New year goals. Looking back, looking ahead.

I stopped making resolutions long ago, but each new year, I set goals that I want to achieve by the end of the year. 2013 was interesting, and certainly threw some curveballs my way. 

At the beginning of the year, I set 19 goals.

- I was successful in accomplishing 6 of those. Woo! 
- I came very close to achieving two more. One will be a goal again in 2014. The other won't, simply because I'm setting another goal that will make that one less of a priority this year.
- One, after researching it more, just wasn't feasible. 
- I simply lost interest in 2, and have no regrets about not pursuing them. 
- I decided that 3 would be nice to achieve someday, but they weren't big enough priorities to pursue this year. 

But the last 5... I attempted each of them, ran into some unforeseen hurdle that made them more difficult than I thought, but really should have had the discipline to complete them. They'll be back on the list for 2014. 

Aside from the successes and shortcomings of my 2013 goals, I had the opportunity to experience and learn a number of things that weren't even on my radar at the beginning of the year. 

Looking ahead to 2014, I'm going to follow the same approach I used in 2013. I'll set a few financial, fitness, professional and personal goals. Each should be realistic, and will include a plan for making them achievable. I hope the biggest difference will be how often I track and measure my progress, for I firmly believe that is almost as important to success as effort itself. 

2014 looks promising. I hope you've set goals, and I wish you all the best as you pursue them.