February, you're gone so soon!

I think I wanted to post something two weeks ago, but apparently that didn't happen.  Here I am at the end of another month, looking back on my month's goals...

1. Cut unnecessary spending: done.  My main goal was to finish February having spent less money than I earned, and I succeeded, even though my next paycheck is tomorrow.  Tomorrow!  I'm going to get 3 in March, apparently!  The success was only by 5 dollars, but I wasn't cutting back on my food, and food is my main expense, so I'm still proud of myself.  I'll try to keep it up in March.

2. Keep in touch with friends: done.  Sorta.  My intent was to connect with someone every day and that may have happened?  It's surprising how much I text people.  I definitely feel a bit more in touch with certain people now than I did before, but there are others who I still feel the need to contact again.  Like my cousin... I need to not forget to call him back.

3. Cut internet / time wasting and spend more time with more relaxing breaks.  I forgot about this one, actually, but I have significantly cut my internet time... I'm not sure if that came with prioritizing other kinds of breaks or just with being busier.  I know part of it, however, is that I'm now reading magazines with breakfast instead of being on the computer... and that's The Economist, so it feels productive too.

I'm starting to realize that there's a few different types of goals I could have.  There are the "in general, I want to _______" goals, like spending less than I earn and cutting internet time.  Then you have to-do list type goals, like "I want to knit a scarf", etc.  Finally, there are the daily challenges.  Its probably good to figure out what each goal is when I start rather than get halfway and be like "heyyyyy, I thought I was going to do something every day but I think I'm still in the spirit of it."

March is going to be interesting, since not only does it have Spring Break in it, it also is bound to be less stressful than February was.  I haven't really thought about things I want to do this month, so lets see what comes of this.

1. Stop complaining about generic business or tiredness.  There's a culture around here, it feels like, of competing to be the busiest and the tiredest.  And where does it really leave us?  Now, if I'm legitimately feeling stressed or couldn't sleep, that's one thing.  But if I'm feeling generally pretty good, I don't think I should be complaining.  This is a sort of wishy-washy goal but we'll see what happens.

2. Finally write up the pattern for my crochet narwhal and post it for sale on Ravelry.  It just needs to happen.

3. Catch up on Economist so I'm reading the most current one, not one from 2-3 weeks ago.  (Sooner rather than later, methinks).

4. Now for something fun: I want to do a photo a day challenge.  I guess I don't need to explain that one.  Maybe I'll try to post pictures here, and try to take pictures with stories.

Something inspiring: http://dharmacomics.com/

Edit: 5. Update the design here and on Unintended Nachos.  I can has web design?

Resolutions, month 2

At the start of the new year, I made a resolution I still intend to keep: to start a new 30 day challenge (or more) at the beginning of each month.

To hold myself accountable to that, I'm going to report on how old goals went and what new ones I'm starting right here.  I doubt anyone would remind me of this fact, should I not post at the start of a new month, but ... it'll still help.  And maybe someone will join me and be an accountability partner in a 30 day challenge.

So, my goals from last month:

1. Sweater: knitted!  I know, it doesn't look quite knitted, but I did finish the other sleeve.  I just don't like any of the pictures of myself wearing the completed sweater quite as much as I like this one.

2. Learn HTML/CSS: Still working on it.  School happened.

3. Job research and applications: still going strong.  I've put in 2 applications since the start of January, have one company I plan on applying for at some point, and one company approached me with a position I'm now interviewing for.

4. A post here and on UnintendedNachos each week: Ha.  Ha... ha... yeah, I shouldn't keep setting post rate goals for myself.  It's never going to happen.

.....

February is going to be a really busy month, thanks to clinic (which is awesome, but time consuming).  So I don't want to make any big plans that might just make me too stressed.  A couple plans though:

1. Cut unnecessary spending: thanks to a lack of winter break paychecks and the amazing ski resorts of the Pacific Northwest, I spent a lot more money than I earned in January.  So February is going to be about reversing that.  Stick to buying food and other things I need.

2. Get back in touch: Over the summer I told myself I'd write a letter every day.  As it turns out, that's really difficult, especially because people don't often write back (so it's hard to find people to write to).  In February, I'm going to give myself an easier job in the same spirit: make an effort every day to connect with someone I don't often talk to, especially people who aren't on campus.  Just texting someone is fine.  I'll try to gather a list of people I'd like to talk to more at some point (but no, I won't be sharing that one).

3. More intense relaxation: too often I find myself spending my free time staring at the internet, wishing I could do something "fun".  Ultimately, I feel no less stressed and usually just mad at myself for wasting time.  To change that, I'm starting February with a good idea of things I really love doing and want to do more of, and that I find relaxing.  I'll carve out regular time to do those things and cut internet time, so I'm ultimately more productive and feeling better.  I've been working on this one already, and found that it's easy to stay off Facebook if I know I want to be off Facebook and I log off - giving myself an extra few seconds to think about why I want to log in.  Same goes for the rest of the sites I frequent.  Logging off pretty much cuts my desire to be on.  And the prospect of doing the relaxing things I love - knitting, reading, baking and spending meaningful time with friends - makes it easier to say no to the less relaxing things I don't like so much.

The third is a goal I think many of us could benefit from.  Does anyone want to join me?  Let me know, and we can work together!  Same goes for the other two, actually.

Here's to a fantastic month :)

Driving in the moment

Over the summer, I started meditating.  It's something I'd been meaning to try for several years, honestly, but I never quite got the motivation.  Then I discovered that there's a subreddit for meditation.  There's a subreddit for just about everything, actually, but subscribing to this one is probably the best decision I made last summer.

While just thinking "I hear meditation is good for you, I should try it" wasn't great at making me actually want to start, seeing lots of testimonies about the benefits of meditation and tips on how to do it every time I logged into Reddit was a fantastic push into the world of mindfulness.

To say that meditation was "helpful" would probably be an understatement.  After starting to meditate, I slept better, was more focused (most of the time), and was significantly less stressed.  When I say significantly, I mean... since I started meditation, I haven't needed to take my anti-anxiety medication.  Since I started meditation, I also wrote my entire thesis, so it wasn't because I wasn't under any pressure.

Fast forward to last weekend.  I was driving my car down to campus so I could have an easier time getting all my stuff back home after graduation.  It's a long drive, supposedly around 18 hours but, including our detours off the highway for lunch and sleep, I'm pretty sure it took closer to 24 hours of driving... 3 very long days.

As long as the driving was, though, it wasn't painful.  It was peaceful.  Meditative, you might say.  Driving is the ultimate test of living in the moment, because when you're driving, the most important thing to pay attention to is what's going on around you - not doing this has very real and costly consequences.

Much of the drive was also gorgeous...

In addition to the need to pay attention, driving to campus was a reset, in a way - three days where all I had to do was get to the next location, and if someone else was driving, I could knit or read.  I had my phone on hand if I needed it, but otherwise I was disconnected.  I was waking up early to get where I needed to be, and I was with a couple of the people I most enjoy being around.  We even managed to stop at a beach on the last day.  It was the perfect combination of peaceful and fun.


Since the drive, I've been waking up earlier (my sleep schedule never went back to what it was before), and feeling better.  I'm looking at a completely overwhelming semester with excitement, and looking forward not just to the overwhelming amount of classwork and workwork... but to the time I'll have to spend with friends before I graduate, and the time I'll have to read and knit and do things I like to do.


Maybe I'm over-optimistic.  I think I can pull it off if I really want to.

Baby Turns vs the Big Slope

I went skiing yesterday.  It was good fun.  There was snow, and a hill, and I went down the hill.  Something like that.  A few times I went down into the snow.  The usual drill.  Nothing big.

But actually, every time I go skiing it is something big.

I don't remember wanting to learn to ski.  I remember my mom thinking it would be a good idea, socially, to be a skier - something I can do with friends, since most of my friends are skiers.  The thought of attaching my feet to long planks of wood and sliding down a hill more than freaked me out.  I didn't want to be at the mercy of gravity.  I've mentioned before that I'm scared of falling, and, somewhat related, I managed to go through the entire Red Cross Learn to Swim program without ever learning to dive.  I can do racing dives now, for swim team, but it took getting my Water Safety Instructor certification to be able to stand on the edge of a 1-meter diving board and dive off it.  No jumping, no fancy anything in the air.  It never happened.

Nowadays, I enjoy skiing, but its still a lot of work to get to a point of feeling like I'm in control. Steep slopes still scare me, even in little bits.

The first (and pretty much only) black run I went on was practically a face.  Not exactly... easy when you're scared of slopes.  But I was going down with a ski instructor and a class that was just as scared as I was, and the instructor knew how to handle it.  One turn at a time.  We worked our way down the hill in a line, only considering the small patch of hill in front of us, the skill required for a single turn.  Then stop.  Then turn again.  Then stop and celebrate one more victory over the mountain.

So it was yesterday, when I encountered a couple steep slopes that were just big enough to be intimidating.  Looking down at the whole slope was scary, but one turn is manageable.  Eventually, the slope gets shallower and I can keep going... much faster than it would if I just stared at the whole thing and got scared.

So it is in life.  Sometimes it's good to look at the big picture and not get caught up in the nit-picky details, but often we're faced with tasks that are too large and scary to comprehend all at once.  For me, right now, that task is finding a job.  "Find a job" is huge.  Updating my resume isn't.  Emailing someone to ask if they know of anyone who's hiring isn't.  Cleaning my room can be big, but picking up my jacket isn't.  And one jacket at a time, it'll get easier.

... [well written, inspirational conclusion].

New Month's Resolutions

I'm sure I'm not alone in the yearly battle with New Year's resolutions.  It's a new year, so I should come up with some fantastic goals for a year's scale!  Then by the end of January (by the end of January 1, even), you've completely forgotten what goals you set for yourself, and completely forgotten to care.

I always wrote down my resolutions somewhere I could find them later (my journal, usually), so that by the end of the year I could look back and see if I accomplished them.  You know, see if I happened to do what I told myself I'd do but forgot to put any effort into doing.  Sometimes, I succeeded.  For instance, when I said "volunteer", I'd already submitted an application for a volunteer position I'd wanted for years... and I've always wanted to try ballroom dancing so the year that was my goal... well, I got an opportunity and took it.  Note that in both those situations, though, the solution was thrown at me, or at least something that was ridiculously easy to obtain.

Otherwise, there were two main problems with my resolutions, probably the same problems most people have.  Problems that made it weird to look back a year later and say "I told myself I'd do that?"

First, many of my resolutions weren't year-long goals.  They are things that I intend to accomplish by, say, July.  So when next December rolls around, I look back and go "hmmmm... well that was a while ago".  A couple years ago, I put my Gold Award on my resolution list.  Come winter break of my first year of college, and finishing my Gold Award had happened... soooooo long ago.  It'd be the same if I made a resolution for this year to be "graduate" or "find a job".  A good thing to work at for the next couple months, but really not worth a whole year's resolution.

Other goals were immediate desires.  One year, I had "learn yo-yo" on my resolution list.  Needless to say, I stopped caring about learning yo-yo, and its not like the level of expertise I wanted was worth spending more than a week or two on anyways.  Etc.

The biggest issue with my New Year's resolutions, though, is that so many of them are too ephemeral, and don't come with an actual course of action.  This is the problem with the classic "lose weight" and "exercise more" type goals.  Except mine are even worse, since there are some set courses of action for losing weight and being more active.  One resolution I had, two years ago, was "embrace adventure".

Wat.

No seriously.  Wat?

I have a different idea this year.  Let's see if it holds.  (Trust me... it probably won't.  But worth thinking about anyways).  Recently I watched a TED talk about 30 Day Challenges, which you should all watch, because it's short and inspiring.  The basic premise is picking something you want to do and then doing it for 30 days.  A month isn't that long, so even crazy things could be a challenge (don't buy anything is a common one).

I'm considering picking a new challenge or two each month this year, just to see how it goes.  Unfortunately, I'm halfway through break right now, and had a couple goals for break I'm already working on, so those may be my goals for right now.

1. Knit a sweater (will be done by the end of break)
2. Obtain basic knowledge of HTML and CSS, which is happening thanks to Codecademy

New goals for January?
How about getting a post here and a post on Unintended Nachos each week.
And since I really need to do it, getting some job research done.  Maybe applying for some things.

Anyone else want to join me in having New Month's resolutions each month?  Got any fun ideas for New Month's goals?  Let me know!