2019 year in review

I started what I hoped would become a tradition last year with a 2018 year in review. The topics I summarised allowed me to write a series of dedicated posts going into more depth on each, helping me fulfil a desire to write more in 2019.

Well, it succeeded. I wrote 8 posts off the back of this review, and about the same number again on topics covering a series of interests I felt compelled to write about. In light of the success of this exercise, I’m repeating it again this year.

So here are the highlights of 2019 I’d like to mention and possibly write about in a dedicated post.

Getting married
Obviously this is a massive life milestone. Clover and I have been together for over a decade now and in 2019 tied the knot. We had two amazing ceremony’s - a Buddhist ceremony in the UK, and the main ceremony in Jamaica. They were both truly amazing experiences that we’ll treasure forever.

Health and fitness
I’ve continued to improve my fitness level, reaching new records this year in all types of exercise. I’m feeling and looking better than I ever have. I’ve managed to get more done in the same amount of time. I feel I may be crossing that boundary if I wish to progress further, but fully intend to push it in 2020.

Gaming
I’ve rediscovered my interest in gaming. It started in 2018, but I think I spent more time playing games in 2019 than I have since I was a teenager. Not just video games, but board games too. There are two major contributing factors to this increase, but it’s something I really enjoy and I made a point of doing more things I enjoy last year. A trend I hope to continue in 2020.

Eating & Drinking
There’s been a significant cultural movement in the past year to eat less meat, something I’ve been watching closely. We’ve never been big meat eaters, but we did start to eat less towards the end of the year. I’d like to continue that trend into 2020.

Connected to my fitness and increasing age, I’ve been increasingly concerned about my overall health. We eat healthily, but I have some alcohol most days, and always have. I tracked what I drank last year whilst trying to reduce my intake. Now I have a baseline and can use data to help set goals in a quantifiable way. Having data helped me greatly with workouts, so I’m hoping it does the same here. I also tried tracking water and caffeine intake which yielded some reassuringly uninteresting insights.

iPhone 11 Pro
I didn’t buy much new tech in 2019, the biggest and most impactful purchase was a new phone. Put simply; it’s the best phone I’ve ever owned. I skipped the previous generation and I was thinking of doing the same again, but the improvements in the camera and the battery, in particular, tilted the scales. I’ve never been happier with a phone. It’s shown me the future of computational photography and I’m all on board.

Podcasts of the year
One listened to a huge amount of podcasts again, as I do most years. I wanted to start highlighting those I like the most and new ones discover as a log I can refer back to.

2020 theme
I’d like to start setting a theme for each year, inspired by Cortex podcast. My aim is to have a single guiding principle that sits at the back of mind but helps steer me in both major and minor decisions I make. There are no milestones, key results of figures to be assigned, just a guide to help provide some focus and prioritisation.

I’m experimenting here so might try a few things to help me with this theme, including tracking or journaling more. I’ve decided that my theme for 2020 is the year of commitment.

A few things where I want this theme to influence the most in 2020 include:

• More commitment to my relationship with my new wife.
• Do more personally on the house - on a budget.
• Continue on the commitment to my health and fitness
• Commit to saving more (or spending less) money where ever possible.