This is the second in my quarterly review series. If you want to take in the full series, you can read my Q1 2022 review here. In my Q1 post I talked about some of the challenges I was having with establishing rhythm in my new consulting business. I must say that things are better. Still not great - and lots of work in progress - but a definite marked improvement from where I was at the end of March. My focus as I continue this work is developing a feeling of accomplishment as I do these things. I'm doing them and now I just need to learn to take more pride in the actual work.
I shared my process for reviews in my Q1 post. So, this will be slightly briefer in that regard. That said, I am going to share my 12 favorite problems as a follow up to my most recent post.
Here is a list of accomplishments for Q2:
I migrated my personal website - http://www.iwannabemewhenigrowup.com - to a new provider with a much more modern and up to date feel. In the long run it should also represent a cost savings and an opportunity to do more things like paid subscriptions, etc.
I signed agreements with five new clients and executed work with six clients. This work included trips to New York City and Portland, Oregon.
I've spent a lot of time specifically in the last month deeply engaged in developing and refining templates, checklists, and recurring prompts to help me in the area of rhythms.
I was honored by the Ivy Tech Richmond campus when I was presented with an honorary degree in May
Gayle and I took a five night cruise in May. You can read all about it here.
I took an awesome vacation to Glacier National Park with my dad and sister which involved planes, trains, and automobiles. You can read all of the daily posts and find a link to our videos from this page.
Kona earned his AKC Canine Good Citizen certification!!
Continued publishing newsletters weekly, published 11 pieces of content on Medium, and I started writing on the Blockchain - publishing about 14 pieces there. I also launched my new YouTube Channel - Knowledge Work Nexus. Between that and my personal YouTube channel, I published 14 videos. Learning about video editing has been a long term goal. I'm really proud of this progress!
My patio garden is in full bloom and I've begun planning my garden for 2023.
I am serving as the Obsidian mentor in R.J. Nestor's AP Productivity Course. If you want to refine your own methods for getting more of what you want to get done done, this is a great course for you.
What fell off in Q2:
I'm still struggling with the same things in Q2 as in Q1 - having too many learning goals, not keeping up with my health and fitness, and fine tuning my revenue and business development goals for my life. Specifically, I missed the following goals:
I didn't launch a cohort based small group coaching program which I planned for Q2. I still have this on the radar but it needs more thought. It may not get up and going until as late as Q1 of next year.
I didn't get my direct customer outreach/mailings done but have put together a plan and scheduled them so I now have a better assurance they will get done.
As noted above, I signed five new contracts so I did not meet my two per month goal.
I probably did spend four hours each month searching for and reviewing RFPs but it was not systematic. My new systems work will hopefully help with this some as well.
Instead of logging 10 Peloton workouts each month, I logged 0 - total (ugh!). I have cooked more healthy options but even in the nutrition category I'm a bit of a mess. My mental health is in good shape as I've been doing meditation very regularly.
I also didn't complete any courses on Coursera.
So, with all of this, am I discouraged? No! The point, in my mind, for writing down a goal, is to see once you write it down if you even still feel interested in it. All of these interested me and simply need more refinement or more development. So, with that, here are the plans for Q3, acknowledging that I am already somewhat deeply into Q3 since I'm not actually writing this until the end of July.
What are the plans for Q3:
Continue delivering my minimum viable shipment of publications per week. My current goal is 1 video, 1 newsletter, a personal blog post, a business blog post, and at least one additional article on Medium/Hive.
Develop and send my direct customer outreach for training.
Sign an average of two new contracts each month.
Redouble my efforts with Kona's training to prepare for our therapy assessment.
Complete one course/learning program on Coursera - this had little progress in Q2 but I want to complete it in Q3.
Get a holiday photo shoot scheduled for Kona and I so we can do holiday cards again this year.
Enjoy some rest and vacation time including a cruise on Disney's new ship - the Disney Wish - in September.
I plan to "finish up" my bathrooms that I renovated several years back. They need a little touch up.
Continue working on online course ideas including an email based course and the cohort based coaching program mentioned above.
My 12 Favorite Problems
As noted in my most recent post, I'll also begin giving any notable updates on my 12 favorite problems in these quarterly reviews. For this first review, I'm going to simply share by 12 favorite problems.
How can I develop greater stability in my business?
How can I make my health and wellbeing a foundational part of my personal self care?
How should I develop and deploy products that create passive income?
How can I balance my time between cultivating meaningful relationships and meaningful work? (This question is borrowed from Joe Balcom because I liked it so much and it is so relevant to my life.)
How can I continue to fill my world with ease and simplicity?
How can I best support others as they develop into who they want to be when they grow up?
How can I bring curiosity and creativity to other people's lives and to my own life?
How can I better manage my attention and focus?
How can I continue to improve my communication - specifically focusing on story telling ability - through writing, video, and other forms of media?
How can I better honor my own need to connect to something bigger in the universe?
What is my legacy and how do I ensure its resonance?
How can I make sure my case isn't too full? How can I integrate more time for play and rest in my life?
As I close this post, I want to specifically mention Julia Saxena's 12 favorite problems. As I mentioned in my initial post about this topic, I found no females who had shared their favorite problems. As I continued doing research for this post, I found Julia Saxena's post about her favorite problems so I'm happy to share that link here.