideas) - I only wrote down 18 places, but again I'd count the fact our walking holiday took us to muliple places on the same day. I think one of my favourites again was Malham, but I also loved Riley's Fish Shack
17 - Visit the gym / do home work outs 21 times - Didn't really manage this, still haven't been back to the gym post Covid (so nearly 2 years!). Alan did persuade me to try to learn to ski so we have been skiing at Xscape 6 times.
18 - Plant 21 "things" whether seed bombs or vegetables. I managed 13 different varities of plants and multiples of these, so this was achieved!
19 - Watch 21 live music/comedy/guest readings - on zoom or hopefully some in person - By going to - Managed to achieve this with End of the Road festival seeing Hot Chip the following week at Heaton Park and also the funniest online zoom I've ever seen with Offmenu Podcast with James Acaster and Ed Gamble.
20 - Eat entirely veggie for 21 days - I did achieve this on quite a few days, but kept forgetting to count, so hopefully, but not sure!
21 - Complete 21 chapters or re-edits of chapters on my novel - I achieved this and have only got about 5/6 chapters to finish, need to crack on with it though and get some volunteer readers for some feedback on my first draft!
Other Targets
- Run 2021 KM or 1256 miles in 2021 - this is 256 more that last year about an extra KM or 5 - 6 mins per day. - Not quite, I achieved 976.3 miles as I fell off pace about halfway through the year and also have not been out of the house much since picking up a heavy cold on Christmas day. I did manage to cover a total of 1297 miles including a tiny bit of cycling, and the rest was running, walking and skiing, so I think I'll take that as a win.
- Ride at least 122.2 hours in 2021 (2 hours and 21 minutes every week on average) to help with the below target - covid permitting! - I only managed...3 hours and 27 minutes including some time on zwift, this wasn't the year I did much cycling at all.
- Complete half ironman triathlon - Sundowner - Didn't get anywhere with this!
- Donate my hair to Little Princess Trust in celebration of getting vaccinated (fingers crossed!) - Achieved - donated 16 inches in July after nearly 2 years with no haircuts!
Other things that I achieved that I didn't plan or expect:
- New Job - After nearly 14 years at one company that I really enjoyed working for and had some great colleagues, I ended up in a situation where I was forced to resign with nothing to go to. It was probably one of the bravest things I've had to do as work has always been a constant and a safety blanket for me, I'm really pleased that I managed to find a new role with a great company and new manager who were understanding to allow me to have a couple of months out inbetween and I've made a good start to a new challenge of opening their Leeds office in December.
- Supporting my family through some of the biggest challenges that we have faced.
- Getting back to face to face guiding in November, it was so rewarding to finally be back in person with guides.
- My most viral ever LinkedIn post...over 111000 views and 1433 reactions - lots of debate that has given me inspiration for a new blog post about how people are predisposed to recruit to their own biases around length of time in a role, when actually it should be shaped around what skills and experiences are needed by the role to be recruited.
