Because I don’t feel like blogging on New Year’s Day this year, I thought it
would be good to knock out a year in review post on this final Monday of the
year.
Recap
2018 was a transitional year of sorts for me as well as the family. For me I
went from riding the high of quitting my job to work on a startup, failing
fucking miserably, and starting a new job after a short stint of freelancing.
For the kiddo, her big transition was from dance to music, specifically drums.
She decided to quit dance after attending a new, presumably better studio, that
specializes in beating kids down emotionally rather than build them up.
All for the best though, quality of life has went up immensely with a solid
life lesson of knowing how to value yourself and your time when you’re in an
abusive situation.
I know the aforementioned dance exodus was a big deal for the wife, but for her,
I think the biggest transition has been in her wholly stepping into the role of
family treasurer and budgetarian.
I’d say she’s the CFO of Team Sherman, but she hasn’t jumped at the opportunity
of doing the taxes yet 😉
Overall the year started somewhat high, went down hill quick then has been on a
decent upswing since. Hoping the trend continues through 2019 even though I know
we are probably going to be facing some hard times with at least one of the
pugs.
Accomplishments
So last year I set out on what I would consider somewhat modest goals.
As modest as I could have considered them, I barely made a dent in two thirds of
them.
With that, when you shoot for the stars, you may land on the moon, or whatever
they say. I still managed to read a dozen books and put together at
least one song I was pretty proud of.
Where I was able to crush it, was on my fitness goal of 1,000 reps of body
weight exercises per month. In fact, thanks to the 7-Minute Workout, and
actually doing it every single day of 2018, I was able to knock out 5,000-6,000
reps of body weight exercises every month.
Lessons Learned
I think the biggest lesson of 2018 for me is that ideas are not only worthless
without execution, but execution isn’t really shit if nobody wants what you’re
selling.
Shipping doesn’t fix everything*, customers do. Preferably paying customers
unless those customers are actually your product 😉
At the end of the day, every single fucking statement is just smoke and mirrors
if you don’t have customers. Hell, even if you have a customer or two, it’s
still just hearsay, often times just opinions about what may or may not work.
I’m still trying to be more of an optimist, but there’s a healthy level of
skepticism being factored in anymore. Everybody gets taken with a big ass
helping of Morton’s until they prove otherwise.
With that, I’ve learned to trust my gut a ton more in regard to building,
marketing and selling a product. After being in a job for a while that beat me
down, I lost sight of that in a lot of ways.
Not saying I know everything, but being in the trenches of products and
platforms for nearly 20 years has to account for something.
* Yes, I know I need to update my tag line 😉
