It’s hard to believe 2024 is already halfway done. I don’t know about you but I feel that as I get older, each year seems to go by faster and faster. Weird heh?
For the last six years, I have set goals and resolutions at the beginning of the year and tracked them via a spreadsheet. Then each quarter I would write a quarterly update here. For me, this has kept me motivated to complete my goals throughout the year and has kept me accountable.
It is often said that people fall short of their New Year’s resolutions by the second week in January (the second Friday in January is known as Quitter’s Day). This is not a surprise. At the beginning of each year, I see a lot of people in the local community gym and that number slowly decreases throughout January. By February many of them no longer show up at all.
Although I am unlike the general public. I do face a bit of such a syndrome too. For me, I tend to lose focus on my goals and resolutions in Q2 as you will find out below.
2024 Goals and Resolutions
As mentioned, most of my 2024 goals and resolutions are yearly long ones that require me to continue working on them throughout the year. This makes them more challenging.
I managed to complete some of these goals in Q2 but as you can see from the spreadsheet above, I struggled with some of my yearly goals.
Financial Goals
Dividend Income Over $55,000 – WIP. $28,933.12, A
After six months we received a total of $28,933.12 in dividends. If we multiply this number by two – to get the annual figure – we should be able to hit the $55,000 target. At this point, we might end up with over $56,000 assuming no additional dividend raises or cuts and no more contributions.
Travel hack to earn $2,000 equivalent of points – Done. A.
In Q1 we “earned” an equivalent of $1,410 in points by hitting the welcome bonuses from TD Aeroplan Visa Infinite, WestJet World Elite MasterCard and Scotiabank Passport Visa Infinite.
In Q2 we earned some additional points:
- $350 WestJet dollars from the remaining welcome points from WestJet World Elite MasterCard
- I received the 2nd year 15k Aeroplan bonus from my TD Aeroplan Visa Infinite for an equivalent of $315.
Adding everything up meant we received $2,075 in travel points and completed this goal!
Since we have a few big expenses coming up, I decided to apply for the American Express Business Gold Rewards Card. By spending $5,000 in the first three months, we’d earn a welcome bonus of 75,000 Membership Rewards points. We will transfer these points to Marriott at a 1:1.2 transfer rate (it’s an odd rate IMO) to get 90,000 Marriot Bonvoy points. I believe Marriott points are very handy for family trips so we have been accumulating them over the years.
In case you’re looking to travel hack and earn some points, you can sign up the following using my referral links:
- American Express Business Gold Rewards Card – Earn a welcome 75,000 Membership Rewards points by spending $5,000 in the first three months.
- Marriot Bonvoy American Express Card – Earn 55,000 Marriot Bonvoy points by spending $3,000 in the first three months.
As mentioned in our HSBC credit card dilemma post earlier this year, we are transitioning into new credit cards. Right now our go-to cards are Scotiabank Passport Visa Infinite (for travel points), Scotiabank Momentum (for groceries), and WestJet World Elite MasterCard (for Costco). Ideally, it would be nice to transition into one card for most of our purchases. As of now, the Rogers World Elite MasterCard looks interesting so we might apply for that card later this year.
Reduce # of individual stock holdings to 40 – WIP. 43 stocks. B
At the end of Q2, we hold 43 individual stocks in our dividend portfolio. I highlighted some potential stocks we might close out in the Q1 update but we didn’t close any of them (Canadian Tire, Magna International, Qualcomm). Instead, we closed Johnson & Johnson and Starbucks and reinvested the money in QQQ and GOOGL.
Despite having this goal, I don’t want to close out positions merely for the sake of meeting a new year’s goal.
Blog Goals
Continue publishing a blog post every Monday – WIP, A
I have published a blog post every Monday. I like this publication schedule and I think readers like it too.
Write & publish a 10 year review post – To do
By the end of July, this blog will be 10 years old. It’s hard to believe that I have blogged for 10 years. It’s an amazing accomplishment knowing that many blogs disappear after a yea or even less…
Stay tuned for this 10 year review post.
Personal Goals
Do 1 minute plank each day – WIP, B-.
Well, I went from an A letter grade to a B- letter grade mostly because I haven’t been doing a 1 minute plank consistently. Since I was travelling a lot in Q2, from time to time I would forget to do a plant before bedtime.
This is one goal that I lost focus on in Q2 so I need to get back to doing plank daily.
Read for 10 minutes before bedtime – WIP, 12 books read total, B+.
I read 4 books in Q2. Due to travelling around the world (Taiwan, Hong Kong, Shenzhen, New York, Atlanta, Denmark, France, Sweden, and Iceland) throughout Q2, I didn’t always read for 10 minutes before bedtime.
So this is yet another goal I lost focus on in Q2.
My excuse? Sometimes I didn’t have a book available to read. Oops!
But maybe that’s not a very good excuse. I need to do better in Q3.
These are the five books I read in Q2:
- Mind Change: Changing The World One Mind At A Time: our mind is very powerful. This was an interesting book to read and the author talked about how we need to break the historical patterns to see improvements in our lives.
- On Wings of Eagles: another Ken Follett book based on a true story. The story was very exciting to read and the fact it is a true story made it even more fascinating. However, I’d say this wasn’t one of the best Follett books.
- Macrame Murder: a very easy to read mystery book but full of twists. I thought the ending could have been set up a bit better though.
- Crowned and Moldering: yet another murder history that was relatively easy to read. I liked Crowned and Moldering a lot better than Macrame Murder.
- The Aspirational Investor: I really enjoyed this book and the ideas the author introduces. For example, grouping your investments into personal, market, and aspirational buckets to help analyze the risks is a brilliant idea. I also like how the author continued to state throughout the book – “Investing is about you. Your investment strategy can and must be designed to help you make progress toward the things that matter most. It should not be a blunt instrument of force, whose primary aim is to “beat the market.” When executed properly, your investment strategy can fulfill your need for safety and give you a shot at your dreams and aspirations.”
Reduce body fat to 15% – 17.2%, C-
I dropped off the ball on this goal in Q2. That makes it three straight personal goals that I lost focus in the last three months.
While travelling, I didn’t pay as much attention to what I was eating (aka overeating, snacking way too much, and drinking sugary drinks). As a result, I gained a bit of weight, in fact, almost 5 kg or 10 lbs!!!
I need to cut back on my calorie intake for Q3 and get back to my exercise routines to reduce my weight and body fat percentage.
This is one area I was quite good at in Q2. I consistently spent less than 15 minutes on X and Instagram on my phone.
Since Elon Musk took over X (or Twitter as it was formerly known), this social media just isn’t as good as before. I miss the opportunities to connect with other like-minded people there. Lately, it’s all about people with blue checkmarks trying to get as many views so they can get the monthly payout from X. I definitely have found myself cutting back on X.
Clean up the garage – Done
We cleaned up the garage quite a bit in Q1 but had some Scouting supplies and stuff we needed to give away. Fortunately, we successfully gave away these things in Q2 and now have a cleaned-up garage with a lot of room for Mrs. T to do pottery and me to do kettlebell workouts.
Fun Goals
Rent a Model Y for Iceland trip – Done
We rented a Model Y for our eight-day Iceland trip in June (I’ll write a post on the trip later and my experience with Model Y). It was really cool driving an EV for an extended period of time. It was also neat to do one padel drive mostly.
Visit Taiwan with family – WIP
At this point, it’s unlikely for us to visit Taiwan this year but we’ll wait and see.
Omakase with Mrs. T – WIP
Originally I planned to take Mrs.T to one of the omakase places in Taiwan when we visit Taiwan. Since we don’t have plans to visit Taiwan, to accomplish this goal, we’ll need to find an omakase place in Metro Vancouver.
Summary – 2024 Goals and Resolutions – Q2 Update
With 2024 halfway done, I have completed three goals. I dropped the ball on three personal goals that I need to refocus.
Overall, I’d probably give myself a B letter grade for Q2. For Q3 I need to put more emphasis on healthy eating and exercising so I can get my body fat percentage down.
How was your Q2? Did you accomplish any goals and resolutions?
Great article, enjoy all the tips you give even outside of stocks. (Ex. How to get 2k in travel points) Thanks for all the great reading material.
You’re welcome.
As always, enjoy your article. Good of you to share your human frailties. My husband & I are in our 70’s. Briefly, regarding drip/no drip. Our RRIF remain in drip mode, while our joint ()all CAD dividend stocks) & our TFSA produce income – no drip. So far, so good!
Hi Cat,
Thank you very much. Your drip explanation makes a lot of sense.
Hi Bob, we are also looking to take the family to Iceland, so looking forward to your post on that trip. Nice job on the progress towards your other goals.
Thank you Chris. You’ll have a lot of fun in Iceland.
Looks like time to buy more of that QQQ amongst others !
Sure looks like it.
Congratulations Bob in your achievements. I believe you’ll be soon reaching your dividend income generation goal. I have been wondering if you have a plan (strategy or maybe a new article idea) to stop the automated DRIP before your retirement (assuming you decide one day to do it). I assume your intention is to live out of those dividends, therefore when would you stop the DRIP-ing? a year prior retirement, 3 months before or other. Also would you be keeping that in cash? to facilitate withdrawals or other.
As you can tell from my questions I am actually approaching that stage soon, so I am looking for ideas on how to manage those dividends to pay for my retirement.
Thank you for all your great articles.
Thanks Lenny. We probably will stop dripping about a year or two prior to living off dividends so we can build up the cash reserve. That’s the plan anyway. 🙂
The old saying goes when you are young the days fly by but the years drag; but when you are old the days drag on the years fly by.
That’s an interesting saying for sure.