WARNING THIS IS A LONG POST w no TDLR likely
March 6th 2023 I started on this journey… my “90 Day Plan” or challenge. I kicked it off for many reasons, mainly, I needed to do somethings different, I needed to get in shape, I was going through a significant break up, my father had died a few months earlier and I was not going out that way, I needed/wanted to make more money and learn some new skills doing it.
Todays post is a reflection on that 90 day plan, what worked, what did not work, how can I improve it, do I need a new 90 Day Plan or can I just keep pushing with the elements that worked and move forward? Or is an actual “Plan” what I need?
So lets break down my specific goals and steps, each in their own category and take a look. What goals did I hit, miss, fail miserably on? What steps/tasks/things did I hit, miss, miserably fail on. Did this 90 Day Plan work over all? Sort of work? Brilliant success? Dismal failure?
The Goals:
From my original post that kicked this off:
I need to get Real Real with myself about some things. I need to “unbecome everything that isn’t really (me), so (I) can be who (I was) meant to be”
That is my journey. The next 60-90 days will all about that.
Social media will be minimized (exc to post about this and food/wine pics, one of the skills I hope to improve is the picture taking), TV shut off, outtings limited to things I have to do for work or have a commitment to, intense Bible study, intense dive into some books, Ted Talks, deep cleaning of the house and myself. I think I have 10 books right now I want to get into, some of them are daily 2-3 page inspiration things, some are read and note take, contemplate, internalize. get back to the trading desk and trade Options and Forex again.
I took that post and created a list of Goals for this 90 Day Plan.
Increase 2023 Income by $40K
Get into better Physical and Mental Health
Work on Relationship Skills
Work on Other/New Skills – Learn new things
Get more God Focused/Centered
With this goals in mind, I set up a task list to get this done, and a pretty aggressive daily schedule.
The Schedule was as follows:
Monday – Fridays
Morning – Up at 415am, Peloton 10-20 mins, Jesus Calling, Pray, Breakfast, Go to Work
Afternoon – At Work
Evening – Peloton (ride and/or body conditioning class 20-30 mins), Bible Study (reading New Test from front to back, one chapter a day), Read 20-30 pages from Book List, Dinner, One hour TV max, Light of His Presence, Pray, Bed by 9pm
Saturday
Morning – Up by 6am, Peloton 10-20 mins, Jesus Calling, Pray, Breakfast, One Hour+ Home Maint/Cleaning
Afternoon – If I have an outing to do, do it, else Home Maint for an Additional One of Two Hours. Home by 3pm though
Evening – Bible Study (reading New Test from front to back, one chapter a day), Read 20-30 pages from Book List, Dinner, One hour TV max, Light of His Presence, Pray, Bed by 10pm
Sunday
Morning – Up by 6am, Peloton 10-20 mins, Jesus Calling, Pray, Breakfast, Church
Afternoon – This is my “Free Day”, if you do not Rest after a week of hard work, what is the point?
Evening – Prep for the Week, Dinner, One hour TV max, Light of His Presence, Pray, Bed by 9pm
The Tasks to get this done:
Daily Bible and Devotional Study
Daily Reading of Positive Mindset/Attitude Books – 20-30 pages per Day (10 books in 12 weeks)
Work Out twice per day, Morning and Afternoon, approx 1hr per Day total
Clean the Garage
Yard Work
Demo Master Bathroom for Remodel
Clean the House better than I had been (fold laundry was a big one I got lazy on)
Listen/Watch Daily PodCasts and TedTalks – Positive things
Eat Better, smaller portion, healthier
Cut Alcohol consumption by over 50%
Learn some new skills related to Video, Photo, Social Media, Writing
Start Trading Again, at least on Forex
How did I do? Lets break it all down…
Goals:
Income Increase – As of right now, I am plus $20K for 2023. That is from standard income sources. I believe I can hit the +40K this year, but likely fall into the 25-30K. Irons are in the fire. Things are moving, but it is SLOW. Long term, I will add two or three new income streams over the next 6-12 months.
Outcome: Success. The $40K number was made up, had no basis for using that number. Have increased by $20K, that is pretty signif, and things in the works to add to that.
Better Physical Health – Def in better shape than I have been in the last 10 years. According to Peloton, the last 90 days was 151 work outs, plus a different app I tried for about two weeks, which was 10 per week, so another 20ish. 171 work outs in 90 days. 65 Active Days according to Pelton, so I def did not hit my Every Day, Twice a Day Goal, a huge gap was the last two weeks since the Car Accident. My back has been problematic, that cost me 15-20 work outs, and then a few week ends out of town. When I did not have access to my Peloton, I simply did not work out. That is an aspect I need to do something out.
I changed up my diet a bit also, less alcohol (50-60% cut in consumption), added a lot of fruit to the diet, and salads a few times a week. All of that contributed to better health for sure.
Outcome: Success. I am 100% in better shape. I did not hit my 2/Day goal, but I did some work. I corrected some signif diet issues.
Better Mental Health – I have always been on the “positive” side of things. I realized early in life that Attitude is Important, and to not dwell on the negative. That said, we all have our moments, God Knows I have had mine. A large part of this Goal was Reading. Bible Study, Church, TedTalks and Podcasts. During this 90 Days I came across GaryVee, a Social Medial Marketing expert, this life outlook is ridic positive. I have consumed 20-30 hrs of his content during this 90 Days, bought one of his books “Twelve and a Half” Check him out https://garyvaynerchuk.com/ On top of that I got through 5 of my 10 books, but read two other books for the Book Clud we started at work. So 7 books in 12 weeks, not the 10 I wanted, but still pretty solid. Getting into better shape, fixing diet, cutting alcohol also contributed to staying positive. Seeing results of things I did, also assisted.
Outcome: Success. Need to stick with it, keep reading now that I have started again. Keep working o Attitude, Gratitude and Positivity.
Relationship Skills – I have always been very independent, but always liked having someone around. Security feeling. But I want things my way (like we all do to some extent). That is a problem when in a relationship. My access to working on this Goal was reading. So the success in Better Mental Health was a part of this also. I did not get to all of the books I planned for this goal. I did get through Being Happy, but did not get to The Marriage Rules, which I had started in the past, but needed to get back into and start over, reading it with a purpose. Essentially my skill gap is in the Empathy and Consideration for others. I am rather emotionless when it comes to myself, on daily things, a lot of things do not matter to me, they are what they are, to me.
I make a medium sized deal of things that are a big deal, I do not make a big deal, or even a small deal (or even a deal) over things that are a small deal.
So my deficit is that because those small things do not matter to me, why do they matter to someone else? Well, they OFTEN do matter to someone else. That is not right or wrong, it is just what it is. I need to consider that more often and work on that.
Outcome: Mild Success. Just my realization of that is a success. Now I have to put it into practice, as well as sharpen up on Empathy and Consideration.
Learn New Skills – I enrolled in some online classes, bought some of those dreaded “courses” for $29 (its a $497 value though!! so $29… ) Need to finish the Photography and Film one, a 14 day program. Its pretty solid , or seems so. In all I signed up for three or four sets of classes, I was like $150 total.
I have used some of this stuff already, started a few new social media accounts on different platforms and posted. My picture taking is still lazy, I need to work on it. My video editing skills are simplistic (not enough reps yet). BUT getting into this has net’ed me some 3-4K videos and posts, a lot of 1-2K posts and dozens of 50-500 view posts. Have to start somewhere. I also have plans to do a Wine show and YouTube it. Maybe the biggest take away from the Social Media stuff is “if you wait until you are ready, you will never do it” so I have started to just do it. I ran a couple wine classes at work as “practice” for a wine show, now I just need to do it.
Outcome: Mild Success on the way to Wild Success. one or two of the new income streams I am generating
Get more God Focused and Centered – Daily reading in Jesus Calling, daily Bible Study, go to Church. Seems easy right? Wrong. I was out of town a lot of weekends, especially the last 40ish days, so missed Church the last 5 weeks in a row? Jesus Calling was a success. rarely missed a day , Bible Study did not miss many days. Made it through Matthew, Mark, Luke and almost done with John. Daily Prayer, twice a day, plus trying to give Praise throughout the day , much harder than I anticipated. I definitely prayed at least once a day, usually twice. The Praise and Thanks throughout the day was much harder. All of that said, I feel Closer. I feel better. I Believe more than I did when I started this. It is a path that I need to continue on and improve.
Outcome: Mild Success. This is a life long path though, need to keep moving forward.
Now the individual tasks I planned. This is where I adjust. The goals do not need to be adjusted, the How I get to them does though.
Daily Bible and Devotional Study – Need to get to the 2/Day Prayer, and Thanks and Praise through the day. Likely no adjustment needed on this one, just hit the marks.
Daily Reading of Positive Mindset/Attitude Books – 20-30 pages per Day (10 books in 12 weeks) – Bit off more than I could chew. I simply ran out of time every day. Up at 415am and in bed 9pm, and could not fit 20-30 pages in. Rescale this for 10-20 pages, or two books per month. Continue with reading, but get more realistic on it.
Work Out twice per day, Morning and Afternoon, approx 1hr per Day total – Its the right goal. But maybe not 7 days per week. Def 5. But maybe two days per week it is just morning or just afternoons. This will allow for more reading time, and likely help me avoid burn out. What I was trying for was in AM 10-15 min cycle and 5 min stretch, then in PM 15-30 min cycle, 10-20 min strength and/or core work out, 5-10 min stretch.
Clean the Garage – Got this 90% done. Was a lot more work than I thought. I took 3 loads to the dump. removed a LOT of stuff. Books and books and books, thing I would never revisit. I touch every piece of paper in this garage, and made decisions. Papers from high school and college, frankly brilliant papers (lol), that really have no meaning at 53 years old. The NSA, CIA and Tri Lateral Commission are not coming for my advice at this point. Tossed them.
Yard Work – Started this late in the program, like two weeks ago. Lots to do, going well. This will be all summer.
Demo Master Bathroom for Remodel – Bit off FAR MORE than I could chew time wise. I am so far behind on this one. The entire job should be done. I am not even demo’ed yet. Car accident set me back on this, but really, it should have been completed before that happened. Need to get this done ASAP.
Clean the House better than I had been (fold laundry was a big one I got lazy on) – Decision made on this, already in progress. About 2hrs a week to maintain it.
Listen/Watch Daily PodCasts and TedTalks – In progress, Slowed down a little the last three weeks. I do not think this has to be a daily thing, but something I pay attention too for sure and continue to invest time into.
Eat Better, smaller portion, healthier – Done. This was pretty easy actually. I have upped my water intake significantly. Added salads a few times per week. Do not eat the whole steak or whatever just because I can. Added a work out stack to my diet (pre workout, post workout and protein mixes check out my link for discounts on these products https://ep-nutrition.com?aff=10057 )
Cut Alcohol consumption by over 50% – Amazingly easier than anticipated. Do not get me wrong, Wine is still my Thing. But I was drinking a bottle per night, plus wine tasting on Saturdays and some Sundays. I am maybe two bottles a week now, plus the tasting on some Saturdays. This has increased my energy a ton, making the 4am wake ups a lot easier. Also just in general I feel a lot better. Will keep this going.
Learn some new skills related to Video, Photo, Social Media, Writing – As described above, did not get as into this as I wanted, but did make progress. The biggest part of this was in pushing myself to do things I do not like. I do not like being on camera. I do not like being the “face” of something. I ran video gaming events for years, and on large events, I almost never did the announcing, or the intro/welcome to the event or the close out, I almost always had someone else do that. I do not like being front and center. Now I put myself on my phone and do 1-5 minute “about me” things and post them to 5 or 6 different platforms. Still not comfortable, but doing it anyway. Will continue with new skills learning and pushing myself.
Start Trading Again, at least on Forex – Really did not do this, and it is easiest way for me to hit the +$40K income bump. Before I took the position I have now in the flooring industry, I traded for about 6 months. The last few weeks doing that I made about $1000-$2000 per week, with the last week making $2000 per day average. I took the job, lost track of a big trade and blew my account up with a $13k loss. Its been almost 2 years now… need to shake that and get back on it. Forex is the easiest lowest entry point way and it is what I went to school for five years ago. Have to get back on this.
Changes Moving Forward
The biggest is likely easing up on myself and not pushing as hard to “get it all done” Not that I do not intend to hit the needed markers and goals, but to not put too much pressure on myself to hit it for hitting its sake. But enough pressure that I do not let it slip and blow entire days off.
Reading will be reset to a more realistic level.
Work outs will still try for twice a day with a minimum of one cycle session and one strength or core session and stretching. When I can will cycle twice a day. Likely reduce to 5 days a week.
Diet and alcohol will continue as they are.
90 Day Play Outcome: Success.
Not as big as I hoped, but honestly, almost everything related to this was made up and written down and I just went for it. I had no evidence of my ability to do this, except my own dedication and Will Power. I do not like to fail, or lose, but I am not afraid too lose. So I went for it.
I will see how the next 30 days go, and if needed will put a 90 day plan back into action. I will get back into near daily video updates of some kind to help me stay accountable.
THANK YOU to those that followed me on this and cheered me on.
Thank you to those that said I could not or would do it, I did it for you. I like to prove people wrong, especially about what I can do or cannot do.
Special thanks to Donovan, one of my oldest friends. Your journey the last couple years inspired me to do something different. Follow his IG Page if you want to see someone dedicated to getting fit and being a better man every day than he was yesterday. @donovanthecolt
Mom, my Sister, RS, my D&D group, DVC, VJ, SG, a dozen or so people from the old days at Bothell High, and many others. You followed me, commented, when I would run into you in the real world would tell me you you found some level of inspiration in my humble journey. Thank you all!
This 90 Days has been life changing in many ways. The journey will continue…
Sponsors for this 90 Day Journey
EPN Supplements https://ep-nutrition.com?aff=10057
ChillPod https://www.chillpod-us.com/discount/CHRISTOPHE81631
