It’s the last week of my first 12 Week Year. Overall, there was significant progress, but I didn’t reach my goals. The average week score is 58%, and the highest week score is 79.3%. Some of the falling out was due to sickness, and some because of lack of motivation. The book’s recommended score is 85%. Given that, it’s no wonder I didn’t reach my goals.

It was definitely worth it. Despite not reaching my goals, there was substantial progress:

  • I sold my car, leading to savings of $100 NZD (~ $66 USD) per month. The goal of saving $100 NZD per month was actually reached.
  • Improving health. There was some progress, but I could do more. I’ve lost more weight, my liver is in a much better shape, and I control my mind better because I meditate every day. There are some long-standing issues that weren’t resolved though.
  • Finding friends. I didn’t make a single friend, but I have less social anxiety because I meditate, and I practice deep conversation via Kind Words game. I also started participating on Reddit.
  • Earning $8000 NZD (~ $5285 USD). Didn’t earn anything, mostly due to poor health and lack of interview skills. I didn’t practice mock interviews at Pramp until much later in the year, because I was reluctant to do it, and thought it wasn’t that important. But it is important, and I’ve made great progress after just 3 mock interviews. I did put a lot of effort into upskilling, and learned Vue, Docker and AWS (via Udemy courses). There were things that were planned, but never done, but I feel I just overcommited with those.

So, overall, 12 week year provided:

  • Motivation. I managed to find the right way of thinking about goals.
  • Focus. By limiting tasks to just a few goals, I was able to cut out inessential tasks.
  • Structure. By planning tasks weekly and daily, I knew what had to be done.

What worked

  • Putting consistent effort into an Udemy course every day, helped me to go through several of them. Vue, Docker and AWS were the ones that I finished.
  • Meditating every day.
  • Scoring the past week helped me to be motivated to do what was planned. Not the best kind of motivation, but I’ll take anything that helps.
  • Connecting with my goals helped with motivation.

What didn’t work

  • I still procrastinated on items that I didn’t feel like doing. I have had goals and sacrificing mood, and it didn’t help. I’ll need to find a solution to this.
  • My average score was pretty low (58%, not 85%), and I didn’t reach 3 out of 4 goals.
  • Scoring was broken because I scored TODO list items as well, not only essential activities.
  • I planned too much activities, and it affected the scores badly.

What’s next

I plan to take a break, and choose a new set of goals for another 12 week year in 2020.