I’m sure this will be an ever changing list, but it is good to get it down. How many times in my life have I taken 3 months to write down all the things I’d like to accomplish, and then categorize them? How many times? NONE. Well, one… now.
This list is sure to be ever-changing. I’ll add things to it. I’ll probably tweak some things already on it. I’ll accomplish some of these (some already have been!), and I’ll probably write some off as “that just isn’t going to happen, and I’m ok with that.” But in the end (or is this the beginning), I know what I’d like. Perhaps now I can develop some plans on how to get there.
So here we go… 9 pages (at this writing in Microsoft Word) of Chet Cromer’s wants and dreams. The six categories are kind of ranked right now, but the items within them are not… Yet. This one is definately “for me,” but as I’ve shared this experience of being coached and walking this life of starting to set goals and do what I do because it relates to what is important to me, I’ve noticed some people like to hop on the bus and go with me. So here we go.
#1: Mental Development
- Write a book (7/18/10)
- Write a 1 Year Devotional Book (7/18/10)
- Get a Master’s Degree (7/18/10)
- Teach a college level class (7/18/10)
- Learn to remember people’s names quickly. (7/23/10)
- Learn a new programming language (7/26/20)
- Read one book a week (8/3/10)
- Be known as a convincing person who can get others to act on their beliefs (8/3/10)
- Learn how to fly an R/C airplane (8/3/10)
- Develop a professional and regularly updated personal blog (8/9/10)
- Share my story / testimony in an auditorium full of people. (8/17/10) *
- Become a regular contributor to a magazine (8/17/10)
- Get training to be a counselor / mentor. (9/9/10)
- Get up early every day (5:00?) to make the most of the early morning hours (9/22/10)
- Identify and implement a project-based method of finishing tasks that works for both personal and business areas of my life (Mental Development)
- Spend one hour a day, Monday – Friday, on my sales action plan or self improvement. Listen and read to self improvement books / audio at least 5-6 times a week. (Mental Development)
- Getting from Start to Finish: Spend 30 minutes every day reading. Develop a place to keep 2-3 books on different subjects so they are accessible to me when I have time. Block off time to read (Mental Development)
- Proactive Self-Improvement: Make time each week to have an adult conversation with my wife and talk about what is important to us. (Mental Development)
- Intentional Reading Plan: Learn how to set goals with my wife. (Mental Development)
- Quality Family Time: Read with/to my children every day. (Mental Development)
- Develop Writing Skills: Create a blog or journal entry each day on something relevant to my day. (Mental Development)
- Develop and exercise speaking / teaching skills: Find an opportunity to teach a group on a regular basis. (Mental Development)
- Teach/Mentor/Train Individuals: Develop relationships with 1-2 specific men in my life, and reach out to 2-3 specific youth as well. Make a point to add something to their lives each week. (Mental Development)
- Retain what I’ve learned: Blog or journal a small summary from each day, before the day is gone forever.
#2: Financial / Career Development
- Develop a software application from the ground up and a client base for it as a large part of the business. (, 7/16/10)
- Help my wife open a restaurant (, 7/16/10)
- Leave work behind for a 2 week vacation (7/17/10) *
- Continue working hard, but don’t feel or be bound to a 9-5 “schedule” that dictates what I do each day. (7/17/10)
- Buy a working farm (7/17/10)
- Buy someone else a house (7/18/10)
- Have a real office. Not just a corner of the spare bedroom. (7/18/10)
- Be completely debt free (7/21/10)
- Define my company’s purpose and what we do in a specific, measurable statement. (7/23/10)
- Patent something (7/23/10)
- Learn a new programming language (7/26/10) *
- Sell a piece of software to a larger company
- Find an investor with an idea, and develop their product, start to finish. (7/31/10)
- Describe what I do in 1-2 sentences in a manner that is interesting and inspires followup. Do so in a manner that applies both to interested businesses and to individuals who just want to know what I do. (8/3/10)
- Get a new customer originating from a cold call (8/3/10)
- Give a seminar or teach a class on communicating with clients and finding solutions WITH them, not just FOR them. (8/3/10)
- Develop a catchy logo for my business (8/3/10)
- Go back to St. John USVI with the family. Pay for some friends to go with us. (8/3/10) *
- Remove myself from responsibilities that are superficial to what I want to focus on and that could be better handled by someone else (8/7/10)
- Develop a reputation within my local area as a business where honesty, results, and solution finding are important. (8/9/10)
- Become influential in my area of business focus (8/9/10)
- Develop a professional website for my company (8/9/10)
- Build an organized and useful contact list (8/10/10)
- Provide counsel as a regular part of my day – teens, men, couples. Perhaps even as a professional “side job.” (9/9/10) *
- Buy a new tractor, complete with attachments (9/9/10)
- Buy lower level season tickets to the Indianapolis Colts (9/9/10)
- Find someone to invest money, time, and commitment in one of MY ideas. (9/22/10)
- Make it through this time of business transition and come out stronger, leaner, more profitable, and happier (9/22/10)
- Give away an increasing proportion of my income: Find out what percentage we are currently giving away (instead of a set $) and increase it by 1% over two months. From that point forward, treat it as a specific % of income and increase it incrementally (Financial /Career Development)
- Prepare for unknown long-term future: Write My Will (Financial /Career Development)
- Become debt free: Create an amortization schedule for my last credit card and pay it off in 2 years. (Financial /Career Development)
- Open my eyes to alternate careers: Find a good book about the career of Christian counseling. (Financial /Career Development)
- Plan ahead for business finances: Create a “dream” and “bare minimum” budget for C2IT starting from the point I’m at right now for the next 12 months. (Financial /Career Development)
- Build residual income: Start a NING site for home-service and fleet-based businesses with the expectation of building them a custom ticket / dispatch management solution. (Financial /Career Development)
- Give away an increasing proportion of my income: Read the biography of R.G. LeTourneau (Financial /Career Development)
#3: Family Life Development
- Help my wife open a restaurant (7/16/10)
- Go horseback riding for a week out west (7/16/10)
- Leave work behind for a 2 week vacation (7/17/10)
- See each of my children come to know Jesus. (7/17/10) *
- Participate in my children’s baptisms (7/17/10) *
- Buy a working farm (7/17/10) *
- Have a family that grows stronger with time, even after my children leave home. (7/23/10)
- Teach my son that he has what it takes, so that he believes it, not just because I tell him. (7/23/10)
- Teach my daughter that her worth is far beyond anything a person can assign to her, and that she will always be beautiful (7/23/10)
- Explore with my wife our pasts, fears, and dreams. Write them down, and accomplish them together (7/23/10)
- Develop a yearly family vacation that we do each year as a tradition, such as a camping trip. (7/23/10)
- Host an exchange student (7/23/10)
- Develop a family crest that we can hand down when our children grow (7/23/10)
- Self-fund my retirement plan (8/3/10)
- Max out my IRA contributions by the time I’m 40. (8/3/10)
- Pay cash for a car (8/3/10)
- See my wife develop confidence in herself (8/3/10)
- Go back to St. John USVI with the family. Pay for some friends to go with us. (8/3/10)
- Make my wife proud of what I do (8/7/10)
- Go to Hawaii (9/22/10)
- Cruise the Mediterannean (9/22/10)
- Cruise Alaska (9/22/10)
- Reach out to kids without a stable home environment through love and hope (Family Life Development)
- Develop an intentional use of time together each day so that I recognize its value (Family Life Development)
- Take a two week vacation to a place far, far away. (Family Life Development)
- Develop better methods to “leave work at work,” both during the week and on vacation. (Family Life Development)
- Plan our future together with my family – short and long term. (Family Life Development)
- Become a couple known for listening, understanding, and even giving counsel to other couples and teens. (Family Life Development)
- Spend more planned one-on-one time with my wife. (Family Life Development)
- See my children come to know (and be known by), love (and be loved by), and serve their Creator. (Family Life Development)
- Develop regular one-on-one activities with my children. (Family Life Development)
- Encourage my children to find and pursue their dreams, even at an early age. (Family Life Development)
- Encourage and help my wife find/rediscover/pursue her dreams, no matter how far-fetched they may seem (to her or to me) (Family Life Development)
- Understand my own need for personal discovery, and recotnize that each of us will have to make some journeys on our own. (Family Life Development)
- Turn Thursdays into a father-son day including breakfast, dropoff and pickup from preschool, and an activity after school. (Family Life Development)
- Establish a monthly meeting with my wife to set up our budget, our calendar, and monthly goals. (Family Life Development)
- Plan a week in 2011 to go somewhere new. Put in the calendar, and plan for it as a goal. (Family Life Development)
- Establish a monthly date night with my wife. Look ahead 2-3 months. (Family Life Development)
- Get out once a quarter for a personal-discovery outing (camping, long walk, etc.) (Family Life Development)
#4: Ethics and Beliefs
- Open an after-school coffee shop to serve teens and provide adults a place to mentor them. (, 7/16/10)
- Lead an event for teens “into the wild” with horses, camping, life lessons, and spiritual discovery (, 7/16/10)
- Lead an overseas missions trip (7/17/10)
- Give an ever-increasing percentage of my income to church, ministries, and charities. (7/17/10)
- See each of my children come to know Jesus. (7/17/10)
- Participate in my children’s baptisms (7/17/10)
- Write a 1 year devotional book (7/18/10) *
- Lead 100 people to know Jesus (7/17/10)
- Pray with 1000 people (7/19/10)
- Be known as a man of honesty, integrity, and confidentiality to a point that I am sought out by and approachable to others. (7/23/10)
- Never look at pornography again, and develop a habit of bouncing my eyes and impure thoughts (7/23/10)
- Develop a solution for a ministry that is core to their operation. (8/3/10)
- Be invited to the leadership or board of an influential ministry (8/3/10)
- Start a not-for-profit company to mentor and care for rural and suburban teens (8/9/10)
- Help someone else share THEIR story in front of an auditorium full of people (8/17/10)
- Provide counsel as a regular part of my day – teens, men, couples. Perhaps even as a professional “side job.” (9/9/10)
- Create a once or twice ayear youth outing / retreat with reflection, teambuilding, and the “big picture” story (9/9/10)
- Plant a church (9/9/10)
- Help someone else plant a church (9/9/10)
- Lead and serve in an area I am passionate about (Ethics and Beliefs Development)
- Become a youth pastor or leader in a local church. (Ethics and Beliefs Development)
- Start, or find and participate in, a mentoring ministry for kids at my church and in local schools. (Ethics and Beliefs Development)
- Become effective at developing leadership teams (Ethics and Beliefs Development)
- After becoming leader of a large area in a church or organization, develop a leadership team that does the work of leading… TOGETHER. (Ethics and Beliefs Development)
- Serve in non-spiritual areas outside of my church: Expand mentoring ministry from local church to local school. (Ethics and Beliefs Development)
- Develop leadership skills: Continue coaching experience past initial sales / personal life focus. (Ethics and Beliefs Development)
- Develop lists of core beliefs and understandings: Make a list of personal beliefs that are non-negotiable, and develop a written understanding of each. Develop into a list of personal and business values. (Ethics and Beliefs Development)
- Read a book on leadership of some sense each quarter. (Ethics and Beliefs Development)
- Let someone develop ME. (Ethics and Beliefs Development)
- Establish a mentor relationship with Steve Pierce and meet with him on regular basis for prayer, advice, and simple sharing. (Ethics and Beliefs Development)
#5: Social Development
- Be invited to play a participating role in someone else’s wedding (7/17/10)
- Lead 100 people to know Jesus (7/18/10) *
- Pray with 1000 people (7/19/10) *
- Maintain a strong friendship with another man throughout life, regardless of circumstances (7/23/10)
- Become influential in my area of community focus (8/9/10)
- Share my story / testimony in an auditorium full of people. (8/17/10)
- Help someone else share THEIR story in front of an auditorium full of people (8/17/10) *
- Run for public office (9/9/10)
- Obtain a position in public service, either through election or appointment (9/9/10)
- Become comfortable with incomplete thoughts (Social Development)
- Gain confidence in unfamiliar group social settings. (Social Development)
- Place myself in unfamiliar social settings. Go into the event with a good answer to the question “what do you do” and be prepared to meet new people with specific personal questions. (Social Development)
- Keep / Guide / Place conversations on the intended / relevant topic. (Social Development)
- When leading a discussion, have an outline and guide of where the discussion is going. Review the outline following the discussion and make notes on successes and areas where improvement is needed. (Social Development)
- Become more familiar with relevant current events: Find a relevant source for news – local and national – and review it on a regular (but not obsessive) basis. (Social Development)
- Become familiar with events in my clients’ industries. (Social Development)
- Pay attention in conversations with clients about THEIR customers, industry happenings, and set up Google Alerts for these items. Review them regularly (but not obsessively) and forward interesting information to clients. (Social Development)
- Develop conversational skills that incite responses.
- Intentionally ask questions that do not have a Yes/No or other one-word easy-answer. For close friends, develop a question more than “how are you.”
- Develop my own personal response to “how are you,” that while genuine, is not as shallow as “fine.” Possibly even consider the answer to this question each morning, affirming how I am, who I am, and what I am here for.
#6: Physical Development
- Put on a full football uniform, including gear, and do something in it. (, 7/16/10)
- Train and compete in an athletic event such as a triathalon or mountain bike race. (, 7/16/10)
- Hike the Appalachian Trail (7/18/10)
- Lose weight and gain muscle so that I am no longer categorized as obese or even overweight. (7/23/10)
- Climb (or ride a horse) down and back up the Grand Canyon (7/23/10)
- Raise a horse from a baby, including doing or helping with the initial training. (8/3/10)
- Be able to see my abdominal muscles (8/3/10)
- Cut pop out of my life (8/3/10)
- Hit a home run at a softball game (8/7/10)
- Participate in an offroad triathalon (8/16/10)
- Do a yearly walk/run event with my wife (8/16/10)
- Move out of the obese and overweight sections of the BMI (8/16/10)
- Ride a bull (8/17/10)
- Cut, rake, and bale a field of hay (8/17/10)
- Get my yard and landscaping under control (8/18/10)
- Ride in a NASCAR racecar (9/9/10)
- Build an obstacle course. (9/9/10)
- Get exercise with my family on a regular basis (Physical Development)
- Participate in a team-based competitive activity that includes training and competition/goal that I can work towards. (Physical Development)
- Build endurance without fatigue (Physical Development)
- Increase my weight training abilities. (Physical Development)
- Find a personal sport or individual achievement to accomplish. (Physical Development)
- Be satisfied with my body composition. (Physical Development)
- Build flexibility. (Physical Development)
- Plan a monthly family outing based on the weather for that time of year. (Physical Development)
- Plan a weekly family outing around the home for exercise. (Physical Development)
- Work out 3-4 times around the house on my own or with my wife. (Physical Development)