Do something scary - Meet your objectives

Twenty five years I worked for a major corporation where objectives were established and regular evaluations measured my performance. Objectives were usually clear, concise and achievable even if they were a stretch.  Now that I'm closing on three months of retirement I'm considering my next evaluation.  What were my retirement objectives? Have I achieved?

When I mentioned my concerns about setting and achieving my retirement goals to my daughter she said "If you want to know if you're making the most of your time and achieving your goals ask yourself 'What have you done that's scary'?"


Hmmm.....interesting. I thought about it and I realized I'd done lots of scary things since I retired, actually retiring was first on the list!

Let's see:

Retirement objectives: Start an online quilting business and work at it full time. Complete my nine UFO's (unfinished objects!)

Accomplishments:

I opened an Etsy shop. www.etsy.com/shop/pieceandtranquilty Scary: lots of techie stuff to learn. Then I actually made my first sale after 2 weeks! I can't say I'm working at it full time but I do several hours a day.

I joined a quilt guild. Scary, not good at groups, shy meeting new people, Everyone was wonderful, nothing to be scared of.

At the insistence of my new guild friends I entered a quilt in a show for the very first time. Very scary! I won a Viewers Choice Award at my very first show! What was I scared of exactly?

I started this blog, writing about all of the above. Scary, would I have something interesting to say? Would anyone want to read what I write?

I started a Facebook page for my business: https://www.facebook.com/PieceAndTranquilty. Not too scary after all that other techie stuff.

Last but not least, I completed a dozen cat quilts, 2 table runners (one of them was a UFO), and made progress on a full size quilt (another UFO) - only a little left to do on that one!

Only a few days to go until my evaluation.....I hope it goes well! Maybe I'll give myself a raise! What do you think?