Oh hey there, 2025

Lets start with sharing my positives / negative for 2024 and move on to some thoughts about goals and follow through.

2024 Positives and Negatives

2024 was an interesting one. The highs were very high and the lows were very low (I am more into undulations for these things as opposed to big ups and downs).

After races, I often ask my athletes to come up with three positive things and one negative thing that happened in during the event. Unless the event was flawless (when does that ever happen?!) or they achieved a certain outcome (ie. a win), it is quite telling that in a lot of cases, they struggle to come up with three good thing, but can easily come up with more than one negative thing!

The goal is to build on the positives and learn from the negative without giving the negative more weight than the positives. The same approach can be taken for an end of season review, or an end of year review.

Here are my three positives and one negative for 2024 (yes, it was hard coming up with three positives and only one negative)

Three positives from 2024

1. Bucket list trip to Greenland for a photography workshop during peak midnight sun in July. I flew through Copenhagen, took a few days to explore the city and rented a Factor Ostro to ride around the Copenhagen area. As a side note, I was always worried about taking any time off work in the summer, but I planned my schedule appropriately, worked extra hours before and after the trip, and it was totally fine (Personal)

2. Launched a few business projects that were a long time (years) in the making - An annual women’s cycling scholarship (I love being able to give back to my community), and a whole new website, with new branding - Everything is under the name ‘Endurance Collective’ now. After 18+ years under the name Performance Training, it was time for a change (work).

3. Got officially diagnosed with ADHD in February (I suspected I had it since I was young, but never did anything about understanding it more and getting officially diagnosed). It felt like a massive relief and knowing for sure helped me substantially (personal)

One negative from 2024

My injury, hands down. In short, I went to see an RMT (Registered Massage Therapist) at the end of March (as a preventative measure, I was not injured) and ended up in the ER, and with a peripheral nerve injury to the femoral nerve. I could not stand straight and could barely walk for close to 6 weeks. I have done a lot of rehab (still doing so) and 9+ months later, I am still dealing with extreme tightness and weakness, as well as a constant level of discomfort that ebbs and flows in severity.

My progress has not been very linear, which is normal but frustrating none the less, and the effects were physical, emotional and financial.

I postponed a planned cycling trip to Vietnam as a result (I’m hopeful I’ll make it there in 2025), spend thousands of dollars on rehab, assistance (cleaning services when I could not walk, grocery deliveries, etc) and will need to keep seeking physiotherapy help for this injury regularly moving forward, all out of pocket.

The therapist is still practicing and the clinic where this happened reacted by gaslighting and generally dismissing me.

The long story from May is here:

I saw an RMT and ended up in the ER

These are my personal positives and negative for 2024. What are yours?

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Lets chat about new year resolutions

I used to think new years resolutions are pointless, because it’s not like something magical will happen when one year end and another begins… This is likely because I have no trouble setting big scary goals, and the plan to achieve them, at any time of the year.

That said, not everyone is the same as me and perhaps we just need to reframe things. New years resolutions are simply goals that are set at a particular time of the year, which happens to be at the end of one year and the start of another.

If using this time of the year to take the time to reflect, set intensions and goals works for you, that’s great! I am not here to tell you what to do, or to teach you how to set goals.

I am here to give you some food for thought on how to follow through a week, a month, 6 months after you set those goals / resolutions, when real life challenges creep in and things get hard, when nothing goes as planned, when curveballs are coming at you at 1000 miles an hour, etc. You know what I mean… Progress is never linear and shit will come up. It’s not if, it’s when.

The follow through is really all that matters. So, what do you do at that point, when thing don’t go to plan or after the excitement has settled a bit? Here are a few examples of thoughts that will likely pop in your head and how to reframe them:

‘I don’t have time to do this workout today’

Okay, that is fair. I am sure something came up. It happens. That said, what do you have time for? If you had 90 minutes on the schedule but there isn’t enough time, do you have time for 45 minutes? If tomorrow’s workout is shorter, can you swap training days?

Ask yourself - What can I do today, in the limited time I have available, that will get me closer to my end goal? To the person that I want to be?

‘Maybe this goal is not for me anymore’

Why is it not the right goal anymore? What changed? Why did you chose this particular goal? What was your why to begin with?

What is your why?

It’s completely okay, and sometimes a good idea, to re-evaluate your goals. Just make sure you are doing so in a way that is not emotional, and make sure that the reason to modify the goal is not just because things got hard (that is going to happen, big goals are hard).

‘Achieving this goal is taking a really long time’

If the goal is set around developing new habits, then yes, habits take a while to form but it also means that it is more likely that the habit will stick in the long term. Reframe that as a good thing, not a negative!

Meaningful results take time. The effects of endurance training takes time. Embrace and celebrate it instead of getting frustrated by it, and set some smaller milestones along the way.

‘I can’t do this on my own’ - On sharing your goals

I have seen a few posts that claims that sharing a goal with others creates a dopamine hit that makes you feel good and like there is already progress, which could lead to a false sense of satisfaction before taking action, which could negatively affect moving from idea to execution.

It’s true. BUT I think that is not a valid reason not to share your goals with others because there is plenty of evidence that those who achieve their goals usually have some sort of support, which can not happen if you do not share your goals with others.

The key is to be honest with yourself and with those around you on what those goals really are - Don’t play them down or embellish them and you don’t need to share with everyone and anyone… If you can’t achieve a goal of your own, get some help in the form of a support network. It can be paid (like a coach, therapist, consultant…) or it can be free (like family, friends, training partners), each with it’s own set of pros and cons.

If you are worried your support network will see you struggle to achieve your goals, know that that’s exactly what they are there for - That is the whole point… You need to use your support system when you struggle and celebrate with them when you succeed.

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Did you set some goals for 2025? I would love to hear from you either by commenting below or via email.