Setting Personal and Professional Goals in the New Year

“Well, the first days are the hardest days, don’t you worry anymore…"

As 2024 comes to a close, it’s time for a bit of self-reflection. We probably all have hit some personal and professional goals this past year, but if you’re like most people, you’re a “work in progress” who always strivesto improve with each new year. I think setting personal and professional goals is a great way to keep evolving and to keep ourselves in check so that we never grow stagnant.

As most of you know, I’ve been fortunate to hit most of my professional goals and can now exclusively enjoy being the Feature Writer for WSDaH along with tutoring children in NYC through a program called Reading Partners. Both ventures have been extremely rewarding.

Ironically, however, I still struggle with some personal goals. One in particular is my constant habit of worrying. I’m what’s known as a catastrophizer, which is basically a person who immediately jumps to the “worse-case scenario” while magnifying the severity of a situation or event. I’ve managed to fool many people with my “happy-go-lucky” personality but deep down, I’m plagued with worry 99% of the time.

Many years ago, my grandmother Lilli told me that “99% of the things you worry about never come to fruition”.

She was married to my grandfather Ruby who harbored deep anxiety any time the weather predictions were bad. Can I blame it on heredity? Hard to say. But I do know that the silver lining to being a catastrophizer is that we always have a plan b as people like me are usually “prepared” for the worst outcome.

But this unnecessary level of worry is emotionally exhausting and serves no purpose. When I think back to the amount of energy I’ve expended on worrying over the years on medical diagnoses, vacation details, family members, jobs, etc. it boggles the mind. To quote Leo Buscaglia (aka “Dr. Love”) “Worry never robs tomorrow of its sorrow, it only saps today of its joy.”

That is going to be my daily mantra in 2025.

One thing I didn’t have to worry about this past year was finding the perfect WSDaH Family members to share their stories with me for my articles. I continue to be inspired by the members in this group who always seem to be on the road to self-improvement. Here’s what they had to say about their goals for 2025:

“When Jill asked me to elaborate on my personal and professional goals for 2025, I realized how fortunate I’ve been in my career trajectory. Back in 2013, and after a 25-year career in corporate marketing, I took a leap of faith to follow my passion and get into the wine industry. I soon stumbled upon a unique and amazing opportunity to be an independent sales rep and brand ambassador for the Boisset Collection.

Led by a brilliant, charismatic Frenchman named Jean-Charles Boisset (whose family owns many award-winning wineries in CA and France), I became (and still am) one of their top sales leaders and managers. Who knew? My passion and ‘thirst’ for learning surely helped put me on the road to success. ‘Wine is an amazing elixir that brings people together’—JC Boisset. ‘We can share what we’ve got of yours ‘cause we done shared all of mine’—Hunter/Weir. As a Wine Ambassador and Concierge, I love sharing great wines, turning people onto new ones, recommending food pairings, curating events and wine gifts, and most of all, bringing people together around a live or virtual table to share good wine, good food, and camaraderie!

A few months ago I began working with an exciting startup called Sommsation—an experiential online marketplace for independent premium wineries—helping them build out a new wine ambassador program, and introducing my treasured clients (and new ones) to many highly-rated, sustainably produced wines.

I love connecting people too, and recently brought our longtime Deadhead family friends into Sommsation so that their very cool winery can have wider visibility, and I can sell their fantastic organic wines (with Stanley Mouse designed labels)! Stay tuned…

As a glass half-full person (I prefer a full glass of course), my goals for 2025 will include forging many new and meaningful connections through merging two loves of mine that go together well and have stories to tell—great music and great wine! I feel blessed to be a part of this amazing family and network, to be able to blend business and pleasure with such an incredible, talented, smart and successful group of people. Let’s just keep truckin’ on… keep on and keep calm’!”

Anne Minkin, Fine Wine Curator & Concierge, Boisset Collection/Sommsation

“One of my top personal and professional goals for 2025 is to continue to increase the amount of time I spend on networking and staying active in the community. One challenge I have had to work on over the last decade or so since becoming a lawyer, is to stay engaged in the community. This was not at all an issue through my early 30s. Back in young adulthood it seemed like there was an endless supply of fun social activities. It was rare for a week to go by that there wasn’t a ski trip, concert outing, party or big night out to look forward to.  Networking and staying in touch with people seemed to come naturally.

I have found this to be more difficult as responsibilities have ramped up, and I began prioritizing learning my trade over staying in touch with people. Particularly for the first few years of my career (when I was bad at managing time), I found myself frequently canceling plans and, when I had a little downtime, I was often too tired to think about social events. As a consequence, I found over the years that my connections with people started to fade. This is a pretty common thing people talk about as you start getting older and not entirely a bad thing (we do all have to grow up at some point). That said, as I have gotten older, I have missed having a relatively large circle of close friends that I would expect to hang out with on a weekly basis.

One of the things I’ve been working on for the last few years is getting more active in the community, including doing more charity work. One charity that has been particularly rewarding for me is volunteering as a tutor for Reading Partners. Through this charity and other similar ones I have worked with over the past 15 years, I have tutored a young kid in a range of subjects for the academic year. I believe one-on-one attention is incredibly helpful for these kids as I have personally witnessed enormous growth in confidence and skill over the course of a year. I have recently been exploring opportunities to increase my role with Reading Partners and working with my firm to encourage people to volunteer. I hope to make meaningful progress on this next year.

More generally, I hope to continue to work on my networking habits. Over the past few years, I have gotten a lot better at saying yes to networking events, even when I very much would rather curl up on my couch and shut my mind off. Over time, yes has become my nearly automatic response. Joining the WSDaH family has been incredibly helpful in developing the kinds of networking habits I want to have. Participating in regular networking buses and in-person events have gotten me feeling more comfortable talking about myself, and I have found myself thinking a lot more regularly about reaching out to people that I may be able to help. This has started to develop into much more of a habit over time.

One of my most important goals for 2025 is to keep this momentum going and continue to increase my involvement in the community. I’m sure there will be challenges in doing so. My wife and I are expecting our second baby girl this January. We are absolutely thrilled, but I expect that my social calendar will have to be curtailed for a period during the beginning of the year. My hope is that I will nevertheless be able to find ways to keep the ball moving in the right direction. I believe that if I’m able to do this, good things will happen.”

William Barnard, M&A Associate, Locke Lord LLP

“My personal and professional goals for 2025 are a beautiful wondrous thought. To really look within myself and understand where I am and where I am going. As Ray Stevens sang in ‘Mr. Businessman’:

‘You better take care of business, Mr. Businessman

What's your plan?

Get down to business, Mr. Businessman

If you can

Before it's too late and you throw your life away’

Those lyrics really resonated with me. As a business owner and in evaluating my goals for 2025, I’m setting my sights on growth and bringing greater joy to more people. I’ve been fortunate in the last 20+ years of building successful relationships, which has allowed me to provide access to any entertainer anywhere in the world. I have immense gratitude every day for what I’ve been taught and continue to learn with regard to production, staffing and labor and all that goes into making a concert happen truly anywhere in the world. What a gift that has been. The ability to execute at the highest levels with the access and the production only means one thing —more joy for more people truly living a life of music and smiles.

In moving forward, my goals are for continued connections, more gigs, more visibility for me, Headline Booking and all the services we provide. Ultimately, I know greater financial stability within my life will allow me to continue to build and grow Headline Booking.

Headline Booking will be 14-years-old in 2025, What a wonderful milestone. I look forward to the future and being able to share this gift, which continues to grow daily, with others around the world.”

Matt Altman, Founder/CEO, Headline Booking Group

“As the managing member of Brach Eichler, my professional goals include the continued growth for the law firm. Not growth for the sake of growing, but rather strategic growth. What are our clients’ needs and how can we meet those needs? Further, we have worked very hard to develop a professional and business-oriented community that not only includes the attorneys, but also the entire staff. We learn new things each day about our profession but also about ourselves on a personal level. We have provided an environment for this type of growth for the entire team at Brach Eichler and I am extremely proud of what we have accomplished so far and look forward to continuing this trajectory into the future.

On a personal level, I really need to get back to practicing the banjo, acoustic guitar, fender strat and my trusty Uke! At the end of the day, it is about family, friends, good health, good wine and smile, smile, smile!”

John Fanburg, Managing Member, Brach Eichler LLC

“2025 is shaping up to be a year of planning—a time to map out our retirement master plan, a strange and wonderful prospect. It's time to pass the torch at work and make sure my team is ready to carve their own paths. As the song goes, ‘Sometimes we live no particular way but our own’ and I want to leave knowing they're set to bring their own unique spark.

But work is only part of the journey. I’m also planning a road trip I'm calling Dead Travels—an adventure to historic venues and local music scenes. My husband and I will be hitting the road, searching out as many old, refurbished vaudevillian theaters and vintage cinemas as we can find, soaking up the music and, naturally, catching and documenting every Dead cover band along the way. ‘Strangers stopping strangers just to shake their hand’—that’s the vibe I’m after, connecting with fellow music lovers in new places.

I've never been to Chicago, New Orleans, Nashville, Austin and most places between the East and West Coasts…so you can see where this is going. Not only do I want to experience local blues, country, bluegrass, and zydeco in historic venues, but I’m also excited to visit iconic places like Red Rocks and the Gorge.

One last thing about this trip: while recently visiting my daughter in Vermont, I took a ferry across Lake Champlain, and it struck me—why not find all the small car ferries along our route? There’s something magical about crossing a lake or river, pausing to take it all in.

This trip idea started back in 2020 as a kind of therapy, with live music scarce at the time. It’s thrilling to see it coming together now, and with some help from genAI, planning it is easier than I imagined. We might not be traveling on a bus, but my baby blue Bronco, Stella, will get us around. ‘Nothing left to do but smile, smile, smile’!

To my WSDaH Family—if you have recommendations for music, food, or venues anywhere between here and California, please send me a message. I'd love to connect and make this trip even more fun.”

Bonnie Liggett, Retired

“When life looks like easy street, there is danger at your door…”. But not always. Here’s to a productive, fulfilling 2025 for all of us. Hope everyone has a worry-free New Year!

“Everything will be okay in the end. If it’s not okay, it’s not the end.” ~ John Lennon