Yes… I know… you are probably thinking that nobody makes their New Year’s resolutions nearly 3 months into the year. In my defense, most of my resolutions were decided a while ago but it was just recently that I committed to blogging. For 2017, my spare time off of work was spent mostly on developing my flashcard mobile application. And for 2018, I have a few goals that I want to focus on to have an even more productive year.

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Resolution #1: Be conversational in Spanish

My father has always stressed the importance of learning a 3rd language which has always stuck with me. Being able to travel to Spanish speaking countries and to communicate fluently is something I want to accomplish. I have taken a few Spanish courses in university along with reading books and watching Netflix shows in Spanish. This has greatly improved my reading and writing. However, speaking and listening are areas I struggle with, especially when the conversations aren’t slowed down for me. To be conversational in Spanish, I want to push myself to communicate in Spanish 3 days a week.

Resolution #2: Complete and promote my flashcards mobile app project, My Vocab

Whether it’s going to Spanish classes, reading Spanish books, or watching animes in Spanish, it’s common for me to come across words that I don’t understand. Whenever this happens, I jot down the words on my notebook so I can review it later. However as time goes on, this process becomes more and more infeasible. I read Spanish books during my commute to work and watch Netflix shows in Spanish during dinner, so having a notebook wherever I go is not practical. And secondly, as I jot down more vocab, organizing and reviewing the vocab gets more and more difficult. With my interest in programming, I decided to develop a flashcards mobile app, My Vocab, that allows me to record, translate, and review words I want to learn. With the main features developed, I want to promote it to see how far I can take it and get as much feedback as possible.

Resolution #3: Read 20 books

I have always enjoyed reading and have been reading on and off throughout the years. With a stronger emphasis on improving my Spanish, I have spent the past year reading Spanish books during my commute to work. However, that’s where it stopped and I had never thought about dedicating more time to read. That is, until the following conversation I had with my girlfriend, Grace:

The conversation was simple, but it got me thinking. I can be more productive, I can read more, and I can do more. I searched up books I want to read immediately and established my book list within a few hours. The following day, I went on Indigo and purchased all the books on my book list that are available. I have dedicated time slots to read since then and have decided to read at least one chapter every day. I can already feel the impact it has on my thought process and is definitely one of the best decisions I have made this year so far. All it takes is one push or one inspiration and I’m thankful to Grace for that.

Resolution #4: Develop my personal brand

The first English book I decided to read this year is Crush it! by Gary Vaynerchuk. Throughout the book, Gary stresses the importance of developing your own personal brand. A personal brand to me is the way people remember you. Developing my personal brand can help me connect and build trust with a bigger audience and also for my case, document my growth and learnings over time which I find invaluable. To start it off, I’ll write a summary of every book I read and share the learnings that I take away from it.

Resolution #5: Start a new project

With My Vocab mobile app project coming to a close, I want to challenge myself to start a new project that can potentially be a business. I haven’t decided on the idea yet, but I’ll share it with you here once it’s decided.

So here are my 2018 resolutions as well as my first blog post. I’m excited about what this year brings and I’m looking forward to reaching my resolutions! Thank you for spending the time to read what I have to share. Feel free to leave me a comment on your 2018 resolutions as well and we can keep tabs on how each other is progressing throughout the year!

10 Comments

    1. Thank you so much for spending the time! 🙂 Hopefully, I can achieve most if not all of my resolutions. Already been spending a lot more time reading so far and I’m loving it! Goal setting is truly a motivational thing but I’ll need to keep it up!

      I was never known as a good writer back in school, so still lacking in this area. But hopefully, my desire and effort to improve will help me produce better content as time goes on. Will also be reading blog posts like yours to get some ideas on how to become a better blogger 🙂

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      1. Yes, if you want to get better at writing, one of the best things you can do is to continually read. Eventually, you’ll develop you’ll own writing voice and style, but reading others’ well-written works (not mine, read the masters! haha) is how you imbibe good structure, proper word choice and phrasing, etc.

        If you’re really serious about developing your writing style and would go as far as reading books about it, I recommend either Strunk’s “The Elements of Style” (more basic and lays out things more simply) or Pinker’s “The Sense of Style” (more modern and also a bit more advanced, but very informative).

        But don’t forget to have fun with blogging, too! Your blog posts ain’t gonna be graded by an English prof, hehe. Don’t be too concerned about getting everything right with regard to structure, grammar, flow, etc., that you forget to let your own voice shine through.

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      2. Thank you MistressoftheInk (let me know if I should refer to you by something other than your profile name) :). haha There are a lot of things I can learn from your posts. And you have good thought-provoking content as well!

        Thank you for the book suggestions! “The Sense of Style” sounds very interesting based on the summary. Maybe it’ll end up being one of the 20 books I read this year 😀

        And yup! I just really want to be able to convey my thoughts clearly and don’t have any structure, grammar, flow issues that will distract the readers from the content. But yes definitely having fun so far! Also rewarding too!

        People like you make the blogging experience so much better and fun 😀

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  2. Learn Spanish in 3 days…? Like conversational? Is that possible for us average Joes? XD

    I read that Gary Vee’s book too! If you love it, you gotta check out Jab Jab Jab Right Hook when you are done with it 🙂

    My NYReso is to grow my YouTube & Twitch Streaming Channel 😀
    I used to not have time to game tbh but ever since I found this new goal to work on, I have an excuse to play games while bringing smiles to my viewers and make some positive difference while I’m at it haha! Not a huge channel yet but glad to say that I got some regulars 🙂

    Hope you’re doing good Charles!

    Your pal,
    Benjamin
    http://www.projectbiy.com

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    1. “Communicate in Spanish 3 days a week” not communicate in Spanish in 3 days hahaha I hope I can be that good 😀
      Thanks! I’ll definitely consider reading it as part of my 20 books this year. I also know he has a new book, “Crushing It”, so I’ll also need to look into whether I should get that one as well. Are you planning to get this book? I need to do some research to learn about the differences in comparison to “Crush it” first.
      I don’t play many games but keep up the good work on your youtube channel! As long as we are persistent and have patience, we can reach our new year resolutions 🙂

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      1. Oh naww I read them via scrib’d, a monthly subscription app. For the amount you pay, you actually get A LOT of books to read!

        If you are good with ebooks, I definitely recommend it. Best part is you can cancel the subscription any time when you feel like you’re not using the service much anymore 🙂

        If you got time to read, definitely get it lol! Books like these can help push us further towards our goals 🙂

        Hope you’ve been good! Apologies for late respond, I tend to forget about WordPress comments due to many other responsibilities these days :O

        Your pal,
        Benjamin

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      2. No worries man! I’m staying away from e-books for now. Enjoy having some time off of devices, but will definitely look into scribd if I decide to go that route! Thanks a lot for the suggestion Ben! 🙂

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