Goals for 2025

We're officially a quarter century into the second millennium. Time is madness.

Like many people, I find the changing of the calendar an opportunity for reflection. What have I done and what would I like to do? Blogging about my goals helps me hold myself accountable to them. My goals span different areas of my life, from my academic and research work, to my hobbies. Over the past few years I've developed a system of setting small, medium, and large goals in each category--which is also a learning experience in its own right. In the rearview mirror, some object(ive)s are larger or smaller than they initially appeared. Behind all of what follows is the intention to be calm, curious, generous, and joyful in the year ahead.

What are your hopes or intentions for the coming year? Whether you have many New Years' Resolutions or none, I wish you a peaceful and productive 2025.

A year of good reading! [Source via Tumblr.com]

In academia... 

• My SMALL goal is to reach out to the Weaving Media research network for conversations about the intersections between textiles and poetry.
  
• My MEDIUM goal is to develop a weekly practice of Latin translation and grammar revision on Wednesday mornings.
  
• My LARGE goal is to find a new academic position by the end of August.
  

In blogging...

• My SMALL goal is to post at least one addition to my growing collection of modern poems about late antiquity and the Middle Ages.
  
• My MEDIUM goal is to write or finish at least three posts about books, including a round-up post about my engagement with the delightful Books in Translation reading challenge.
  
• My LARGE goal is to finish my series of posts, Learning New Words with Lymond, about word choice and storytelling in Dorothy Dunnett's The Game of Kings.
  

In crafting...

• My SMALL goal is to knit a pair of fingerless gloves in a pattern that is new to me.
  
• My MEDIUM goal is to learn and memorize a new and more elastic cast-on for socks.
  
• My LARGE goal is to make a good start on two big sewing projects: a quilt kit I brought the summer I moved to the Netherlands, and a dress using fabric I bought at the Lapjesmarkt.
  

In living in the Netherlands...

• My SMALL goal is to be a tourist at a Dutch parkrun outside of Utrecht.
  
• My MEDIUM goal is to go to at least two new museums: I'm particularly eyeing a trip or trips to Leiden to visit the Rijksmuseum van Oudheden (for their exhibit on the Bronze Age) and the natural history museum Naturalis.
  
• My LARGE goal is to visit Terschelling, one of the Wadden Islands.

In publication...

• My SMALL goal is  to finish all three of my outstanding book reviews, and to politely decline any further review requests in 2025, so I have time and energy to focus on other things.
• My MEDIUM goal is to finish and submit at least two of my ongoing projects.
  
• My LARGE goal is to cultivate a regular writing practice, with the goal of producing at least 500 words per week. With three two week breaks (one in March, one in July, and one in December), this will hopefully lead to forty-six weeks of writing and at least 23,000 new words.

2025 Books in Translation Reading Challenge

In reading...

• My SMALL goal is to read Joanna Russ's The Female Man and Jane Gaskell's Strange Evil, two books which have been on my shelves for over a year.
  
• My MEDIUM goal is to finish reading Edward Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, a project I began ten years ago.
  
• My LARGE goal is to participate in the Books in Translation Reading Challenge. I had such fun with it last year! I also want to collect some of the adorable badges from the 2025 Fantasy/SF Badge Collection. I have a new reading challenge of my own, which I'm calling the Bancroft Prize Reading Challenge. Awarded annually by Columbia University, the prize is given to books on American history and/or diplomacy. Two of my favourite works of history I've read for fun have been by Bancroft-winning authors, so I'm setting myself the goal of reading a previous winner or the 2025 winner when it is announced in March or April.

In running...

• My SMALL goal is to go for a long run (10+ miles) in a park where I've never been for a run before.
• My MEDIUM goal is to complete one parkrun a month between January and August 2025.
  
• My LARGE goal is to finish the Utrecht Marathon with a smile on my face and free from injury, in under five hours.
  

In teaching...

• My SMALL goal is to complete and submit the reflective writing necessary for a University Teaching Qualification at Utrecht University.
  
• My MEDIUM goal is to keep a reflective log about my teaching, recording what went well, what could be improved, and my ideas for future sessions.
  
• My LARGE goal is to complete a pedagogical publication, growing out of my Professional Practice Fellowship research.

Line drawing of a graffito from Pompeii. Very excited to see it in person. [Source]

In traveling...

• My SMALL goal is to visit the British Library exhibit Medieval Women: In Their Own Words.
  
• My MEDIUM goal is to plan and take a trip to Pompeii and Herculaneum over my teaching spring break in March.
  
• My LARGE goal is to attend Eurocon 2025.
  

In writing...

• My SMALL goal is to participate in 1000 Words of Summer and the shorter versions that occur throughout the year.
  
• My MEDIUM goal is to sign up for and take a writing class.
  
• My LARGE goal is to read, reflect on, and engage the exercises in Ursula Le Guin's Steering the Craft.

I accidentally failed to save my intended version of this post, so this is a second, shorter draft. Trying not to take this as an omen for the year ahead. The original post ended with Emperor Gregor Vorbarra's immortal line "Let's see what happens," which I gingerly tack onto this version.

Previous New Years' Posts:  2021 2022 2023 2024