The new year has just begun, time to review 2016 and set new goals for a new amazing year! I love setting goals and making plans although I don´t always stick to it.

Work

2016

I worked a lot last year, but it was worth it. My first studio got a lot more clients, new trainers joined our team and I opened two more studios, one in january and one in april. I also taught two teacher trainings this year and participated in one. I had the luck to be part of a pole camp as a teacher twice this year, I judged for the first time and had my first international workshops in France. I also performed a lot more than the year before, which was one of my goals for 2016. I had my first hoop show, my first contortion show and also my first international show in switzerland.

I think this was a really successful year! It was a lot of stress, too, but this forced me to learn how to reduce stress, plan my time better and take care of my own.

2017

This year I don´t want to set too big goals for my work. I want to focus on the studios and students I have instead of growing my business more. I also hope to perform again as much as last year or even more and create new shows. My big goal is to have more shows together with my double partners and to save some money to finally buy a freestanding aerial rig and maybe a new aerial apparatus. I fell in love with the aerial spiral a while ago, but I also like the possibilities you have with an aerial cube.

I also focus on working not to much. Last year I had 10 free weekend (most because of birthdays or marriages), this year I want to make sure I have one free weekend each month and one free day per week. I already tried this during the last months, but it is not always easy to have one day with no work at all, but I´m slowly getting used to it ^.^

Health

2016

I think my health was way better than in 2015. The year before I often got sick because of all the stress with work, studying and competing. So last year I only competed with my double partner and after the openings of my studios I tried to work less. My trainers helped me a lot with this by taking over some of my classes. I still had a long break in the beginning of the year because of a pulled muscle, had some problems with my ribs and my right elbow, but that happens if you train. Going to the gym has helped my shoulders a lot to stay healthy this year, I only stressed it once during teaching because I was maybe a bit too cold.

Going vegan also helped my health a lot, if you read my blog already, you might know that it reduced my stomach cramps at night. Before I went vegan I had them almost every night, I woke up because of the pain and now the cramps are almost gone.

2017

For this year I want no serious injuries again and I want to improve my eating habits more, so my cramps will be soon totally gone and my body will be more healthy, energetic and happy 🙂 More veggies, fruits, salad, good carbs like potatoes, brown rice, whole-grain pasta and less sugar, chocolate, white bread, convenience foods,… Just a natural healthy balanced diet which also includes to drink more. Tea helped me a lot with this during winter, but I still often don´t drink enough.

Training

2016

Due to all the work I didn´t have always a lot of time for my training. But together with my double partner Bianca I was very successful. We qulified for the world championships in London and placed 4th. Which was something we totally didn´t expect, so it made us even more happy!

2017

I defnitly want to put more time again in my own training, work shouldn´t always rank first. I have to remind myself more often of this and take more time for my own life and training. I want to train more regular, which is sometimes hard if you are self trained, but still possible and more different sports. I want to spent more time on handbalancing and aerial hoop again and not only pole dance and contortion. I´m also thinking about joining dance classes again, I already found a beginner modern dance class for adults which is not at the same time as all my other classes.

I also have a few tricks I would love to learn, but those are not my number one goal. I´m happy if I just can train more 🙂

Pole Dance I want to work more on my strength again, especially my lifts and maybe start to work on human flag seriously. I also dream of getting the rainbow marchenko pencil with straight legs, do my fonjis more clean, freestyle more and maybe do one solo competition again.

Contortion Perfect triple fold, 30cm middle split oversplit and 45cm in front oversplit, deeper backbend in handstands, safe press up from bridge to handstand and maybe one day a push up from chest stand to handstand

Handbalancing I want to work more on my press up so I can finally do it always, train more often on my canes and just make my handstands and any leg variations safer so I can perform them on stage one day.

Anything Else At least once a week I want to go to the gym and also train aerial hoop with regularity.

Personal

2016

I lost two loved persons last year and almost a third one. This was one of the hardest challenges in my life so far. Which I only shared with my closest friends so far. Life totally changed afterwards. But such challenges make us stronger and allow us to grow. One great thing my grandpa taught me during those hard days and weeks was:

If you really want to do something, do it right away!

Otherwise you might miss the chance and never be able to do it. We never know what will happen the next day or within the next few minutes.

But there were also lots of positive things, I started to study again, I have an amazing boyfriend, two lovely dogs, a great supportive family and I did one of my best decisions last year (going vegan).

2017

I want to go on with studying and even spend more time on it and I really want to do a traineeship at a sports psychologist. Besides that I want to spend more time with my family and boyfriend, relax more, do more weekend trips to get away from work after stressful weeks and also go on holidays in the summer somewhere close to the beach. I also want to improve my vegan lifestyle. I read a lot of books during the last days which confirmed me that veganism is the only way for me to life. I already started to buy only vegan cosmetics, I check my new clothes for animal components before I buy them and I stopped making expections when it comes to food (even not for my favourite cake or dessert). It sounds like lot of restrictions maybe, but if you know the truth about factory farming, there is no other possiblities and today there are so many vegan options everywhere if you just keep your eyes open for it – I´m writing this after I just had a vegan breakfast in a hotel in the middle of nowhere 😉

I also have a few little goals like becoming a better morning person and get up earlier (I don´t get up very late, but I still could improve my morning routine a bit), read daily, plan my days better, spent less time on my mobile phone (just shut it off sometimes for a morning so nobody can reach me and I don´t spent time on scrolling through pinterest or instagram), try new things more often, get a new tattoo, ….

Tipps to reach your goals!

To finish this post I have some tipps for you if you want to reach your goals this year no matter what they are 🙂

Write your goals down! This helps you to remind yourself of your goals, check what you achieved which motivates you and see what you maybe didn´t work on.

Make your goals concrete –  don´t just say I want to train more. What means more for you, how often, how long? If your goals are more detailed it will be easier to know how to reach them.

Set small goals – it is hard to loose 5kg, but it is not so hard to loose 0.5kg and again 0.5kg and again…. Same for any other goals. Write down the little steps towards your end goal, too, and check them off when you reach them. It will feel great to see how you get slowly closer to your goal!

Depending on what you want to achieve little rewards can also help. If you want to learn a trick, the trick will be your reward of course. But if you have a different goal like for example eating no sugar for 30 days, little rewards can help. For example every five days you treat yourself with something you enjoy and really want like a nice massage, a new workout outfit, a diner at a beautiful restaurant, … whatever makes you happy – just don´t reward yourself with chocolate although chocolate is a great happy-maker ^^

I wish you all a happy new year, hope you set great goals and will reach lots of them! If you want to share your goals here with me, just leace a comment and feel free to let me know if you need tipps for reaching a certain goal. If it includes pole dance, sports, healthy lifestyle or something similiar I will do my best to help you 🙂