State of Jeff Report

Normally I wouldn’t prepare my “State of Jeff” speech until January however I felt I needed to do it a little earlier this year. January is looking like it will be an extremely busy time for me and I will have little time to reflect on the past as I will be focusing all of my efforts on the future.

I think that Charles Dickens summed up my year pretty well when he penned the phrase “it was the best of times, it was the worst of times”.

The year 2010 was both a great year and a bad year. At the beginning of the year, during my 2009 State of Jeff, I set some goals. Some of those goals were realized while others were not.

The Patterson Push-Up challenge was one of those goals that were not sustained. After about a month the challenge was aborted and the dream of large biceps faded. I also had planned to run at least 26 miles during the year. I am very pleased to announce that I achieved that goal ten times over. During 2010 I have run over 300 miles, including running 13.1 miles during the San Francisco Half-Marathon in which I finished right in the middle of the pack.

Completing the SF half-marathon was one of the highlights to my year. It was more than just completing a race, it was completing a goal and achieving something that in past years I would not have even considered.

I also set out to write a book or blog more during 2010, which I feel I was able to do. Although my blog posts have not always been consistent, I have logged over 30 posts this year. My endeavors have not stopped there. With some support and encouragement of loyal blog followers I have began the manuscript of a book. I am hoping that my book will be ready for publication sometime during the year 2011 but I don’t see that being on the New York Times bestseller list anytime during the year.

The year 2010 was filled with economic struggles which carried over from 2009 but I am confident that this coming year will provide change to that situation. I mentioned before that during January my time will be occupied working on the future. As I am still working on the specifics so let me be vague, I am hoping that during the coming year that I will be able to enjoy more freedom in my time while increasing my earnings. I will be providing more information on that as plans become more concrete.

In addition to my running the half-marathon in San Francisco, I also participated in several other local races, mostly 5K runs, during the year. I am hoping that in 2011 I will continue to run and be able to participate in many more races. I am hoping to run another half-marathon and perhaps even attempt a full marathon at some point during the year.

Other exciting things have happened to me during 2010 in addition to running. I have made significant progress on my road to self discovery and happiness. I mentioned before that it has been both good and bad this year. As a result of the struggles from the year, mainly in the area of personal and family relations, I have been able to utilize the lessons and experiences learned to assist me in coming closer to living happily. I continue to look within myself to discover the person I feel that I was meant to be.

My favorite quote I learned this year is “Success means having the courage, the determination, and the will to become the person you believe you were meant to be.” – George Sheehan.

I have made great strides in determining who the person I believe I was meant to be is and in 2011 I will find success. I will become that person.

My goals for the coming year are to continue to run in races as I am able. I also plan to donate my time to worthy causes and have already begun the process to use my accounting knowledge to help those in need. I also plan to achieve economic success during the year which I have already begun to lay the groundwork for as well.

There are many other things that I would love to see occur in the coming year but many of them are things I can not directly control. The best I can do, and will do, is to live my life in a way to set me up for success, of becoming the person I believe I was meant to be, and the rest should then take care of itself.

I hope the coming year will be a wonderful year, for me and for all of you.

I thank you for your friendship and for your support.