Setting new goals 2021

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How is everyone setting up goals for 2021?

After reaching goals how is everyone setting new ones?? I feel like I have been resting on my laurels too long.

Work goal for 2021 will be get out of retail! Love my current spot but do not see it lasting forever. Wanting to FIRE but feel like it is a waste of my Pharm.d
 
My goal is to make my money work for me. This SDN forum has been tremendously helpful. I just started buying individual stocks a couple months ago and have done better than expected so far. Of course there's the chance of losing it all, but I'm only risking money that I can afford to lose. Normal people have become millionaires this past decade by investing in Apple, Google, Amazon, Facebook, Tesla etc. I missed out on all of that.
 
Good thread. I was just thinking about this recently. Should I focus on eliminating debt? Get into being a landlord? Become the next Warren Buffet? It's so hard to choose. :/

In terms of career goals I have one. Do not be laid off. I already had my hours cut from 40 to 35 so I would hate for that to get worse. I do have ample emergency fund should that happen and I suppose I could always try to find a roommate or two if it came to that.
 
My goal for 2021 is to visit two national parks: Yosemite and Yellowstone..
I never made it to Yosemite, but made it to Yellowstone. Recommend at least a week, plan in advance, beware of road construction in the park, and go just after labor day. After labor day weather usually beautiful, crowds drop off a lot. Also make reservations. Finally visit the grand tetons they are right next door.
 
Not really sure why anyone would want to be a landlord when you can just park your money into index funds.

Dealing with the tenants.. Either you have to learn the maintenance or pay arms and legs to have someone fix things. Sounds awful.

I don’t know, YouTube would lead me to believe it’s super easy and you just roll around in the passive income all day.
 
Yosemite NP - peak flows typically late May but that's close to Memorial Day weekend. Also Glacier Point Rd is closed all of 2021 due to renovation so if you want to hit Glacer Point or Taft Point you'd have to hike from the valley floor
 
I never made it to Yosemite, but made it to Yellowstone. Recommend at least a week, plan in advance, beware of road construction in the park, and go just after labor day. After labor day weather usually beautiful, crowds drop off a lot. Also make reservations. Finally visit the grand tetons they are right next door.

Yeah no way I am going there without seeing grand Tetons. In fact I am also planning on adding Glacier NP which is 5-6 hours away, for a total of 10 day trip.
 
Great thread. My 2020 goal was stabilization. I am now in a no debt situation with a decent amount saved, which feels really good (long story how I got here...it involves some tragedy, some luck, and a lot of saving and living a “boring” life). I’m not able to retire yet, but maybe in ten to twelve years. So my goal is not to lose my job, either. I think I have finally accomplished stability though.

I now feel stable so I’d like to build. Maybe take on things I wouldn’t otherwise have risked. Maybe something new at work, but only if the right opportunity came along. Maybe just some travel. It would be nice to actually stop living like a student and loosen up for a few minor indulgences.
 
In terms of career goals I have one. Do not be laid off. I already had my hours cut from 40 to 35 so I would hate for that to get worse. I do have ample emergency fund should that happen and I suppose I could always try to find a roommate or two if it came to that.

I dunno what our company is doing. They need to like buy out a competitor or something to get some business...

Anyway, personal goal is to just control things I can control. I'm fortunate to be in a better position than most and have tried to make and save/invest as much as I could for the past 12 years in my RPh career. However, if that is to stop at some point in the future, I do plan on going back to school and rebrand.
 
I dunno what our company is doing. They need to like buy out a competitor or something to get some business...

You're not wrong. We haven't gotten any new business at my site in so long I have started to wonder if we don't have a sales team or what is going on.
 
You're not wrong. We haven't gotten any new business at my site in so long I have started to wonder if we don't have a sales team or what is going on.

Our Achilles heel is the lack of aggressive expansion/effective sales team. I strongly believe we offer the best in class service and am dumbfounded at how the smaller regional chains can get a piece of the pie. In my experience most of new business came from M&A (that's how I ended up here) and especially with the infusion of wall street money and merger in the past couple of years, hopefully we should be primed to make another purchase.
 
Didn't mean to detail the thread, but assuming I'm still gainfully employed next year...

Hope to speculate on vaccine/hopefully late covid stocks
 
Anyway, personal goal is to just control things I can control. I'm fortunate to be in a better position than most and have tried to make and save/invest as much as I could for the past 12 years in my RPh career. However, if that is to stop at some point in the future, I do plan on going back to school and rebrand.
What would you go back to school for?
 
What would you go back to school for?

It all depends on what your strengths and interests are. For people who really love healthcare, perhaps they might go back and get a PA or even MD. For those with an aptitude in problem solving, there's coding boot camps. I have been in a continuous process of finding an alternative career path that best fits my strengths, interests, and my timeline (age and amount of time I'm willing to spend in school). Choosing an education or career is probably the most important decision you'll make in your life second to choosing your partner in marriage. It's really important to understand that and know yourself to make an informed decision instead of going with what a random person says on the internet.
 
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It all depends on what your strengths and interests are. For people who really love healthcare, perhaps they might go back and get a PA or even MD. For those with an aptitude in problem solving, there's coding boot camps. I am and have been in a continuous process of finding an alternative career path that best fits my strengths, interests, and my timeline (age and amount of time I'm willing to spend in school). Choosing an education or career is probably the most important decision you'll make in your life second to choosing your partner in marriage. It's really important to understand that and know yourself to make an informed decision instead of going with what a random person tells you on the internet.
I make informed decisions, and I don’t just go with what a random person tells me on the internet. I’m not sure how you got that idea. Lol. I’m just curious to see what others are switching to because maybe it’s worthy of consideration.

My strengths and interests are being a clinical pharmacist, but anyone in this profession knows that’s not enough. Healthcare is all about money now. The nonsense and politics is even affecting physicians, and many of them have told me they discouraged their kids from going into medicine.

I don’t want to pick another career, go to school for years, get in debt, only to find out that my strengths and interests are not enough. Just like pharmacy. Job security, good work-life balance, minimal stress, and good work environment are equally important, if not more. Pharmacy was not saturated when I started pharmacy school. Otherwise, I would not have gone regardless of how interested I was, or how well my strengths aligned with the profession.
 
I want to learn Spanish. Going to Mexico City in Jan 2022 for the USMNT World Cup Qualifier against the hated, diabolical El Tri.
I pirated Rosetta Stone and used it once. The only thing I remember from my 1 hour study is "las ninas beben". And, I can check prescription written in Spanish from sheer word/pattern recognition.
 
I make informed decisions, and I don’t just go with what a random person tells me on the internet. I’m not sure how you got that idea. Lol. I’m just curious to see what others are switching to because maybe it’s worthy of consideration.

I don’t want to pick another career, go to school for years, get in debt, only to find out that my strengths and interests are not enough. Just like pharmacy. Job security, good work-life balance, minimal stress, and good work environment are equally important, if not more. Pharmacy was not saturated when I started pharmacy school. Otherwise, I would not have gone regardless of how interested I was, or how well my strengths aligned with the profession.

Sorry, my words weren't directed towards you, and I certainly didn't mean it that way. It's more for those "PharmtoPA" people where they'll want to be spoon fed a career path when told that pharmacy isn't a good choice in terms of ROI. I definitely agree, job security, good work-life balance, minimal stress, and good work environment are qualities that any job or career seeker would want to have. Any job or career choice fitting that criteria would obviously be extremely competitive or have a lower than desired salary. BLS is an excellent resource btw
 
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Sorry, my words weren't directed towards you, and I certainly didn't mean it that way. It's more for those "PharmtoPA" people where they'll want to be spoon fed a career path when told that pharmacy isn't a good choice in terms of ROI. I definitely agree, job security, good work-life balance, minimal stress, and good work environment are qualities that any job or career seeker would want to have. Any job or career choice fitting that criteria would obviously be extremely competitive or have a lower than desired salary.
It’s ok. I just wanted to clarify. I’ve just been burned so badly with Pharmacy even though I did my research. There’s no way I could have predicted what this profession would become. I’m worried about making the same mistake again. I know people who have gone to med school, pa school, and dental school after pharmacy. They’re going to have lots of loans, and those professions have their own set of problems. Although they’re better than pharmacy.

As for the important qualities of a job that I listed above, I know I might not get all of those, but I’d like to get as close as I can. Especially if I’m going to go back to school. Pharmacy used to have a lot of those qualities back when I chose it. It was always stressful, but not unbearable like it is now.
 
Sorry, my words weren't directed towards you, and I certainly didn't mean it that way. It's more for those "PharmtoPA" people where they'll want to be spoon fed a career path when told that pharmacy isn't a good choice in terms of ROI. I definitely agree, job security, good work-life balance, minimal stress, and good work environment are qualities that any job or career seeker would want to have. Any job or career choice fitting that criteria would obviously be extremely competitive or have a lower than desired salary. BLS is an excellent resource btw
BLS was not accurate about pharmacy, so I take anything I read there with a grain of salt. My school kept using the BLS statistics to inform us about the pharmacist shortage. Where’s the huge shortage by year 2020 that they kept talking about? 🙁
 
BLS was not accurate about pharmacy, so I take anything I read there with a grain of salt. My school kept using the BLS statistics to inform us about the pharmacist shortage. Where’s the huge shortage by year 2020 that they kept talking about? 🙁

Once the pharmacy school expansion happened (from like 90ish schools to over 140 today), the writing was on the wall. I graduated in 2008 and it still wasn't easy to get a job even back then.
 
Once the pharmacy school expansion happened (from like 90ish schools to over 140 today), the writing was on the wall. I graduated in 2008 and it still wasn't easy to get a job even back then.
Interesting. In my area, things got bad a year after that. It has gotten progressively worse each year.

When I started pharmacy school, they were closing stores some days because they didn’t have enough pharmacists. Recruiters were constantly calling the pharmacy, trying to recruit pharmacists for other jobs.
 
I pirated Rosetta Stone and used it once. The only thing I remember from my 1 hour study is "las ninas beben". And, I can check prescription written in Spanish from sheer word/pattern recognition.


Honestly, I just need to know how to order tacos. And how to say "We got Pulisic, Reyna, McKennie, and Dest now. Prepare to be destroyed."
 
Really not into the whole arbitrary goal setting based on the calendar...more into taking things slow and improve myself little by little. Example: re-organized my entire place last month (donated a bunch of hardly used stuff, out with the old, in with the new...much needed as I have been accustomed to moving every 5 years or so due to school, parents' work, etc.). Never been use to living in one location for longer than 5 years

Getting into various hobbies/recreations...mainly auto detailing and auto maintenance/repair DIY stuff lately. Like acquiring new and practical skill sets to keep my brain nice and active. I could seriously lose myself in fiddling with machines all day (taking apart, putting back together, making modifications, understanding how they work, etc.)

2020 - built me a top notch covid-19 home gym - fun challenge in thinking critically on getting the most versatility out of choosing the right equipment accommodating with pretty severe space limitations and equipment shortages galore, not to mention creating the right environment in terms of layout (separation of physical work from leisure) and thinking critically about things like proper flooring, humidity, air flow, sound dampening, lighting, storage, etc. Will be a huge time saver and worth the investment long term

Well work related, from going to overnight to daytime position, learning how to be a better people person and figuring how to manage techs. As firm believer of being as self reliant as humanly possible, knowing when to ask for help (directing others) has been a learning experience for me (also from being somewhat of a control freak). I've definitely made progress

For the big 3 (diet, exercise, sleep), I've stayed pretty damn consistent (after the whole covid-19 gym closure hiccup and move to home gym life). Striving for slight improvements in the sleep department by upgrading my mattress and looking to make some modifications for my bedroom/study for a better environment. Room for improvement on cutting down on screen time/blue light late in the day for sure...kind of my vice right now
 
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I used a chemical to try to ****** the fire.

Edit : Yeah, people are going to think I have a weird fire based sexual fetish.

i am keeping your phrase censored. Partly because it has a bigger potential for misuse and partly because I know it is more fun for you to find the breaks than it is to see them fixed. 😉
 
Good thread. I was just thinking about this recently. Should I focus on eliminating debt? Get into being a landlord? Become the next Warren Buffet? It's so hard to choose. :/

In terms of career goals I have one. Do not be laid off. I already had my hours cut from 40 to 35 so I would hate for that to get worse. I do have ample emergency fund should that happen and I suppose I could always try to find a roommate or two if it came to that.

what is your interest rate % on the debt? if it is a school loan i would wait on Biden!

Landlord can be good. need raising rent and prop values...I think VOO and VTI is much easier
 
what is your interest rate % on the debt? if it is a school loan i would wait on Biden!

Landlord can be good. need raising rent and prop values...I think VOO and VTI is much easier

I paid off my student loans years ago. I don't regret it regardless of what happens later on. I like not having the debt. I have a mortgage, a car payment, and a loan for solar panels. Technically I could pay off everything except the mortgage but I am not all about that Dave Ramsey life. I like having an emergency fund >$1000 and having investments and such.
 
I paid off my student loans years ago. I don't regret it regardless of what happens later on. I like not having the debt. I have a mortgage, a car payment, and a loan for solar panels. Technically I could pay off everything except the mortgage but I am not all about that Dave Ramsey life. I like having an emergency fund >$1000 and having investments and such.
I kept thinking Dave Ramsey was that chef with the reality show. I didn’t know why you guys kept mentioning him. Lol. I still don’t know who he is, but I’m guessing he’s some dude that gives financial advice. Maybe I’ll google him later.
 
I kept thinking Dave Ramsey was that chef with the reality show. I didn’t know why you guys kept mentioning him. Lol. I still don’t know who he is, but I’m guessing he’s some dude that gives financial advice. Maybe I’ll google him later.

You should. He has a radio show, youtube channel, he has seminars, books, etc. His advice actually is good but his claim to fame is being fanatically anti-debt. Like don't contribute to a 401(k) even to get the match until you are debt free. Don't go to school unless you can pay for it out of pocket. He does allow for a mortgage I think.

It's an entertaining show/channel but I personally don't follow the advice too closely.
 
You should. He has a radio show, youtube channel, he has seminars, books, etc. His advice actually is good but his claim to fame is being fanatically anti-debt. Like don't contribute to a 401(k) even to get the match until you are debt free. Don't go to school unless you can pay for it out of pocket. He does allow for a mortgage I think.

It's an entertaining show/channel but I personally don't follow the advice too closely.

That's dumb. 401k match is only about 5%. It's free money!
 
You're not wrong. We haven't gotten any new business at my site in so long I have started to wonder if we don't have a sales team or what is going on.
Wow. Thought that was just the people I worked for. We have a guy supposed to be doing that who never leaves the building. Not sure how you get business that way, but then I'm not the sales guy....
 
Interesting. In my area, things got bad a year after that. It has gotten progressively worse each year.

When I started pharmacy school, they were closing stores some days because they didn’t have enough pharmacists. Recruiters were constantly calling the pharmacy, trying to recruit pharmacists for other jobs.
A couple of pharmacists I knew switched employers back then for sign on bonus, better pay, and vacation. We even got bonus to get someone on board and stay for the duration of the contract!
 
Goals:

1) Learn more programming both for fun and for future job prospects. I need to be more focused.
2) Keep my job
3) Consider a side hustle or some other new stream of income for when #2 falls through since it's probably only a matter of time
 
Yeah no way I am going there without seeing grand Tetons. In fact I am also planning on adding Glacier NP which is 5-6 hours away, for a total of 10 day trip.
Nothing beats grand tetons....
 
I want to learn Spanish. Going to Mexico City in Jan 2022 for the USMNT World Cup Qualifier against the hated, diabolical El Tri.

The Azteca is an absolute experience.

My goal besides survival is to buy out my bankrupt neighbor for insultingly low money if he doesn't murder or suicide for life insurance money and rezone the property and aggregate both mine and his as a Torrens.

And help my wife get used to working from home as she always had a gofer in the office to get her coffee, do her dry cleaning runs, and other menial labor that she's having me do. I do love her but it's hard to like her from that perspective (and we have had a couple of fights when she obviously forgets that I'm not just a gofer). I'm really thinking hiring a personal assistant and having it charged to the firm, but that's in the air given the need to get them back into the office when practicable.
 
The Azteca is an absolute experience.

My goal besides survival is to buy out my bankrupt neighbor for insultingly low money if he doesn't murder or suicide for life insurance money and rezone the property and aggregate both mine and his as a Torrens.

And help my wife get used to working from home as she always had a gofer in the office to get her coffee, do her dry cleaning runs, and other menial labor that she's having me do. I do love her but it's hard to like her from that perspective (and we have had a couple of fights when she obviously forgets that I'm not just a gofer). I'm really thinking hiring a personal assistant and having it charged to the firm, but that's in the air given the need to get them back into the office when practicable.
$30k personal assistant. 8h x 5 days should be chump change for you lol.
 
$30k personal assistant. 8h x 5 days should be chump change for you lol.


No, it's 75k minimum before household tax and mandated benefits due to labor representation which brings it shy of 100k and it's lawyer hours (70 or so). Security and client privacy issues as most of the PAs are also paralegals. My wife's PA is six digits from the firm but isn't physically here which sucks.
 
Honestly, I just need to know how to order tacos. And how to say "We got Pulisic, Reyna, McKennie, and Dest now. Prepare to be destroyed."

Playing for the same national team that couldn't salvage a draw with Trinidad and Tobago when it mattered most.
I'm excited for the new blood, but if Altidore is still the striker and Michael Bradley is still on the roster, I'm not hopeful for a deep Cup run in 2022; 2026 is looking better with the home field advantage and the automatic qualification. Hoping Sargent continues to develop and replaces Jozy up front.

Good luck at Azteca. To practice, go to an Eagles game wearing Cowboys gear...then multiply it by twenty.
 
My goal for 2021 is a relatively simple one: buy clothes that fit. I dropped 15 pounds two years ago but was afraid I'd put the weight back on, and haven't updated my wardrobe accordingly. While the pants are still good, my suit jackets and dress shirts are all too big- I put my arms out to my sides in some of these shirts and I look like a sailboat in a gale.

Unfortunately, I hate clothes shopping with a white hot passion, so while it is a simple fix I'm really going to have commit myself to do it. I just donated a couple of these oversized shirts to the Salvation Army, so I've started the process.
 
And help my wife get used to working from home as she always had a gofer in the office to get her coffee, do her dry cleaning runs, and other menial labor that she's having me do. I do love her but it's hard to like her from that perspective (and we have had a couple of fights when she obviously forgets that I'm not just a gofer). I'm really thinking hiring a personal assistant and having it charged to the firm, but that's in the air given the need to get them back into the office when practicable.

You are the gofer. Happy wife happy life.

My goal for 2021 is a relatively simple one: buy clothes that fit. I dropped 15 pounds two years ago but was afraid I'd put the weight back on, and haven't updated my wardrobe accordingly. While the pants are still good, my suit jackets and dress shirts are all too big- I put my arms out to my sides in some of these shirts and I look like a sailboat in a gale.

Unfortunately, I hate clothes shopping with a white hot passion, so while it is a simple fix I'm really going to have commit myself to do it. I just donated a couple of these oversized shirts to the Salvation Army, so I've started the process.

Can't you just get them tailored?
 
Can't you just get them tailored?

For the suit jackets: perhaps.

For the shirts: Buddy, these aren't Brooks Brothers or Thomas Pinks; I just bought four new dress shirts on Uniqlo for $58 total. They are replacing shirts I bought on clearance at Marshalls. I think I'll pass on a tailor. 🙂
 
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