First Month Of 2023: How It's Been Going So Far - January Recap

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January written out of Scrabble letters on white background - featured image for January recap

I won’t do it.

I won’t… No.

I have to.

I can’t believe January is over! Lol.

That was fast. I feel like I’ve done nothing this month; it went by so far I barely noticed it. January was full of getting into new habits, refining my goals for this year, and discovering myself. Choosing my word for the year was a great idea. It helped me to focus on what I want and on following my own path, not someone else’s.

I decided to ditch Instagram for now. Yeah, I know, I just set myself a goal to grow my following there, and now I’m giving up? The thing is, that I wanted to start a business and get into blogging to be able to have more freedom, and I don’t think Instagram fit anywhere in my current vision.

RELATED:
2022 Year Review & Goals For 2023: I’m Going To Make This The Best Year Yet

Maybe I’ll change my mind in a month or two.

Maybe I’ll delete my account altogether.

Who knows?

If you want to know more where my decision came from, check out my blog growth report that will go live next week.

Navigate to where you want to go:

Highlights of the month

Wow, I cannot think of any highlights this month. It’s unbelievable.

There is one thing that deserves to be here, though, and it’s my daughter starting a nursery. Even though she spent more time at home being sick that in the nursery itself, it was so refreshing to have a bit of time for myself and to be able to work in my office corner instead of on the living room floor.

Challenges of the month

It’s been a struggle to post twice a week, to be honest. This is my eight post published this month and I can’t believe I actually pulled this off. Truly.

Last week, I hit a very low point and wanted to disappear once again. I took a break, decided against publishing anything on Friday, and went for a walk. And you know what? In the evening, I sat down to write my 400 words for the day and I finished a draft. Instead of rushing it, I decided to publish something I wrote weeks ago and kept ready “just in case”.

Content schedule is supposed to help you stay organised and work for you, not against you. If you can’t keep up with it, make some changes without feeling guilty. There’s nothing wrong with changing your mind or taking a break when you feel unwell.

Personal goals and habits I worked on in January

Seeing that sharing my blogging strategies and goals motivates me to achieve them and actually remember about them, I decided to share my personal goals here too.

I realised, though, that I haven’t really set any personal goals for the year… That’s why I spent a lot of time refining all of my goals, adding new ones, and brainstorming habits I’d like to implement this year to help me achieve those goals.

Finally, I came up with a new strategy to tackle setting goals and habits. I’ll share more about it soon!
It wasn’t such an unproductive month by any means, though. I successfully implemented a new habit of writing 400 words a day and writing my Evening Pages daily. If you don’t know what Evening Pages are, check out this blog post where I talked more about it.

On the blog in January

Most popular posts

What To Pack When Moving Abroad – The Ultimate Packing List For Moving Abroad – pretty self explanatory! It has everything you need to know about packing when moving abroad.

The Ultimate Guide To How To Pack For A Move In 3 Days – all about the tips and tricks I collected during my last 7 house moves.

The Ultimate Guide To St Ives – 13 Best Things To Do In St Ives, Cambridgeshire – my travel guide for St Ives, Cambridgeshire based on my personal experience of living there for a year.

January favourites

Books

Well, this is getting quite boring… I’m still reading a mega-series I started in November last year – Dragon’s Gift. I just finished both, The Druid and The Amazon, series. Since they’re pretty similar to each other, I can’t say which one was my favourite book, but I can say which was the worst book I came across this month.

Spare.

I read about 30% of it and honestly? I can’t go any further than that. It’s literally impossible. The entire book is boring and written sooo badly. Sure, I’ve mentioned earlier that I don’t enjoy reading non-fiction books, but this has nothing to do with it.

Actually, it would be refreshing to read something completely different, with no magic, dragons, or demons. Royal family has always fascinated me, and I really thought that Spare would be an interesting, insightful book to show the public how the Royal family looks like from the inside.

Nope.

It’s nothing like that.

One more Pa or Mummy and I’ll go crazy.

Netflix and shows

January was my last month with Netflix, and I don’t think I’ll be coming back. I forgot to cancel my subscription before it renewed so I stuck with it but didn’t watch anything. I just switched to Disney Plus, which looks like a better option for now.

I can’t believe I’m saying it, but I actually enjoyed watching Cars. And Scary Movie. It’s not as bad as I thought it was.

Podcasts

I enjoy listening to podcasts but I also forget about them quickly. There’s one that stayed in my mind for longer and gave me a lot of food for thoughts. It’s Allie Cassazza’s interview with Marisa Peer about owning your enoughness, overcoming shame, & rewiring your brain. Check it out, it’s really good.

Personal goals and habits I want to work on in February

There’s one goal I want to focus in particular in February and it’s creating a product. I have a few ideas and did a bit of market research, so I’m really hopeful.

There are three new habits I want to implement on top of ones started in January, obviously:

meditate for 5 minutes,
declutter, clean, or organise one area a day (or for 15 minutes),

drink 1 litre of water.

They scare me a bit, to be honest.

Coming up in February

Well, I don’t want to jinx it but I still want to keep posting twice a week in February. I’ve been feeling uninspired and unmotivated to write lately. I don’t remember the last time I had trouble brainstorming content ideas!

One thing is sure, I want to create a challenge in February. I’ve already drafted it but I’m still going back and forth trying to decide whether it’s really a good idea or I should go for another idea I have in mind. We’ll see how it goes.

Since it’s supposed to be a freezing month this year, I don’t think we’ll go for any trip, either nearby nor further away. I can’t wait for the weather to get warmer, as I’d love to go for a walk by the sea!

What about you? Have you planned anything fun in February? Let me know in the comments below!

First Month Of 2023: How It’s Been Going So Far – January Recap

Highlights of the month

Challenges of the month

Personal goals and habits I worked on in January