2025 Goals: A Moving Target on Crutches

As 2024 wound down, I was starting to gather my thoughts for 2025 and my goals for the new year. By the time my business and website was ready for prime time in November, I had missed basically all of the deadlines for the local holiday art markets and fairs...as well as many of the big spring ones. So many of my ideas for 2025 were focused on researching more market opportunities and making sure I hit those application deadlines.

And then two things happened in the last few weeks of the year. First, we realized that my studio had not escaped the Great Mold Infestation as we had originally thought and would need to get torn up and rebuilt over the course of a month or two. Second, I broke my right foot and started 2025 with a big question mark of just how much of the year would be devoted to recovery. Really puts the brakes on planning a year of building your art business and driving yourself to a bunch of markets and then standing around at a booth for a couple of days.

I was ready to roll with the hiccup of losing my studio. I knew I could set up spaces elsewhere in the house to keep my art & writing going. It wouldn't be pleasant, but the house has been a hub of less-than-cheerful chaos since October when we started the remediation journey. It was a familiar hiccup.

I was less ready to pivot when I broke my foot, especially because we spent the first three weeks of the injury uncertain as to how bad it really was. And then we were told that surgery might still be needed, depending on how my recovery progressed (or, rather, did not).

So I spent most of January resting but also feeling a bit sorry for myself. All those grand ideas of starting the year with goal-setting and planning and resolutions and habit-forming: poof, gone. But as I got closer to the end of the month, I started to look for the small things I could manage, the little (metaphorical) steps I could take. I cracked open a daily planner I had bought (undated, ofc; flexibility is all) and started with a high-level map of the next five weeks and then narrowed my focus to the next week and then just went a day at a time.

Social media calendar for February? Yeah, I can do that. Complete those SMART goals I developed for January back before the fresh chaos? No driving or fancy footwork required there. Revisit that e-Commerce course I started through Startup Tucson last year? Check, there's a week-ish of daily activities sorted right there. Organize my finished and nearly finished artwork for a big "See What's New" splash at the end of the month? Absolutely manageable.

Yes, I still want to get into the fall and holiday markets. And I'm not giving up on any spring ones I can find (I'll only do summer if they are indoor venues; triple digits are not exactly going to encourage a crowd of visitors). I'm tracking deadlines and application requirements. I also talked through market help with the spouse so I can maybe still make something work even if my foot isn't 100% ready.

2025 still feels very nebulous, but I am working hard to make progress where I can. I'll celebrate each bit of momentum, each victory, each morsel of success.