On Sundays I’m looking back on the past week. How did I perform towards my goals? How did my blog do? And how am I keeping up with my Getting Things Done system and Zen to Done habits?
Blog performance
I was ill this week, a nasty case of stomach flu. I’ll spare you the details, but it wasn’t pretty. It took a couple of days to get well and a lot of sleep to really get back on my feet again. I’ve slept a lot, more than I usually sleep in two weeks. But I feel great now! I have lots of energy and somehow I feel a lot better than before. In hindsight I think I may have walked around with a virus for quite some time already, but I was just ignoring it.
Anyway, the blog has done fabulous without me. Subscriber numbers continue to increase day after day which is delightful! Visitor numbers have dropped significantly, but that’s hardly a surprise. Last week was massive and it would’ve been spectacular if that would’ve lasted.
| Statistics week 06-2008 | ||
|---|---|---|
| Average RSS subscribers: | 857 | +136 |
| Average daily visitors: | 364 | -691 |
| Technorati Authority: | 269 | -1 |
Progress towards goals
Obviously progress here is not that good. Most of these goals need attention or some kind of (physical) effort from me. Being ill effectively prevents that from happening, so there’s not a lot of progress on the primary goal of renovating the 2nd floor. The other goals (except for the marathon goal) did pretty well nevertheless.
The renovation project is showing good progress, but I can already foresee that I’m not going to make the deadline … again. I had a subcontractor over this week for the plastering that needs to be done. And I initiated that way too late, so he’s not going to be able to meet my deadlines. I could go look for others, but I know the quality of this guy’s work and the fact that his agenda is full is a good sign too. He will squeeze me in early, because the job is not that big (for him anyway).
I’m keeping the deadline right where it is, and let the goal get overdue. I’m not going to ease on my work on the project, because I’m behind as it is. My ability to estimate the time of different jobs is getting better and better, meaning that I grossly underestimated the time to do some of them. It’s a good experience and I enjoy working on the project most of the time.
| Material State | ||
|---|---|---|
| 2nd floor renovated by 02-2007 | Some progress. Subcontractor came by, and I worked on Saturday. | |
| Active State | ||
| 2500 subscribers by 12-2007 | Overdue! 34% done. Up 5% from last week. It’s getting there  |
|
| Social State | ||
| Be in contact with friends and family 4 days a week | Yes. 7 out of 10 weeks. This one is going pretty good. | |
| Emotional State | ||
| No goal at this time | ||
| Physical State | ||
| Run half a marathon in 10-2008 | Obviously no progress, probably even negative progress. | |
Zen to Done / Getting Things Done – weekly review
Last week I didn’t do the weekly review checklist, because of my wedding anniversary and our visit to the sauna (it was actually in the sauna that I got sick). In the past week I did most of the stuff anyway, a bit on every day. This makes that for some of the points I’m done for this week already, and for some I have only small stuff to do. Which I’m skipping this week again, because today we’re going celebrate our wedding anniversary again. This time without getting sick (hopefully). We’re off to the beach today (the weather is excellent, just like spring), and visiting Tarzan the musical.
Random thought: Why is there no “Relax” or “Enjoy yourself” habit in Zen to Done? They are pretty essential in the big picture of productivity in my opinion.
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I know quite a number of people started out the year 2008 with several goals. Most of them probably have forgotten about it! But I am happy to see you following up on it. Keep up the good work.