As the year winds down and 2021 comes to a close, I decided to take stock of the wins I experienced. Granted, not all “wins” are going to be the same for everyone. But this is a good practice to get into as it can help inspire you to do more in the upcoming year.

I know it has for me. I’ve even spent a great deal of time the past few weeks coming up with ways to make next year even better.

It all comes down to keeping yourself in a constant state of self-improvement.

What Wins Happened for Me in 2021?

Everyone has their own idea of a “win.” It depends on what kind of goals you set for yourself and what situations boost your levels of self-confidence and pride.

With that in mind, I accomplished quite a bit this year.

Publish My First Book

My biggest goal in life was to have a book with my name on the spine sitting on the shelf behind me. And this year, I was able to make it happen through self-publishing.

To be honest, I didn’t plan on publishing a book this year. Back in February, I had a viewer ask me if I’ve ever used Kindle Direct Publishing before. Since I haven’t, I thought it would make for good content on the channel.

After taking my own sweet time writing the book, I finally got it published. While I doubt it’ll be a best-seller, the point is that I actually finished and published something.

That, alone, was worth the time and experience of putting it together.

Making it Happen

I decided that I was going to publish this book before the end of the year. A lot of other projects came up and distracted me from finishing the book sooner. However, I was able to release it before Thanksgiving.

In other words, I made it a priority to get it done after deciding to write the book.

All Blogs Increased in Traffic

One of the goals I was actively working on was writing more content for all of my blogs across the board. And I especially wanted to try fixing CrossingColorado.com in particular.

Although I still have a long way to go to fix my weight-loss-journey blog, all of my sites increased in visitor traffic from the year before.

While I still have a long way to go before reaching my ultimate goals with each, I still call all of these wins for 2021. Any victory is still a victory, and as long as I get just one more visitor enjoying the content, that’s all that really matters to me.

Making it Happen

You can’t force people to read blog posts or watch videos. All you can really do is try to entice them to consume your content through the use of keywords, search intent, and providing quality materials.

In this case, you have to write something people want to read.

90 Blog Posts in 30 Days

In September, I decided to challenge myself by blogging every day for 30 days on three separate websites. And I did all this while still working on my GreenGeeks workload.

Needless to say, it was one of the most stressful wins of 2021.

Since each blog was completely different, I had to constantly switch gears in terms of topics. I don’t really know what possessed me to do something like this other than I was just curious to see if I still could.

And I doubt I will ever do it again! It was quite an undertaking considering how much other work I had to do at the same time.

Making it Happen

After my GreenGeeks work, I simply prioritized the blog posts. Unfortunately, this meant I wasn’t able to work a lot on the YouTube channel, my book, writing Despair, or much of anything else throughout September.

Yet, I still met the challenge while writing more than 120,000 words overall. Remember, all of that was after working on my GreenGeeks workload.

Wrote Nearly Twice the Number of Words than 2020

For the last couple of years, I’ve been striving to write more than one million words. This is something I used to do on a regular basis while working with content mills back in the day.

Today, most of my workload includes editing, video production, and research. Unfortunately, this means I don’t get to actually write as much as I used to.

So, I say I want to write one million but am simply happy to surpass what I wrote the year before. In 2021, I greatly surpassed the number of words by nearly twice.

Last year, I wrote 468,580 words across various projects. With just a week and a half left of this year, I am estimated to hit well over 730,000! Needless to say, I feel quite accomplished with this goal.

Making it Happen

Sure, the September experiment with the blogs contributed quite a bit. However, I would still have surpassed 2020’s numbers if I didn’t write a thing that entire month.

I decided to put more effort into both the blogs and my books to get as much published as I could.

Hit 1,000 Subscribers on YouTube

Another one of my favorite wins for 2021 was finally hitting 1,000 subscribers on the YouTube channel. Even though I still don’t have the watch time to get monetized, it’s still a nice milestone to reach.

After all, more than a thousand people view my content worthy enough to add to their list of subscriptions.

What’s funny is that I never intended to build up a channel separate from WriterSanctuary’s blog. The videos were merely a way to accentuate the posts. But I started getting viewers who didn’t read the blog.

Eventually, it became its own thing, yet, still connected to WriterSanctuary.

Making it Happen

In reality, I just make videos that I think my audience wants to watch. As I said earlier, you can’t force someone to consume your content. The best you can do is try to give viewers what they want out of your brand.

Hopefully, I can hit some more milestones in 2022 with the YouTube channel.

After 2021, What Wins am I Looking For?

So, there you have it. The above are the biggest milestones and wins that I had in 2021. From a production standpoint, it was perhaps one of my most epic years. Mostly because I achieved a life-long dream.

I am a published author!

It’s going to be one hell of a chore to surpass some of the greatness I had this year. You could say that I definitely have my work cut out for me.

Throughout everything, though, it goes to show what you can accomplish if you put in the effort to make it happen. I’d say about 90% of your success is going to come down to your mental state.

If you don’t think you’re going to accomplish anything or have doubts that you’ll meet any of your goals, you’re more likely to fail. This is because you essentially just talked yourself into stalling.

Effort dictates success. And if you put in a half-assed effort, expect a half-assed result.

All of the goals I have for 2022 are reflective of the wins I had in 2021. For example, I’m aiming to write more words, publish at least three more books, and start producing a regular flow of YouTube videos again.

The best part is that I know I can meet all of the goals I’ve set for next year. Why? Because I have the mentality of being a badass at what I do.

No, I’m not being conceited. It’s called having confidence. And it’s something that comes when you put in the effort to accomplish your dreams, aspirations, and goals.

I still have a lot to do as I continue to grow. However, I am eager to keep pushing myself forward to see what else I can achieve.

What Kind of Wins Did You Have in 2021?

Out of everything I did in 2021, the only one that I figured I would accomplish was the number of words written throughout the year. Everything else was more of a surprise.

Especially publishing A Freelancer’s Tale.

Think back to what you did this year. What kinds of things made you proud or got the ball rolling for yourself?