Six Nerdy New Year’s Resolutions

I’ve never been one for traditional new year’s resolutions. Sometimes, I think new year’s resolutions can do more harm than good: people set unrealistic goals, fail to achieve these, and then end up feeling guilty when they hit March and can’t stop themselves from eating a whole pack of those custard doughnuts they promised they wouldn’t touch all year. Or, people set resolutions that seem to serve no purpose other than to limit themselves: things like “eat less [insert delicious food here]”, or “go to the gym every day”, or “spend less time playing video games”.

Personally, I think that if you’re going to set yourself goals for the year ahead, they should add something to your life. Resolutions should challenge you, sure, but they should also make your life more enjoyable, and help you to become the best version of yourself.

So this year, I’m making a set of nerdy resolutions to learn, challenge myself, and find more time for the things I care about. Here they are my six resolutions for the year ahead:

Use blogging to stretch my creativity

Over the last couple of months, one of my biggest challenges has been finding time to blog. It turns out, this is a really difficult thing to do once you have a full-time job. So in 2018, I’m going to get back into a routine of blogging and aim to publish a blog post at least once (maybe even twice) a week. I’d also like to diversify the kind of posts I create, which you can read more about here.

Attend more nerdy events and meet new people

Now that I’ve moved to London, I’m excited to be living in a city where there is always so much going on. But I’m yet to really take advantage of all the nerdy events and groups nearby. In 2018, I’m going to find some nerdy groups and events – book clubs, Dungeons and Dragons groups, and conventions – to attend, and start going to more events where hopefully I can meet more people with similarly nerdy interests.

Challenge myself at bouldering

I first went climbing a couple of months ago, and I have now officially caught the bug. It would be great to get into a routine of going bouldering more regularly, and it would be great to see some noticeable improvement and take on some new challenges.

Read 50 books – at least 10 of which are non-fiction

As always, I’ve set myself a reading goal for the year ahead. In 2017, I read 64 books, eight of which were non-fiction. While I’d love to top my 64 books next year, I’d rather set a more manageable target for the year ahead (which I can tell is going to be busy), and try to read a couple more non-fiction books than I did in 2017.

Learn more about history and (geo)politics

Following on from my previous goal, this year, I’d really like to learn more about the world I live in. While I find history and politics interesting, these are subjects I don’t feel like I know enough about, so I’m going to invest some time this year to expand my knowledge through reading non-fiction, watching educational videos, and listening to podcasts. (PS. If you have any recommendations for YouTube channels, podcasts or books, let me know!)

Run a Dungeons and Dragons game by the end of the year

This may be my most ambitious challenge for 2018. I’ve been playing Dungeons and Dragons for about two and a half years now, and I would love to try my hand at being a Dungeon Master. This is something that will take a lot of time and effort and will really push me outside of my introverted comfort zone. I’m very much looking forward to taking this on.

So, these are going to be my goals for 2018. What are yours?