Delayed Motivation Monday – July Goals

I know it isn’t Monday, but I forgot to post this yesterday, and I really didn’t want to wait until next Monday to put up my goals for July.  As I said in my last “goals” post, I truly feel like sharing these provides the accountability that I need to keep me focused on my genealogy goals each month.
First a wrap-up of June’s goals:


1)  Write two blog posts per week.  I managed to stay on track with this one.  I think that the quality of my posts have improved as a result of scaling back, and I know that the “anxiety” over trying to get out a higher volume of posts has disappeared.


2)  Finish reading Thomas W. Jones’ Mastering Genealogical Proof.  I finished this up while I was up in Indiana two weeks ago!


3)  Complete the organization of my paper files.  I hate to have a failure on any goal, but this one is going to have to be an ongoing goal since I didn’t get anywhere near completion on this one.


4)  Catch up on other genealogy reading.  Again…I’m shifting this one to an on-going goal.


5)  Evaluate the Evidentia software program. I had a chance to work with Evidentia and do some evaluation on it.  I definitely love the program and it is on my “to purchase” list!

Now, on to July’s Goals:

1) Continue working on the organization of my paper files. (Deadline: ongoing)

2) Read one white paper or article (non-blog post) per week. (Deadline: ongoing)

3) Finish sorting everything that came home with me from the Indiana trip.  This one is almost complete, so
I’m setting a deadline of July 15th for this one. (Deadline: July 15)

4) Scan at least half of the pictures and documents that came home with me from Indiana.  I don’t think that I can actually get all of it scanned by month’s end (yes, there was that much!) so I am setting a more realistic goal of half. (Deadline: July 31)

5) Participate in the MGP study group.  I’m  very excited about this one, since my group started yesterday!

6) Lay out personal genealogy education program.  Much of what I have been doing in the way of genealogy education for myself up to this point has been a little haphazard, so I want to lay out a plan so I can systematically work through it.  I think that the 10 point blueprint by Elizabeth Shown Mills will probably be my foundation. (Deadline: July 20)

Motivation Monday – Goals, Goals and more Goals

I’ve been a very goal driven person for as long as I can remember.  Growing up, I had personal goals, goals for sports I was involved in, goals for school, etc.  In my adult life, the habit has remained with me…I have had and continue to have financial, personal, professional, and even educational goals.  Interestingly, in my genealogy, that habit never really formed very well.  I don’t know if it was because genealogy was a passion/obsession and a “hobby” or if it was just that I didn’t quite understand how to set goals for my genealogy research, but I’ve never been much of a goal-setter in that realm.

That has all changed over the past few months.  It started with some basic “To Do” lists and the habit has finally set in so that each month I review last month, and set a few new goals for the coming month.  Since I find that being held accountable by another person helps with achieving goals, I thought I would start sharing my monthly and annual goals here on the blog.

June is going to be a busy month with a trip back home for a week, so I trimmed back on what I’m planning to accomplish, but here are June’s goals:

1)  Write two blog posts per week.  This is actually a scaling back goal for me.  I want to pull back on the volume of my blog posts and concentrate more on the quality of the posts.  Hopefully over the next month or so, my readers will see a positive change in the posts here!

2)  Finish reading Thomas W. Jones’ Mastering Genealogical Proof.  This is in preparation for a study group that I am in which begins on July 1.  I want to finish reading the book one time through completely before going back and fully studying it.

3)  Complete the organization of my paper files.  I have been trying to get all of my paper research filed in the appropriate surname and family folders so that I can go back and start on more in-depth analysis of each piece that I have.

4)  Catch up on other genealogy reading.  I have several white papers that I’ve downloaded that I just need to sit down and read through.

5)  Evaluate the Evidentia software program.  I just need to install the program and work with it for a while to see if it is something I want to continue using.

So there you have it…my June goals.  I can’t say that they are overly exciting or anything, but no one ever said that genealogy was exciting all of the time!