The Year in Review

As is my custom, I find it helpful to reflect upon the good and the bad of 2025.  I start the year with goals; this post looks back at some of them and considers other factors we experienced this year.

Spiritual

My goals here:

- Be disciplined in reading/prayer routines (and reduce putzing).
- Do devotionals with the family twice a week.
- Serve better, but in fewer roles.
- Focus more on others. Figure out balance with competing needs.

Some good things here. Prayer was better from mid-year on, when I started doing evening quiet times (in addition to morning) with better regularity. And I now do Sunday morning 'prayer walks' for about an hour, which has been transformative. Humbling but good and necessary.

I did not do devotionals with the family nearly enough.

I stepped down from two roles this year (one 'permanently' and the other temporarily), which was needed to better focus on the family and my own spiritual disciplines. That has been helpful, yet life remains overwhelming at times due to the busyness of the season (lots of activities and obligations for all five of us). Overall, though, this was a positive year spiritually.

Nutritional/Fitness

My goals here:

- Get (and keep) weight under 185 lbs.
- Eat more fruit/vegetables. Eat out less.
- Improve gut health.
- Complete 270 workouts; bike 1200 miles.

Weight loss achieved! For the first time since college, I dropped my weight under 180 lbs (my low was 175). I am just over 180 today, as the holiday eating has taken its tool, but am confident I can stay at/under 180 moving forward. What a blessing. The keys for me have been eating less (and better) and walking more (doing an evening mile walk plus other things). 

I completed 272 workouts, which is satisfactory. I had shoulder surgery in April that knocked out a month, but I was able to hit 1000 miles on the bike, making it the first time I've done 1K in consecutive years.

Most workouts were gym, bike rides, and yardwork. Including the past few years' totals for reference:

2023: 22 runs for 54 miles, 182 gym workouts, 58 bike rides for 623 miles, 15 hikes/walks for 55 miles, 21 mow/yardwork, 113 hours spent working on the basement.

2024: 12 runs for 25 miles, 169 gym workouts, 82 bike rides for 1119 miles, 9 mow/yardwork, 13 'other' (hikes, etc.)

2025: 9 runs for 14 miles, 127 gym workouts, 92 bike rides for 1015 miles, 34 hikes for ~95 miles, 10 yard work (mowing/shoveling)

Reading
My goals here:

- Read 50 books.
- Read 15 works at my American Reading List.
- Minimize my owned-but-unread pile

I read 55 books, and kept my 'owned but unread' pile at an okay number. My post here caps this year's book recommendations. I read only 5 works on my ARL. Overall, though, I'm satisfied.

Household Management

My goal here:

- Minimize stuff in the home.
- Figure out ideal home organization.
- Buy less/budget better.

Buying less went pretty well until November, where the sales got me. I need to be better about ending the year well. Our home still has too many things. We made some home organization strides, but not enough. This one needs improvement.

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Conclusion
Looking across the categories above, it was a pretty good year. Here's to a better 2026. "Never stop starting."