2018 Resolutions

December 2017 25^th, 5:00 AM in the morning:with a warm brimming cup of tea; it’s the perfect time to sort out my next year’s resolution and the path forward to my goals. As a teenager, we had this standing joke which said resolutions are meant to be broken. But as an adult, I feel so lost without them. Not that I abide by them or achieve all of them 100%, but somehow these keep me going during my tough days. Whenever I feel strayed, browsing through these, reminds me of my path.

1.       Be a better mother: Last year it was to control my anger while dealing with my baby. Now that I have started to put a check on my anger and keeping in mind that the baby is growing up into a sweet little toddler, I too need to grow up as Mom. How do I do that? For this my to-do includes:

Progress Chart	Mid Year	Year End
Spend half an hour reading books with him at least 5 days a week
Outdoor activities in the weekend
Start reading stories for him and to him
Visit to the zoo
Last but not the least, continue holding my calm and give me unconditional, bountiful love and affection

2.       Be a better daughter and daughter-in law: It sounds surprising to read a good daughter and daughter-in-law, in one breath. But, I strongly believe if I can be a good daughter-in-law, I would involuntarily become a good daughter.

It is so easy to put the blame on others. I often read in blogs and in various articles how insensitive the in-laws are, how rigid and manipulative they are. But, standing in this technologically advanced era, are we sensitive enough? Are we flexible enough? We are too busy to sit and ponder about a situation: we face a situation, we deal with it, somehow come out of it and if required put the blame on others. I do it more than often. I am not saying all the in-laws out there are godly but I want to take out sometime from myself and improvise myself as a daughter. My in-laws and parents have very minimal expectation of getting a call 2 times a week might be. I as well might to do it. I hope with this my life will simpler and happier than now.

Last year I failed on this resolution of mine as somewhere in between I had lost track and started expecting more than giving. This year I will try not to.

Progress Chart	Mid Year	Year End
Parents (once a week)
In-laws (once a week)
Close relatives (once a month)

In fact I should learn to work on my family ties. I love them from the core of my heart but I don’t know what aversion I have towards making calls. There are some people like my sister (I love her like my 1^st child) , my Boromoni & Chotokaku who are as important as my parents, but I hardly make a call to them. I really really need to start working on that too. So, one more row added.

3.       Learn Power BI and Improvise Tableau skills: The 2 leaders in BI tools as per Gartner BI MQ (Gartner BI and Analytics Magic Quadrant): Tableau & Power BI are also the 2 most widely used platforms in my current organization. Fortunately with my manager’s support, I have an exposure to both. I have very little time in my hand and in a much focused manner; I will have to reach the intermediate level in both of these. If I have to accomplish my career aspirations, I will have to gear myself up with new skills.

Progress Chart	Mid Year	Year End
Tableau
Power BI

4.       Freelancing as my sole career: The last in the list but not the least.  I enjoyed disciplined freedom. I am not afraid of long hours or challenging jobs, but I hate the time restriction, I hate when I have to be in office for 9-10 hours on the lean days (while my child is at day-care). When it comes to delivering quality work, I believe there must be some amount of trust and freedom associated to it. I desperately want to strike a perfect balance between my career and my family and freelancing is the best option for me. Though it has its own perils, after putting it on the weighing machine, I decide to choose it over the office job.

By the mid of next year, I want to take it up as my sole career option an option over my current job. Life is a challenging now as I have to be play multi-roles: a mother, an office-goer and a freelancer; but I will not give up hope. In fact I cannot if I have to achieve my career aspiration! Throughout this year, I have been losing focus more than often and to restrict myself from doing so, I will list down my path forward and will have a regular check on the same. Though this is very personal, I guess anyone who is looking forward to start a career in freelancing will benefit from it (hyperlink the “It”).

The various freelancing options that I have selected for myself on the basis of my experience along with progress chart:

Progress Chart	Mar ‘18	Jun ‘18	Sep ‘18	Dec ‘18
CSS and web designing-
Content writing
BI tools (Tableau & Power BI)
Data Entry

To get work on the above skills, I need to constantly work hard on them. I will have to move out of my comfort zone and improvise upon my skill sets before I can market myself and start bagging work.

5.       The Supporters: Small in magnitude though, these are the stirrers of the upper important resolutions, so noting them down becomes impeccable:

Progress Chart	Mid Year	Year End
Read at least 1 book in 2 months (any type of book)
Start following at least 10 blogs
Restrict partying
Spend at least 2 hours/week with Annoy on his current venture
Healthy living habit, including regular exercise

With so many responsibilities, options, complexities and entertainments, it becomes tough for someone like me to maintain her sanity. These listed resolutions are for those times.

I wish all the best to myself and a happy new year to all!