Saturday Side Quest - Did I Meet My 2024 Goals?

Where has faith and fandom intersected this week?

First off — thank you for the warm reception of last week’s Saturday Side Quest on Life-Changing Games! It has been the best-performing Side Quest so far, so I plan to do more in that vein.

For this week, I wanted to look back at the goals I set for myself in January this year. I’ve taken the habit of not really doing resolutions anymore. I mostly do two things:

1. Set A Theme Word for the Year

2. Set Goals within my Passion Areas

For this year, I set two words—one for my personal goals and the other for Checkpoint, the church that I serve.

For myself, the word of 2024 was story-telling.
For Checkpoint, the word of 2024 was collaborative.

I think both of these evolved and adapted throughout the year, as these theme words are supposed to do. But I found both satisfying as guideposts throughout the year.

Now, onto the goals themselves.

For my personal goals:

• Pixel & Pulpit:

  • 500 Subs ✅

  • More Comments ❌

  • Use of Referrals ❌

  • Draft Book ❌

• Family:

  • Daddy/Daughter Dates ❌

  • Monthly Spouse Date ❌

• Media Goals

  • Read 150 Books✅

  • Watch 50 Movies/TV Shows✅

  • Play 100 Games✅

At first, this is depressing. But, in truth, it should show how useful (or not) goal setting can be. This was a daydream session to set where I wanted the year to go, but it can’t account for the unaccountable.

For instance, my wife and I didn’t have time for a monthly date… because we went to many exciting places this year. We took the kids to Disney World, for goodness sake. So, while we didn’t set up an established date calendar (for myself or the kids), we likely had at least a monthly date each. It just might have been shared with a vacation or family trip.

My goals for this Substack and Pixel & Pulpit were fairly unrealized. What does “More Comments” really mean? Back then, it meant engagement. I think we’ve gotten a bit more engagement, but who could have predicted the future that was Notes?

I also forgot what Referrals were until I reviewed these goals. As the year goes on, they become less and less important.

Drafting a book took a back seat to another project with some peers in the ministry world (more news on that in an upcoming article).

So, was 2024 a failure for me? By no means. But my goals weren’t quite what the year had in store, which is okay. It shows perhaps a bit clearer how vital the word of the year was, thought. I told quite a few stories, as my portfolio shows.

Now, onto Checkpoint:

• Discord:

  • 500 Members ✅

  • 30 LVL2 ✅

  • >100 Online Members ✅

• Twitch:

  • 1500 Followers ✅

  • 20 Average Viewers ❌

  • Have Others Streaming ❌

• YouTube:

  • 10,000 Subscribers YouTube ✅

  • Make Partner ✅

• General:

  • Content Calendar ❌

• Ludogood:

  • Make demo of second game ❌

  • Release second game ❌

Now, this one really exemplifies how goals can change through the year. I had no clue what was in store for Checkpoint in 2024.

We went viral on YouTube in February and everything took off. I had hoped for 10k subs… we’re at over 80k. It’s been a rocket ship of growth there.

Due to that, our Discord community grew quite a bit more than expected, as well. We’re well over 700 at this point and are more active on a daily basis than we’ve ever been.

Twitch, on the other hand, is a bit of a decaying heap currently. We’ve not grown much, even with our virality. It might even cause us to pivot our streaming focus to YouTube in 2025. Time will tell.

If you’d like to see what goals I set for 2025, then consider subscribing to continue reading. Otherwise, have a wonderful day!