2017: The Goals

If i had to summarize my learnings of 2016 to a single lesson, it would be the importance of goal setting and measurability. In the same vein, it is time that i set some clear goals to tackle in the new year.

Write 52 blog posts

Blogging has become one of the single most valuable practices in my career over the past 2 years. Despite this, when things get busy, it is the first thing that tends to be slid out of the way. That will not longer slide.

I plan to aim for at least 1 post a week over the course of 2017. Some weeks this won't happen, but i will need to make up for it at another point. 52 weeks, 52 posts. Ready? Go.

Contribute to Textmate 2

Apart from a brief stint with vim, i have used Textmate exclusively for the last 5 years. I make no apologies about this. Developer tools reward those who put in the time to not just learn, but master them. To this end, mastering Textmate has given me so much. It is high time i give back. 2017 will be the year for this.

Buy more Bitcoins

I am not a man who lives with many regrets, but i have now missed the boat on Bitcoins a few times. The first was failing to buy hundreds when they were mere pennies and i was telling my friends it would be the future, but was too lazy to deal with the MtGox-style interfaces. This laziness would literally cost me millions in potential earnings when Bitcoin eventually exploded.

Since missing that ROI firehose, i have since bought some coins. Unfortunately, as i write this, bitcoin is at $966.30, a increase of 253% in the last 10 months. I can officially say the coins i currently own are insufficient. I will not make this mistake a third time. At this point, i would rather lose money than leave myself open to continued failings to invest in something i philosophically believe is a step forward for international currency.

Bring Detextion to 2k MRR

Detextion is my newest project, and it was first shown to the public in early December of 2016. My goal is to have it making 2,000/month by the end of 2017. Given the pricing and the value i know it provides, this goal is ambitious but not unrealistic. The most difficult piece of the puzzle is that Detextion is, and will continue to be, a side project. Because i work full time and consult, my attention to it tends to be improving its capabilities instead of marketing. This will need to change to hit this mark in 12 months.

Attend MicroConf

One of the things you learn when you are juggling a bootstrapped side project and a full time startup job is time is precious. It is only possible when you focus on efficiency, intuition and some helpful guidance. MicroConf is, by design, a place to meet similarly passionate people who have experience in the bootstrapping space. And, let us be honest, there is never a bad time to take a trip to the city of sin.

Stay hungry; stay passionate

This all-important goal is both the start and end of it.

Without the passion for solving problems or the hunger for creating things, the rest of this loses its joy. It becomes... work. Fuck that.

I remind myself regularly how lucky i am that my hobby happens to be something that can pay the bills. Those of us in the field should be thankful that the history of humanity put us on the earth the same time as the rise of the semiconductor. We are a lucky few. We are the blacksmiths of our age. So let's build something amazing and have some fun doing it.

Stay hungry; stay passionate.

So let's have fun crushing it in 2017. Happy New Year.