Looking back (An annual review – 2015) – Part 3

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This is the third and last part of my Looking back (An annual review – 2015) post. Check the first part here and second part here.

Part 3

Picture Courtesy - Michal Parzuchowski [Stocksnap.io]

What am i working towards?

This year I’m pledging myself to simply ‘Do More’.
What does that mean? This mean this year I’m focusing on doing more, creating more, traveling more and becoming better in the process. Did I say travel more? Yes! This year I’m gonna travel more and it’s gonna be solo more rather than group travel. Why? Because traveling with someone is bad? No! It’s just a different experience. I’ve done that many times already. Traveling with family, friends etc. I’m sure most of us do that in general. Who wants to go travel alone, right?
That’s what i used to think till last year. There were many occasions, many places, many trips i wanted to do. But i couldn’t. Cause i didn’t find appropriate company. So this year i promised myself to travel more and travel solo. But I’m gonna keep my mind open, so if somebody wants to hope on to a ride with me and travel along. So they can. But ‘I’m gonna go. No matter what! Cause ‘I gotta go’. And you know what? Solo travel is a different kind of experience. I haven’t done it before, except once, when I went to Jodhpur alone, it was like in 2006-07. It was almost a decade back! Wow! A decade!!? So I’m really excited this new year about all my travel plans.
But when I’m not traveling. I want to create stuff, build stuff, make good acquaintances, make friends and collaborate with artists across, the world I live in or in the world that’s alien to me.
So apart from acquaintances, friends and relationships; what stuff I’ll be creating or building? Here is an outlook of what I’m thinking to do this year in my creative pursuits:
  1. A podcast – I want to do 12 podcasts for starters this year which will help me achieve a level of expertise in the podcast making workflow. Last year i wrote a detailed article on how podcasts help us become better and how can we use them for good in our life.
  2. A Vlog on YouTube – I do a lot of videos which are mostly private but I’m working on editing this days, so my goal is to publish at least 12 vlogs this year on my YouTube channel.
  3. Go pro in blogging (Get a few guest posts to do in reputed online spaces) – As I’m writing more and more, i want to polish this skill to a professional level, so this year’s goal is to write 50 blog posts on my blog.
  4. Travel more (Ladakh, Bananas and North East India) – This year as mentioned in the above paragraph, i want to travel more, i want to travel solo and soak in all of those beautiful, mysterious city which call for me and share my experiences through blogs, instagram photos and vlogs.
  5. Level up on Photography – From past couple of years I’ve discovered that photography is one of my greatest passions. So this year I wanna shift gears and get some solid gear to level up my skills and learn more and do more in this area.
  6. Storytelling – All of the above 5 points stream down to this one singular sea of creativity which is my main motto, Storytelling. I want to become better in storytelling by all the above means.
Apart from all these creative pursuits I also want to try and figure out my time expansion with Family, so as last year I had moved to a new apartment alone so that i can accommodate my family whenever they come. So this year i want them to visit more and I also want to visit my home town more than i did last year (which was just once!).
I firmly believe in this statement that if you can work on things which you love and still make money, Then you’ll always love the work. I’m trying to pursue that. But still up until the alternate source of income is not there, I’ve got to work my ass off in doing both the things – Things I love and things I don’t but still gotta do. It’s a balancing act.
The Bottom Line: From my past year’s experiences, I feel like I’ve come a long way. I’m become way better than i was few years ago. But I’ve learned the bitter truth. This becoming better thing! It’s not a destination you can arrive to. It’s an infinite path which will never end. You’ve got to fight and stay on track until your last breathe. So being consistent in creating, staying fit and balancing out the important things in life (like family, creative pursuits and entrepreneurship) will be my priorities in this new year as well.
So that’s it with this year’s annual review post. Keep tuned in for my 2016 resolution list and few interesting travel blogs which are shortly coming up.
Thanks for reading.
…Himanshu
P.S.: Feel free to use my annual review as a template for your own.

A Quote I’m pondering on lately – 

“If you don’t make mistakes, you’re not working on hard enough problems. And that’s a big mistake.”
– Frank Wilczek, 2004 Nobel Prize winner in physics

My Annual Review Archives:

Click here to access the list of all my Annual Reviews.

Special note: Thanks to James Clear for inspiring me to start writing these Annual Review posts and hold myself accountable publicly on my reflections of each past year.

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