So. First post of my new Blog, I guess that means I tell you what this is all about?
Two nights ago my best friend gave us both a challenge - Spend the next year sorting out who we are, what direction we each want our lives to take, do all of those 'maybe should do sometime' things, and generally work on making ourselves *better*.
I know that I've spent the last few years coasting through life, and I need to start revving the engine and moving off. I don't know what my destination is, but I figure just moving forward is a good idea.
Yesterday, she also posted a link to this on Twitter, and I got to thinking "Hey.. that's kinda cool."
So, being the social-media conditioned IT Techie that I am, I decided to Blog my attempt at building a better Me over the next twelve months. I'm still a little uncertain about all the exact specifics, but I figure that knowing people are reading this will keep a bit of pressure on to not fall back to 'coasting' mode, and people can always post new and interesting ideas they think would help out!
The big things that I full well know I have to improve, learn or start doing are (in no particular order):
So there it is. The purpose of this blog, and how I want to turn my life around. This blog will be my proof, window to the world, and hopefully you readers will be my encouragement and sometime guides.
Deadline for A New Me is 7th May 2013. 363 days to go.
Two nights ago my best friend gave us both a challenge - Spend the next year sorting out who we are, what direction we each want our lives to take, do all of those 'maybe should do sometime' things, and generally work on making ourselves *better*.
I know that I've spent the last few years coasting through life, and I need to start revving the engine and moving off. I don't know what my destination is, but I figure just moving forward is a good idea.
Yesterday, she also posted a link to this on Twitter, and I got to thinking "Hey.. that's kinda cool."
So, being the social-media conditioned IT Techie that I am, I decided to Blog my attempt at building a better Me over the next twelve months. I'm still a little uncertain about all the exact specifics, but I figure that knowing people are reading this will keep a bit of pressure on to not fall back to 'coasting' mode, and people can always post new and interesting ideas they think would help out!
The big things that I full well know I have to improve, learn or start doing are (in no particular order):
- Get into better shape & lose more weight. Don't get me wrong, I'm no stranger to exercise, but I've still got the ole 'spare tyre' that comes with a desk job and I want to finally get rid of the damned thing. With that in mind I want to:
- Complete the "Couch to 5k" program. This.. may need to wait until winter is over (Obligitory "Winter is Coming" reference) so that I don't freeze.
- Be able to do 50 situps/crunches in a row (starting soft here, I should be able to do more but lets revisit that later on)
- Be able to ride 30+ks without conking out. (I may already be able to do this, I haven't tested. If I can do more than that, I want to double the distance) - Get a game/app up and available. Myself and a few friends have come up with a few different app ideas for iPhone/Android, but we've never managed to actually get anything off the ground. I want that to change, I want at least one thing up so I can go "there, I did it"
- On a similar vein, Writing. I'm one of those people who gets tonnes of ideas, and can fill out an entire world in their head with very little issue. When it comes to actually putting it down on paper (or computer) on the other hand, I'm horrendous.
I have ideas that could work for a 'Choose your own Adventure' style book, or a novel, or a P&P RPG. I want to write up at least one of those in the next year. - Career. This is always a thorny one. The place I'm at at the moment just... isn't intellectually stimulating. Don't get me wrong, it's a good place to work and it pays well, but anyone who has done Tech support knows how mind-numbing it can become. I want to get into a position where I'm designing and/or running systems (or parts thereof), rather than troubleshooting them.
- Place to live. Again, the place I am isn't *bad*, but it's small and rented. I'd like somewhere I can invite people around and they're not squashed in like sardines.
- Stop living in fear. I love my parents deeply, but they brought me up with the whole "Always be mindful of what society thinks of you, never rock the boat, never go outside the norm, always think about your actions" thing. As such I have a habit of second guessing just about everything that I do, and frequently not doing it because I become paralysed by the possible ways it could go bad. No more. I'd rather live with the consequences than the regrets. As such I want to do at least one new/unusual/weird/bizarre thing each month (ideally more often, but lets start small), be it trying a new sport, making an idiot of myself at Karaoke, dancing on the street in a chicken suit, whatever (incidentally, ideas on this one would be much appreciated :) )
- Health. I'm not unhealthy, but I need to eat more fruit & veg. As such I'm going to pick a new vegetable each week and cook all my dinners at least with that vegetable included (like a really slow Iron Chef). I'll post pictures and recipes :)
So there it is. The purpose of this blog, and how I want to turn my life around. This blog will be my proof, window to the world, and hopefully you readers will be my encouragement and sometime guides.
Deadline for A New Me is 7th May 2013. 363 days to go.
I'm amazed to find that you think you are living in fear. I figure anyone who is as open about doing "geeky" things like SCA or roleplaying as you are would be somewhat comfortable about being outside the norm.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, good luck, Darren. I look forward to seeing how this goes!
I think things like SCA etc are easier because it's part of a large group of like minded people (and possibly also because it's not anything that I was raised to have an opinion on, so it's a blank slate).
DeleteThere are plenty of other things though where thinking about what responses to it I might get, or how far outside society norm it is, gives me brain-lock and it's easier to just put it in the too hard basked.
For eg, it took me eighteen months to actually summon up the guts to dye my hair for the Leukemia Foundation. That's an awesome cause and an awesome reason to do something, and I *still* took forever to do it because it'd mean looking 'strange' afterwards.
This sounds like an awesome project! Good luck and I will be following your posts with interest :-)
ReplyDeleteI'd also like to do more bike rides, so let me know if you want company (after June, obviously). You're probably able to go much further than me at the moment - the longest ride I've done so far was 24km, and Laura was giving me worried looks by the end, so I must have been getting rather wobbly!
Re: fear... Yeah, that's a complicated one. I've also been noticing that the past couple of years I've focussed too much on meeting other people's expectations, and lost touch with what I want myself. But I'll probably talk to you more about this over the weekend - if I tried to write out all my thoughts on this I'd be here all night!
It sounds like we just might be able to form a little support group here :)
DeleteI'll definitely welcome a good talk about everything over the weekend.
Also.. it's strangely comforting to know that someone as.. indomitable as yourself also has that fear of other people's expectations.
Hurrah Hurrah! Just reading this is making me want to improve myself too. May see how you're going and take a leaf out of your book after my trip if it's going well for you :)
ReplyDeleteRe the bike riding, we should go for a ride sometime! I recon we could do 30k ... hopefully! (and by sometime, i mean sometime soon)
Wow, more people thinking about doing this. This is awesome :)
DeleteBike ride sounds good to me. There are a couple of other people I know also interested in improving their riding, so we could probably get 4-5 people together.
Just catching up on things.
ReplyDeleteThis is probably the only time I'll say something like this -- it's your life after all and I'm not trying to rain on the parade -- but this is important to me so I have to point it out...
Doing things you want is cool. But one thing I'd suggest is to experiment with not seeing these things as "better". See if you can frame it differently. If you can lose the value judgements about your current self it will help, honestly. All these things come fundamentally from changes in emotions and outlook, so that's where I'd start.
That said, I respect that you have your own goals. I hope they are things you'll enjoy doing instead of just look forward to achieving, if you get what I mean?
On fear, I might be a good person to think that one over. I'll get back to you ;)
I certainly hope I'll enjoy the doing as well as the achieving :)
DeleteI get what you mean about not seeing things as "better", I guess... how can I phrase it...
I think a me that is proactive about doing things more, that gets out and sees/tries new things and is generally more 'active' in life is a better me than the me that coasts through life, at least when compared to my own values.
I know several people who would consider where I am in life to be pretty damned good, and it is, but I think if I can still look at myself and say "Here are things that I believe I should be doing differently", then the 'better' me says "Ok, lets do something about it" rather than "Yeah, you're right, I'll do that. Later"
Does that actually make sense to people who aren't already inside my brain?
It does make sense, absolutely. I'm just offering this up because I see so many people stuck in traps of how things should or should not be, and living in a state of permanent dissatisfaction no matter what they actually do.
DeleteI think a lot of coasting through life comes from fear of not living up to our own expectations. Sometimes framing things we want to do as something other than an improvement can work better from that standpoint. Less risk of beating your current self up as useless, lazy or etc.
YMMV, obviously, but in general while working on personal/life "stuff" I like to consider other models and frames of reference just in case they're useful.
*nods* I'll definitely be keeping other frames of reference in mind, if this one doesn't work out for me after a bit then I'll change tracks.
DeleteThus far I'm mostly using this as brain-organisation for exactly what I want to do (eg, learn to use camera better), deadline organisation (eg, costume parties), breaking things down a bit (Project A = Steps 1, 2, 3), keeping in mind things that I want to improve (overcoming fear of social repercussions) and also as a public audience to both pressure me into keeping up with things, provide a network of support, and to hopefully post things that other people find helpful.
And see, it's already working :) You're already providing me support with ideas of other references/models should I find this model not working :)