2022 Reading and Blogging Goals

At the start of each new year, I like to set myself reading and blogging goals, so that I have something to aim towards throughout the months.

Doing this motivates me to read often and diversely, and keeps me focused on the things I want to achieve.

I try to look back at what I achieved in the previous year and set my new goals based on areas of growth and development I want to target.

I rounded up my reading and blogging in my 2021 wrap up, so now I’m ready to set some new goals.

---

Reading goals

Read 120 books

For the last two years, I’ve set my Goodreads goal at 100 books. In 2020, I read 120 and in 2021, I read 121 books, meaning I’ve beaten my goal two years in a row. Riding the wave of this high, I fancied being a little daring in 2022.

For this year, I’ve decided to set my goal as 120 books. You were probably expecting 150 or 200 and are now disappointed (apologies). 😂 But I want to be realistic. I’ve proven to myself that I can read 120 books in a year, so why not set my goal as the exact amount rather than giving myself a buffer of 20 books.

I have a couple of reasons for doing this.

1. I’m hoping that setting it at 120 will keep me motivated and eager to read
2. Setting it as this might push me to read more than 121 books
3. I’m planning to finish a manga series this year so, theoretically, I should read 120 books easily

I’m pretty hopeful that I can hit this goal and I’m determined to try my best without rushing books or forcing myself to read if I’m not in the mood.

Read books with intent and purpose

What I mean by this is I want to be more selective about the books I read.

Last year, I read quite a lot of books that weren’t already on my TBR because they were short and available as audiobooks. There’s nothing wrong with this, of course, and I’m pleased I did it because I discovered a few books I hadn’t heard of before and really enjoyed them.

But at times, I felt like I was picking books for the convenience of them being short, rather than books I really wanted to read, or books that had been on my TBR for ages.

This year, I want to purposefully direct some of my energy to books that are high on my priority list, no matter how long they are. For me, this means reading with more intent.

Some of the books I’m determined to get to this year are:

Read more of my physical books

Ya girl has a lot of unread physical books on her shelf. Like, a lot. (I’m actually refusing to count them all because I’m worried what the total number would be.)

As my stats from last year show, I read more audiobooks than physical books, which isn’t a problem at all (audiobooks are a perfectly valid form of reading and they’re work well for me), but it means that I’m not picking up my physical paperbacks and hardbacks as much.

So this year, I want to make an effort to read more of the physical books I own. Once I’ve a book I can then decide whether I want to keep it or unhaul.

Finally finish Bleach

I think I’ve put this in my reading goals blog post every year for the past three years, BUT this I’m actually going to do it. This is going to be the year I finally finish reading Bleach (the manga series). We’re ✨ manifesting ✨ it.

The reason I’m confident I can finish it this year is because the Thousand-Year Blood War arc of the anime is being released in October. *heavy breathing*

For context, the last season of Bleach ended in 2014 and it was left without a proper conclusion (the anime had got ahead of the manga and they never adapted the final arc of the manga storyline).

So when it was announced last year that the final arc would be being adapted, I basically lost my sh*t and ascended.

If you, too, would like to lose your sh*t, here’s the trailer:

So, because the anime is releasing in October, I need to finish the manga before then so that I can watch the new series without spoilers.

Finish other WebToons I’ve been reading

While we’re on the topic of finishing series, there are quite a few Webtoons that I need to finish. The main ones that spring to mind are:

• Midnight Poppy Land
• unOrdinary
• Lumine
• SubZero

Most of these aren’t completed, but once I get up to date with a webtoon, I mark them as read and then read the updates as and when they arrive.

I was reading these series in 2020 but then (for some reason) didn’t keep up with them in 2021, so it’d be good to get back up to date with them.

Discover (or rediscover) a new genre

In 2020, I made the discover to end all discoveries. Romance. Not the thing itself, just the genre. An entire genre I’d not really tried before but one that has so many or my favourite tropes and (usually) a guaranteed HEA.

In 2021, I rediscovered nonfiction and classics and spent many enjoyable hours listening to audiobooks of both. I also discovered that I’m absolutely feral for Regency romance and consumed it like it was going out of fashion.

So in 2022, I’d like to discover or rediscover another new genre or sub-genre. I have no idea what it’ll be and I’m not going to force it to happen (it just sort of occurred in 2020 and 2021) but I’m hopeful that by reading diversely, I’ll find somehing new I love.

Blogging goals

Write more themed blog posts

I really enjoy themed blog posts. When I see posts titled ‘Books to read if you love fake dating’ or ‘Sports romances I’d recommend’ I click the link SO FAST.

And I’ve been wanting to write these types of posts for a while, but didn’t feel like I’d read enough books themed around a certain topic or trope to be able to do it successfully.

Now, however, I have a few of these types of posts in draft and once I’ve read a couple more books with certain tropes/themes, I’ll be reading to start posting them.

Get back into blogging semi-regularly again

I talked about this a bit in my 2021 wrap up, but my blogging schedule became pretty inconsistent towards the end of 2021. In 2022, I’d like to post consistently once or twice a week.

In the past, I was trying to post three times a week, but I think it was this kind of behavior that led me to feel burnt out last year.

Plus, working full time and maintaining other hobbies makes this HARD. So I’m going to aim for once or twice per week this year.

Start posting monthly TBRs again (possibly?)

You might have noticed that around September/October last year, I stopped posting monthly TBRs.

This coincided with the decline in my frequency of blogging, but I also just felt that I wanted to change up my reading a bit. That change was to start mood reading.

I’ve always been a TBR reader, so this was a big switch up for me. But, I rather enjoyed it? I could pick up whichever books I wanted, whenever I wanted and this freedom was nice.

But I do also miss the structure that having a monthly TBR gives me, so I might start doing them again. We’ll see!

---

What are some of your reading/blogging/general goals for 2022? Do you think I should start doing monthly TBRs again (are you a TBR-setter or a mood reader)?