Can we set annual practice goals, and do recitation counts measure progress?

You can plan the amount of practice, but counts cannot directly score understanding or progress. Recitations and meditation duration can be recorded. When you will understand a principle or gain an insight is much harder to prescribe in advance.

Someone asked whether practice could have annual goals like work. I found it a good question. Daily recitation, exercises, or maintaining one practice for a continuous period can all be arranged. Small cards marked with circles were also used to count recitations. Such methods help show whether we have continued taking action.

But reaching a number and genuinely understanding its meaning differ. We cannot specify which repetition will bring sudden awakening or guarantee a particular attainment this year. I can plan which practice to undertake and how much time to spend. Later insights still need to be understood gradually through actual practice.

Goals can therefore support continuity without becoming a chase after results. Record what you genuinely did while leaving room for not yet knowing the gains. Serious willingness to practice and refusing to treat quantities as guarantees of achievement can go together.