Although I missed the midpoint of the year, I thought I’d post an update on my 2010 resolutions. This was the first time I’ve ever made any concrete goals for the year, and it’s true what they say – writing down your goals is one of the most important steps to making them a reality. Having had a blog post to go back and refer to throughout the year has helped me keep these goals in the limelight.
1. Expand my data tracker to include walking
Since 2009, I had been keeping a data tracker, as part of my interest in “the quantified self“. Each day, I’d input basic information such as my overall mood and hours of sleep, among others. I can forsee a day when a lot of this data will be automated or made a lot simpler to track than with an Excel spreadsheet, but that’s still somewhere off in the future.
While I did begin adding my daily steps to the data tracker, my results were unsurprisingly disappointing. This year, I’ve had a much more hermit-like lifestyle than in the past, doing my schooling and sidework at home and purposely not going out very often (partially to save money, partially to stay focused). Thus, my walking score was quite often shockingly low – so low that it was pointless to keep tracking it.
After a bout of depression and a major life upheaval in the spring, I decided to stop my data tracking hobby. While it would’ve been fun perhaps in a decade to look back on the quantified trends in my life, it was simply too much work to collect and analyze. I suppose I’ll wait until new automated hardware arrives on the shelves.
2. Get a part time job
This has been tricky. In fact, I’ve been trying to get a job on and off for the past four years. 2010 I’ve had more concerted efforts, overhauling my resume to remove any potential reasons for employers to discriminate during the hiring process (aka: gay community work!), as well as sitting down for hours and applying over and over on those ridiculous online application forms. If companies insist on using an online system, they really ought to agree on a simple standard for all businesses to use so we can remove the onus of repeated data entry for applicants. It is truly a massive waste of time.
Anyways, the demand in the job market certainly is not like it was a couple years ago. I’ve heard difficulties from friends in finding a simple service job as well, so I’ll amount my current troubles to a lack of jobs and a high supply of potential hires. Confronted with such poor prospects, I’ve had to slash my socializing budget, and have instead delved headfirst into school.
3. Exercise at least once a week
This I’ve done on and off. There’s no recreation centre in my community (well, it’s now under construction), and I’m not the type to try and make bus connections for a 15 minute ride to the closest location, and then pay for a pass to exercise for an hour. It’s all too expensive and too much hassle.
In terms of exercise, I don’t need any tremendous amount of cardio, though building my aerobic capacity is always a good thing as a former asthmatic. I tend to focus on building muscle mass, and have done circuits at home, usually twice a week. Though I should try to remain on a weekly schedule, and focus on creating a protein-rich diet for consumption following the routine, I’m satisfied with my current efforts.
I would like to pick up cycling, kayaking, or skiing with time, as I prefer activity-based exercise to a boring gym. Unfortunately, with summer nearly over, there’s little point in investing in a new bike now. I don’t have a vehicle, so kayaking and skiing are pretty much off the radar until that problem is solved. But hey, once the job market picks up, who knows.
In any case, this is tiding my health over until the new rec centre opens next year, which I’ll totally use as it’s only a 5 min bike ride/10 minute walk away.
4. Less procrastination, better time management
With little spending money, I’ve been staying home way more than in the past, which has forced me to procrastinate far less. This focus has translated into the completion of roughly one university course every two weeks, an intense but achievable, and highly satisfying, process. It had reduced the amount of time I used to spend thinking about the City, the Region, and transit matters, which has reduced the amount of blog posts here.
That said, it is amazing how much time is spent and arguably lost hanging out with people or in commutes. Depending on one’s goals, these can be huge time sucks with little return. My life goal at this point in time is to catch up on university and fast-track my first year, which I’ve been successful at so far. I’m not looking to build new friendships or start new relationships – that will come next year perhaps. And I’m okay with that.
This goal, I’m proud to say, has very much been achieved.
5. Do less better
For the past couple years, I’ve been very impulsive, jumping on opportunities whenever they opened up. While I’ve created a broad network of connections and gained a more holistic perspective on life, it has meant that I became a “jack of all trades, master of none.” I didn’t have much focus in life – there was too many projects without enough completion. Furthermore, as altruistic as my projects may have been, they won’t be paying the bills anytime soon, a reality with which I’ve had to contend with.
Learning to focus on that which is most important, learning to establish priorities and stick with them, I’ve gained so much in terms of managing my time and my energy. I’ve had to reduce my commitments and my projects, but in turn, those which I’ve decided I can do have become more successful than if I had remained all over the place.
It is still difficult at times to remain focused and to turn down opportunities, but I’m learning and overall I am doing less better.
6. Broaden my horizons to a global view
At the beginning of this year, I theorized that the failure of some of my projects in the past had to do with a small pool of people who had the same values or beliefs as myself. For example, when I tried to organize a local candlelight vigil for the Copenhagen negotiations in December, part of a global day for climate action, the response was quite disappointing. With just 20 people showing up, I was heartbroken. Ultimately, it had to do with the pool of people I was drawing from. Surrey lacks community and is poorly organized in that fashion, at least in comparison to Vancouver. This is one case where, had I drawn from, let’s say, all of Canada, theoretically there’d be a greater pool of people interested in participating, and thus the event would’ve been more successful.
Part of this goal had to do with returning to my online roots. Drawing from a global pool of people, it is a lot easier to find your community or your niche. It would be difficult to organize and hang out with, say, Harry Potter fans in Vancouver region, whereas on the web, there’s a number of great fan sites that facilitate that connection.
Having operated somewhat unsucessfully at a local level for a couple years, I wanted to go back to the web to find myself and return to my communities. What I’ve learned though is the value of face to face interaction and local community. While it may be difficult to establish, it is just as valuable as the online communities. I think deep down that I am a local boy – I think of myself as a Surrey resident, a Metro Vancouverite, and a British Columbian. While I may also associate with Canada and the globe as essential parts of my identity, their scales are simply too large for me to operate in. I value return on investment and that is most visible when you are in a small community, either in an online niche, or at a local, regional, or provincial scale.
So, this goal I think was another impulsive reaction on my part. I’ve always maintained a glocal perspective (think global, act local) on life and I will continue to do so in the future.
7. Stick to a proper sleep schedule
I’ve never been the type of remain on a sleep schedule. Every weekend, I would sleep in till 10 or 11am. There are those who will wake up every morning at the same time, no matter when they go to bed – I’m not one of them. I used to get around 10 hours sleep a day, though recently have discovered I actually operate more productively on about 7. Any more and I’ll be on oversleep mode, wandering through the world in a zombie-like state for the whole day.
Perhaps it’s because my teen years are now behind me, but I am more prone to naturally going to bed earlier than in the past. I’ve always been a night owl, but as a teen I would stay up till 1, or 2, or even 3 sometimes. Nowadays, I get tired around 11:30 and go to bed usually no later than 1. Which I’ve found is a good thing – I like waking up when the sun is still out; it feels like there’s more to the day that way.
Altogether, I haven’t yet gotten a concrete sleep schedule, partially because doing school online provides me with the flexibility to wake up whenever I feel like it. However, I am satisfied with the progress I’ve made on this goal and don’t think I’ll ever be the type to go to bed at 11 and wake up at 6 everyday – I like rolling with the punches of each day.
8. Launch a web project in partnership with a developer
Now this is an interesting goal. For many years, I’d had a range of online/tech-based projects and ideas I thought would be brilliant but simply didn’t have the skills to code them on my own. I made a goal to finally work with someone to launch one, and in that regard, I have been semi-successful.
In the spring, I had this brilliant blog concept that I was quite confident in. I hired a designer to work with me, ensuring the product had a professional look to it prior to launch. That was an interesting process itself, finding the right partner to work with, developing a brand online through email and Skype, and keeping it all within a tight budget.
That process has been complete for some time. Since the spring however, I’ve begun my university classes, and due to the tight timeline I set for myself, haven’t had the spare capacity to focus on building the blog as I initially wanted to. In the Fall, my university course completion time will extend from a two-week to four-week frame, giving me more time to focus back on the blog idea. So, look for that in the fall sometime.
9. Write a book
Few of you know this about me, but the first topic that got me engaged in “changing the world” was education. My issues with the school system early on translated into creative solutions and new approaches to education, and essentially what became a whole new school system that I developed when I was 16. Since then, I’ve become side-tracked, first with regional transit issues, then with queer community capacity building. I intend in time to return to education, and am taking university classes on the topic this fall. At this point, I plan to use my degree to become a teacher, which will hopefully give me another perspective on the system, allowing me to tweak and modify my old plans.
Through the years though, I’ve returned time and again to this fundamental problem of the education system. I strongly believe that solving this issue could be the greatest gift I could give to the world. If we solve education by allowing each and every individual to build their unique skills, capacities, and identities with the goal of them becoming strong leaders in their community, then we’ll have a pool of human resources from which we can solve the other great problems in the world, from climate change and famine, to poverty and the global economy. Without that strong foundation though, we’re never going to fix these other issues.
I’ve long contemplating the best platform from which to unveil my concepts, and have yet to figure out the best one. I do have a dream of one day sharing my framework for education at TED, but that’s a ways off. My idea at the beginning of 2010 was to share my ideas in a book. Obviously, it wouldn’t be published, but it would be at least a first draft from which I could later mold and remold as my idea develops.
With regards to this goal, I’ve made no progress. I don’t feel too bad about it though – I think when the time’s right, my ideas will find their platform. Right now, I still have much more to learn about education before I claim to have the perfect solution to its problems.
10. Get my driver’s licence
This I did! In February, four years after turning 16. I’ve become quite good at driving automatic, and am finally beginning to get the hang of standard without stalling. Props to me for this.
