Short Term Goal Update & Food For Thought

What a Couple of Weeks

I have to admit, this blog is starting to get a wee bit frustrating so far as I have several topics I'd really like to dig into in depth such as:

• Nature vs Nurture, and if enough negative reinforcement early in life can become strong enough in habit to become like nature
• What I've come to realize in how my time in, and away, from Alaska have worked as an allegory or metaphor for what I've realized is one of my biggest problems that's hampered me in being able to live life
• Having a happy life or happy times versus being happy with yourself (because I know from experience what it can be like to have 2 years of fun, living life well, but still be incredibly unhappy or dissatisfied with yourself on the inside - it's not a contradiction)
• The list of 100+ goals for the year aimed at improving my life and myself. Probably should get those up before the year is half way over :)
• A long detailed study on habit. Really, there's a ridiculous amount of interesting things to explore there when you think about it.

In fact, I was hoping to tackle 2 of these this week, but there were some huge obstacles completely beyond my control that have really shot up the plans and goals. For one, I wasn't planning on being severely sick for a weekend between the time I set all my goals and the time the deadline arrived. It doesn't matter how quickly you recover or "shake it off," you're just not at 100% after a stomach virus that drops 9 lbs off of you in one day. It took days to shake off all the lethargy from that one.

Problem 2: Mediacom cable. 99% reliable my (anatomical posterior). I work online. All my finances are based directly from having Internet and being able to work. The Internet was down for 6.5 hours one day, and it was a day I was fired up, "feeling it," and all set to make up for a bad day and still smash it all out. Then when the Internet finally came back up that night, 6 hours later it went out for another 7 hours - during many of the hours that are often my most productive of the entire day.

It's not just hours loss, but it's also falling behind versus being ahead. I think the mind set you have between those two situations, not to mention the freedom of options that disappear when you're behind, represent far more than actual numbers. But for numbers sake, at a minimum those two outages cost me $150, and probably closer to twice that.

So I set a lot of goals for March 9th as a short term exercise, and in all honesty I failed to meet most of them. But I don't feel bad about that because several of them I did make, and I'm at least working on the others. So the quick recap and run down:

• "Floating Debts," are all paid off other than Mike, which is good since there was another $150 that cropped up that I had forgotten about. Mike also has a check on the way, so progress is moving well there.
• Lowest balance credit card. It's not paid off, but see the Internet being down. Right now I have to make sure I have enough to cover the gauntlet of bills that come up in the middle of every month. But, there is plenty of income I've earned on its way, but I have to wait for PayPal and my bank to process it. Then the credit card will be paid off. So I call this tardy, but a victory.
• Gym: Nope. Done some body weight exercises at home, and still dedicated to losing weight, but haven't been able to make it back consistently. See "sickness" and there were other factors beyond my control.
• Start 20 conversations with strangers. In retrospect this was a little too ambitious, and the downed Internet time resulted in me working at times I was planning to go socialize. I did make it to 6, though, and met our new neighbors down the hall.
• Still working on the 2 chapters for my sister.
• I have wrote all 4 letters, now need to send them off tomorrow, so that's close enough, right?
• I crunched the numbers, and even with the Internet down, I did write more articles in those 2 weeks than the 6 before them. Made it by one.
• Picking up the plastic bins tomorrow.
• Daily personal time is a resounding success. It's been very nice.
• Haven't finished 2 new books, but I've started one new one and am over half way through.

So like I said, not a staggering success, but I'm feeling pretty good about the flow of things. There's no question I feel more like myself than I have in years, and hanging out with my buddy Dan today for several hours was a blast. That's the kind of time hanging out with a friend that's good for a soul.

I've already noticed several friends from earlier parts of my life have tracked me down and whether through e-mail or Facebook or whatever have become part of my life again, and for that I thank God and them. I appreciate every one of you, and it's good to have ya'll around again - even in cyber form (or "imaginary" as Mike likes to call it).

In other news, may have made our first sale for "Truth Exposed Publishing" - the company my brother and I started, even before the first product is finished and ready for launch. You have to feel pretty darn good when you're getting that level of support from the people around you.

The insane writing goals for March continue. I have to say, those 2 Internet outages probably finished off any chance of hitting all (or even most) of the goals, but when faced with the choice of tossing it all in the wind or continuing head on against impossible odds anyway, I chose the latter.

Like I've said before, it feels really good to be back.

So when the end of the month is here, I'll update those results on my freelance writing blog, as well as this one. I'm really happy to find that even stating the year in complete burn out, dealing with deep emotional and personal issues, and deciding to throw all the messes in my life out into the open at once, I'm finding the energy, the strength, and the faith to really make it work. The past couple years I think I would have folded, instead, but this time it's different. I hate using cliches, but it really is one of those "I'm turning a corner," situations.

So while I have to go catch up on some more freelance work, I will be getting back to update this blog soon. Thanks to everyone reading, and I'll make my goal to get the list up by the 15th. One more thing, a teaser for next time.

I'm going to argue in a future blog post how Sinbad's comeback comedy special gives wisdom that could directly help I'm guessing well over 50% of guys with some of the hardest questions they ever had to wrestle with. That's right: Sinbad can help solve the question of "how to be a man." So that's the teaser.

Hope everyone is doing well. Thanks for stopping by!