New Year's Goals

I am not making resolutions. I am setting goals for the year, which is something I don't normally do.  

I am deciding to keep trying even when I fail because I know I will (I guess that's what a resolution is supposed to be).  

I have been pondering this upcoming year and my blog quite a bit.  I do not have a Type A personality and don't normally set goals.  The first time I set a goal intentionally was when I went to Youngstown, NY, for summer missions, and that was only because it was required.  I have spent most of my life floundering around without purpose, like a butterfly flitting around from flower to flower.  So I am declaring 2011 to be a year of purpose.  

Recently, I have seen a lot of people take my God given ideas and use them as their own instead of joining me in the endeavor.  Sometimes, they failed; sometimes, they profited.  In the order of things, God is the giver, I was the one He used to speak or write the idea, and anyone could follow through with it.  But when someone else used my idea, they stole my sense of purpose, especially when I was not allowed to join in.  

First and foremost, this year I will go to Him for Purpose, and unless directed to share it and give it away, I will act on it immediately.  One idea I am acting on is the quietness project, which you can read more about in the goals below.  Another idea I am working on and hope to achieve is the Incredible Women Project.  I am looking for women who are interested in sharing their faith stories - stories of brokenness, healing, pains, struggles of all kinds: infertility, eating disorders, singleness, marriage, divorce, cancer, anything really.  God uses all these things and more to bring us closer to Him, and I'm looking to tell your stories, to bring us into community by sharing our stories about the One.  My blog is intended for community.  I long for you to interact with me.  Please post comments and let me know if you are encouraged by what you are reading.

My 2011 Goals:

1. Read through the Bible chronologically.
2. Reading "Seeking God's Face" daily.
3. Memorize 2 verses a month through the Living Proof site.  My first verse I am learning is:  "You crown the year with your good blessings, and You leave abundance in Your wake.  Psalm 65:11 (NET)
4.  Finishing losing weight (10 or 15 pounds).  Mainly I just hope to eat healthy and aim to exercise regularly.
5. The quietness project.  - Recently a friend said that I was loud on my blog, which did not bother me.  I was being loud on my blog at the time.  However, she commented that my blog personality does not reflect the person I am when I am in your presence.  I want this blog to reflect me, quiet, loud, funny, or whatever I may be.  When I had my first child, I thought it odd to just talk to a newborn baby.  I had to learn how to just talk about anything and nothing at all.  Before, I didn't just talk randomly about anything to anyone.  But most people do.  My thoughts got so stuffed inside that they had to come out and that's how this blog was born - out of need to free the thoughts and to speak.  Most people go to other people with their frustrations.  The quietness project is an attempt to go to God when I want to talk, not to facebook or this blog, but to Him.  It is an attempt to give Him the rightful place in our friendship.  The result of that for you is that I will post our conversation when He leads me to do so.

What are your goals?  Do we have any common goals?