12 Dreams For 2025
Now that we have created our list of 100 dreams, it is time to narrow our focus for the year. I focus on 12 because there are 12 months in the year. This doesn’t necessarily mean achieving one dream a month, but it’s a nice idea. 12 also allows me to focus on dreams across different aspects of life and gives me room to have dreams of various sizes come true. That being said, 12 is just a number; you can choose any number you want. Last year, I achieved 5 of the 12. Maybe I will do better this year than a 42% success rate, but I like aiming higher rather than setting my sights lower to create a false sense of victory. So, here are the 12 dreams that I have decided to focus on for the year 2025; what are yours going to be?
1. Book my first paid speaking gig
This may be relatively simple, but it requires a level of education and confidence in my skill set that I don't feel prepared for. Achieving this dream means growing, taking a chance on myself, and facing lots of rejection that I have not put myself out there for yet. This is a carryover dream from 2024; while that may mean it is harder to achieve than I initially thought, the reality is that I didn’t really try, but I will be turning that around this year.
2. Pay off credit card debt
I will not share the specific amount of debt we have on credit cards because, frankly, it doesn’t matter. I don’t want to risk making someone feel worse because they have more debt or normalize having an amount of debt if we have more than someone else. Having credit card debt is a stressor in my life, and paying that off will relieve a lot of pressure on me. I am hoping to do this through increasing my income rather than tightening my budget to an uncomfortable point.
3. Launch my dream manager program and have my first client
Technically, those could count as two separate dreams, but they do go hand in hand. Like my speaking dream, launching this program requires confidence and a skill set that I don't yet have. I can make this happen; I just have to put in the work to be ready for it. It is also a carry-over dream that I didn’t achieve before because I didn’t put in the effort. That is going to change this year,
4. Make six figures in income on my own pen
Last year, my dream was to make $50,000 on my own pen, and I didn’t achieve it. I made it close to halfway, but it didn’t happen. Achieving this dream goes hand in hand with paying off debt and accomplishing my more spendy dreams. But if I didn’t make it close last year, why would I increase the goal for this year? The reality is that once I figure out my estate planning business, I fully believe it will bring in six figures a year. I am much closer to figuring it out in 2025 now that I have some practice under my belt from 2024. Leaving the dream at $50,000 may be more attainable, but it’s not where I want to end up, so I am stretching my dream to stretch myself.
5. Be a guest on a podcast
It's similar to my speaking goal, just on a different platform. This will require a different approach while meeting much of the same criteria.
6. Have 1,000 followers on Instagram
It's very similar to my blog readership. I've been growing; I just need more time to stay consistent. As long as I keep doing what I'm doing, this should happen, which doesn't mean it was easy by any means.
7. Take Michael on a family vacation to Tweetsie Railroad
In theory, this one is pretty simple to achieve. Tweetsie is within the local leave radius, so we don’t need to use leave to go unless we make it a bigger trip. But I would like this to be a nice family vacation before my husband deploys in the fall. We will have to time the journey within leave constraints and Tweetsie’s seasonal hours since they are only open a few months a year. This will take planning more than anything else, but it will be a dream come true to take our son to one of my favorite places.
8. Visit three new states
I’ve been to about half of the US states and would like to check a few more off that list. I have plans to visit at least one new state in the coming year, assuming my husband doesn't get put on another TDY during that trip, but I would like to check off a few more. I don’t have a preference on which states I see, so I will let the year guide me on which ones to check off.
9. Qualify for Thailand Trip with The Alliance
Every year, the company I work for does an incentive trip. If you write enough business, you get to go on the trip the following year. I genuinely think I can qualify with the estate planning work once I figure it out. This is a massive trip because I was supposed to go on it a few years back, but Covid changed those plans. It’s such a big trip to a faraway destination that I feel like I must qualify, which means I need to do the work.
10. Plan and pay for a trip to Germany
It’s very unlikely that we would get to take this vacation in 2025 purely because we don’t have a lot of leave to spare. The first six months of the year are already pretty slammed with plans, and my husband will be deploying in the fall. It’ll be 2026 before we see this come true, but I would like to take a big trip when he gets home to celebrate making it through another deployment. Germany has been at the top of our list so that we can see a friend and visit another part of the world. Ideally, this trip would be in May or June of 2026, but I am open to doing it later so that I can time it with the Christmas markets. However, going on a big trip requires money and reservations, so I can focus on getting my dream trip planned and paid for this year.
11. Attend a Dimension 20 live show
Watching DND campaigns has become a favorite activity of ours at night, so getting to see an event live would be a lot of fun. This one may be tricky to achieve purely because there aren’t that many dates, and they tend to do them in places that require a flight and a couple of days off work. But this would be a great trip for us to take pre-deployment, and I think we can find a way to make it happen.
12. Have 1,000 readers on my blog for back-to-back months
I surpassed my dream of 500 readers last year. I had a huge month that crossed the 1,000 reader threshold but dropped significantly the following month. I couldn’t tell you why it was high one month and low the next. Sometimes, things just happen randomly, especially in these spaces. But real, sustainable growth would be huge for me and what I am trying to achieve. In 2025, I want to see that happen, and I plan to put in the effort and consistency to ensure it does.