After my not-so-brief hiatus, I’m back in the game. Although I’m a few weeks late, I’m taking stock of last year and the upcoming year in my first couple of posts in this new era of Living in Flux. Last week, I went back to analyze my goals from 2013 and how I ended up doing. I came out of the year with a surprising 4 of 10 accomplished.
Today, I want to focus on my 2013 yearly review. If you’re interested in seeing last year’s review, I covered 2012 in the same what went well/what didn’t go well fashion.
What Went Well in 2013
Life
Overall, I made a couple of big changes in my life. As you know, I was in a long distance relationship throughout 2012 and 2013. Well, I’m glad to say that the distance is no longer! In July, I packed up my stuff and headed to Rochester to start a new journey with Richard. Combining our stuff wasn’t easy and there were definitely bumps along the way, but we’re chug-chug-chugging along!
Career
In my career, things have stayed relatively the same, but have changed drastically at the same time. I was very lucky to be able to coordinate with my employer a remote work situation. Instead of commuting to the city each day, I walk down the hallway to my home office. Remote work has been going well and I feel so very fortunate to have such a flexible work situation.
Money
One of the major added benefits of moving from Hoboken to Rochester is that the cost of living is much, much lower. I was able to achieve some of my financial goals in 2013. Heck, I paid off nearly 15% of my student loans! From here on out, things should be looking up in the money department.
Travel
My major travel for the year was to Europe. Richard and I went to France and Spain, with a week spent in Provence with my coworkers in a castle on a work retreat. I can’t say enough good things about all of the food, experiences and fun that we had. I plan to share some of my experiences there in the next couple of weeks, so keep checking back!
What Didn’t Go Well in 2013
Life
As you may have been able to surmise, things have been pretty hectic for the last couple of months. Moving in and transitioning to cohabitation, a new city (well, old city since I’m originally from Rochester), and a new work situation has been quite the ride. As a result of trying to get settled, Living in Flux has certainly taken the back seat. Now that it’s a new year and things seem to finally be settling down, expect to see a lot more of me around these here parts.
Career
Things with my career have been going well. I have not one, but two furry coworkers (see one of them above). Overall, I think the transition to remote work has been what I expected it would be. However, the unexpected part has been that I have zero desire to spend any time in my office at my computer after I’m done working for the day. This is a good thing, because it means I’m not literally sitting in the same spot all of my working hours, but it means that I haven’t spent as much time writing or uploading pictures from our vacation and things like that.
Money
My bank account took a couple of hits this year (e.g. taxes, moving, emergency vet costs, new-to-me car) and I ended up not coming anywhere close to reaching my emergency fund goal of $10,000. That’s okay though, because that’s the reason I saved up money in the first place – to be able to handle situations that arise without having to go into debt. This year my focus is going to be on student loan repayment, so I’m going to focus on maintaining, not building, my efund for the time being.
Travel
I had a number of lofty goals for 2013 when it came to travel. I wanted to go to Chicago! I wanted to go to four new states! All the things! In reality, I didn’t do any of those. However, there is no room for complaining here, as I did go on a pretty legit trip to Europe.
Looking Ahead to 2014
I’ll be back later in the week with more goals and musings on 2014, but I wanted to close out this post with some general thoughts on 2014. As great as 2013 was, it was weird. Moving ended up being a much, much tougher transition for me than moving generally tends to be. Now that that’s all behind me, it’s time to focus on the future! This year, my focus (and the focus of the blog) is going to be shifting heavily towards my student loan journey and the different ways I try to find balance between aggressively paying off my loans and still being able to have a life and have fun. I hope you’re as excited as I am for this new direction.
