I realised that other day that all the girls in my life are incredibly motivated, tenacious and successful. That’s not to say that the guys aren’t, but most of them are in the ‘I should probably do stuff at some point’ camp rather than the ‘I’m epically juggling 25 things and I’m still trying to achieve more’ camp.

I was discussing life and the universe with one of my friends when out of the blue she asked me, ‘So what’s your five year plan?’

My instinctive response was, ‘What five year plan? I’m supposed to have a five year plan?’

Instead I kind of mumbled something along the lines of ‘I don’t really have one’, quietly, as if for some reason that would make her reaction even the slightest bit different. She was pretty, erm, surprised (to put it mildly), and considering she recently became a full-time mother/housewife, I think it freaked us both out.

In five years’ time, assuming I make it that far, I’ll be 31. Some days I find it hard to get through the next five minutes, let alone the next five years. Everything I’ve read and been advised on is firmly fixed on staying in the present. Don’t think too far ahead or too far behind, because it’s scary. And for the most part, that works pretty well for me. On days where I’m feeling so anxious that I have to break down my fifteen minute walk to work into achievable sections in order to ensure I actually make it there, it’s incredibly helpful.

Having said that, I’m really good at writing lists and achieving aims when it comes to work and I want to transfer some of that mentality to my own projects and short term goals, for various reasons. I need to get websites finished, I need to get organised, and I need to make some money to pay for The World’s Most Expensive Fence (long story short, it’s going to cost the best part of £2,000 to get this bad boy fixed, and that’s before I even consider that I desperately need a new kitchen). So I have ultimate goals for this year, which is a start. It seems easier to have goals which aren’t focused around a specific time frame.

One of March’s goals is to get my new photo site finished…

So here’s my list of things I want to achieve this month:

• Read at least one business book – I buy them pretty regularly and they never fail to motivate me, but most of them are sitting on my bookshelf unread.
• Reply to all emails, tweets and PMs – I am rubbish at this. People email me to ask if they can give me money, and I still sometimes forget to reply, which is just completely ridiculous. So my ongoing goal is to reply to everything that requires an answer.
• Finish my photo project – Recently I’ve picked up an old project I abandoned in the summer – a themed website for free and cheap stock photos. People keep asking me whether I’m selling my photography, and I want to get this website properly live by the end of the month so I can cross it off my list of projects.
• Start reading my photography stuff – I bought Scott Kelby’s Digital Photography series as well as ‘The Ultimate Nikon SLR Handbook’, and I’ve flicked through them but not really sat down with them properly. Plus, they smell really good, so that’s another incentive.
• Get up earlier – It’s getting lighter earlier now, and I love having an hour or so before work to get things done, whether it’s a quick workout or stuff round the house or catching up on internet stuff. So it’s time to start getting up earlier every day, instead of just sporadically like I am at the moment.
  

• Exercise more – Even if it’s yoga for relaxation rather than proper cardio or weights, I need to do more instead of crashing on the sofa. I’m hoping I’ll be able to renew my gym membership within the next couple of months too – I really miss the rowing machines.
  

• Reduce the caffeine again – I was doing pretty well at cutting out caffeine, but it’s starting to creep back up again. It definitely makes me more anxious in the long-term, so it needs to go.
• Get a couple more websites live – I’ve been waiting for Joe to finish a WordPress CSS gallery theme he started for me a while back. I have domains with good backlinks sitting around doing nothing at the moment, and it’s just not sustainable or practical to create a load of blogs. So instead I intend to get CSS galleries and high-quality, limited directories up fast. Once it’s done, it should make accepting submissions and publishing new pages as easy as approving comments. I’m hoping to use this in various forms across at least five or six of the domains I have lying around, so fingers crossed it will work out.

I could add at least another twenty things to this list, but I’m trying to make sure it stays manageable. This month I’m going to a conference, visiting three lots of friends in various parts of the country and going to at least two birthday events, so I don’t want to pile too much on. I’ll write an update to this at some point as extra motivation and to see how I get on.

What are your goals for March?