30 Days of Life Improvement Challenge

[Brunellus]

I just found this, so it's probably too late for me to participate*. Regardless, you all have my support!

*I'm doing alright. All of my problems are very minor. Don't sweat it.

[doodlesplat]

I just found this, so it's probably too late for me to participate

Why, never! You can join in anytime!

[!saak]

I just found this, so it's probably too late for me to participate*. Regardless, you all have my support!

*I'm doing alright. All of my problems are very minor. Don't sweat it.

You might surprise yourself.

[Princess Flufflebutt]

Missed out a little bit but here is something. Will do today's task later.

[Venusy]

I'm not a very visually imaginative person, so this was another difficult one:

Top left: game development. Rare's Twycross studio is the building pictured. Pokémon Stadium 1's Kids Club is there to say that mini-games might be easier to start with (WarioWare might have worked better).
Left: Continue being supportive of others, increase it if possible. Binged "shoulder to lean on" after remembering the post I made in RUSP.
Bottom left: Travel more, see the US or Canada at least once. Pictured is Times Square, Vancouver, and a potential reason to travel.
Centre: Move out. Photo taken by me before we moved out of our old house.
Top right: Social anxiety. The final page of Butterfly.
Bottom right: Fat/muscle.

[StarStep]

Ok here are my Day 2 and Day 3 assignments since I didn't have time to upload the photos yesterday.

Day 2


Day 3

I think my ultimate goal has always been to just live a happy nothing too extraordinary life. I don't really care too much about money and power. I just want to be able to enjoy what's around me.

Oh I also ended up picking myself up a white board where I will try to keep track of all my daily tasks

Also the huge pony eyes seem to be past the point of my white boarding expertise. I think it may have to go up for one of Sunday's daily tasks

[!saak]

Tomorrow's challenge will be posted tomorrow.

Getting a schedule down for this is hard Especially if I haven't done the latest challenge yet. Going for a bit of a breather then, catch you all on the flip!

[Momo]

Is it okay to flake on a day's activity and do it tomorrow if you're going to be doing something uplifting and life-affirming all evening?

[Tears]

Day 4!

Year 1

[*]Be in the same job
[*]Hopefully graduate to deputy editor for Europe
[*]Actually improve at guitar instead of just spinning my wheels
[*]Set up a blog, or get on staff for a film/music criticism site
[*]Actually decide on academic stuff - a language? an evening class masters in economics? Maybe just something fun, like more English lit

Year 3
[*]Stable career. Be still in this. Not necessarily in the same place, but you're actually properly on the way now. Don't lose focus
[*]Have a place, either part-owned (anything beyond part-buy part-rent is probably impossible). Ideally live alone.
[*]Have taken a sabbatical to spend some serious time somewhere
[*]At this point, I'd have finished a masters, if I did one. What then?
[*]Quit smoking
[*]Learn some computer stuff, programming or desktop/online publishing, or graphic design
[*]If no language by this point, get on that. Go back to learning Arabic, if nothing else.
[*]Be sharper at writing, get comfortable enough with longform prose to be able to turn out something half-decent

Year 5
[*]Have a place, properly. Nice apartment, in the city but close to nature
[*]Be at the point of running a regional bureau for a news network, or be a senior deputy editor for a newswire
[*]Be an accomplished writer
[*]For my family to all be okay enough that it's not such a big strain for me, or them
[*]Be totally over weird insecurities

And something personal

[Ponder]

Double whammy! I'll try not to make this kind of procrastination a habit. Don't want to be TARDY

Life Map! The camera didn't pick up the sparkly crayon very well. Looks like plain old cerulean. Oh well. It's still a pretty color.

Vision Board! It seemed like it would be kind of daunting, but I actually had a lot of fun with this one! Actually began tearing up a couple times, but I had a giant grin on my face.

And now I'm off to the gym! It may be almost midnight, but I didn't get a chance to go yet today. Gotta stick to that schedule. :bigmclargehuge:

[!saak]

Post #250 whatup?

Is it okay to flake on a day's activity and do it tomorrow if you're going to be doing something uplifting and life-affirming all evening?

I love you Momar

Double whammy! I'll try not to make this kind of procrastination a habit. Don't want to be TARDY

Life Map! The camera didn't pick up the sparkly crayon very well. Looks like plain old cerulean. Oh well. It's still a pretty color.

Vision Board! It seemed like it would be kind of daunting, but I actually had a lot of fun with this one! Actually began tearing up a couple times, but I had a giant grin on my face.

And now I'm off to the gym! It may be almost midnight, but I didn't get a chance to go yet today. Gotta stick to that schedule. :bigmclargehuge:

Yeeeeeessss!!!!



Day 6: Create Your Action Plan

Waidaminute, didn't we do this already?
Yes!
So why are we doing it again?
The first time was practice!

Yesterday you visualized your goals and your dreams. You scoured the web searching for imagery that felt right, that clicked. You put them together in a collage which represents your dreams and ambitions.
Again you might've felt like adding tasks, or changing them up. Maybe putting images with your words brought you ideas you didn't even consider!
It's a reminder of what we want to achieve. But as we change throughout our lives, your vision board should reflect that too. So update it whenever you feel like it needs to.
Now that you've visualized your goals, let's make a plan to make one of them happen!

Create Your Action Plan

(Again, not to be confused with this guy)

You probably set yourself goals all the time,. Get a cup of coffee in the morning, don't be late for work, buy those snazzy shoes, watch the latest episode... Season 4 is darn far away...
When you set a goal, either consciously or subconsciously, you take the appropriate steps to achieve them. If you want to get lunch, then you get up and make a sandwich, or you go to your nearest, favourite foody place.
These are already a kind of planning, but since these are goals you know how to achieve these are pretty easy. When it comes to your life's goals, the steps might not be so clear.

By making a plan, you make yourself aware of what steps you need to take and when to take them. If you don't have a plan, it's really easy to get sidetracked and lose touch with your goal, which is still a really great goal to achieve!

Your plan is your toolbox, the car you drive to towards your goal. Or your motorcycle, or your spacerocket, or your horsie.
It reminds you of what you need to do next, like a little you keeping you focused.
Today you'll be creating an action plan for your #1 goal at the moment!

Step 1: Pick a Goal to work on
What's the #1 goal you want to work on right now? This can be a goal/subgoal from your life map, or something you started working on before the challenge.

Write down your goal and be as specific as possible. If you want to lose weight, write down how much you want to lose. If you want to get better at cooking, write down how many times you want to cook and the kinds of dishes. If you want to get better at drawing, when would you like to have a piece of art finished and how many?

Write down when you want to achieve this goal
When do you want to accomplish this goal ideally?

There's a method called SMART which you might've heard thrown around. Maybe it makes you go all , but you can also use it to get a sense of what kind of factors you can include

Write down your motivators
Pursuing your goal is like driving a car to your destination, it needs fuel! Your motivators are what makes your engine explodes so many times a revolution.
Why do you want to achieve this goal? Write down as many reasons you can think.

Bonus step
Pick a project title. Name it something awesome, something that makes you smile when you read it, something that makes you laugh, something that makes you go all
GO CRAZY!

Step 2: Create your Action Plan

The greatest hero of them a...
...
...
ahem

Break your goal down into different milestones, and write down when you want to achieve them. How detailed these are is up to you, you can go from monthly goals to weeklies, if you think it'll help.
If you don't know what milestones and steps you need to take to reach your goal, imagine you've reached your goal and work backwards. What steps did you go through to reach your goal?
Organize them in whatever way you think is effective.

Identify your key action steps

To achieve your goal and each milestone, what key steps do you need to take to achieve them?

For example:
Say you want to become a guitarist in a band, and your first milestone is to learn how to play guitar:

"Look into where I can learn to play guitar"

"Ask my guitar playing friends/family"

"Get an acoustic guitar"

"Follow a course"

You don't have to determine every step, just the ones you you can immediately name. You can fill out the rest later. The goal of this is to take action, not paralyze you!

Anticipate your obstacles, and adress them!

You will come across obstacles along your way, obstacles which will try their very best to stop you from reaching your goal. If you recognize them you can anticipate them, If you can anticipate them you can overcome them.
Write down your obstacles, rank them according how big they are. Then think about how you would address each obstacle and write down your answers.
It might be that you don't know answer, your answer could then be: find someone who does!

Integrate your Action Man Steps into your calendar

Integrating them in your calendar means you're taking your steps out of your plan, and into action.

Create Your Action Steps for Tomorrow

Oh hell yes , you're going to work on your goal starting tomorrow. Write down the steps you can take tomorrow.

Repeat the above if you want to plan out your other goals!

Reflect on Today's task

How was today's task?
What did you learn?

Your 30 Day Action Man (Plan)

Still the Greatest Hero of them All! What steps do you have planned for today. Do them with awesome.

[!saak]

I think I need more cardboard



e: dropped a few pictures.

[Hi.]

Oh no! I'm late with yesterday's.
HEY. Hold on, you are late, too, Isaak!

Okay anyway, hidden for huge.

I didn't sign this one because it wouldn't fit!

[Snow Drift]

Sorry for popping in like this, just want to say I am following along, I just need to play catchup a bit.

[!saak]

Oh no! I'm late with yesterday's.
HEY. Hold on, you are late, too, Isaak!

Ssssshhh

[quote="Snow post_id=21629 time=1366473863 user_id=1]Sorry for popping in like this, just want to say I am following along, I just need to play catchup a bit.[/quote]
No need to apologize, don't feel pressured!

--

I finished it!



Since lousy camera & handwriting:

Clockwise, from top left:

Get My Own Place, Make It Look Like This
My own place, my own den, my own little box of quiet and wonder

Spread Joy & Happiness & Make the World Play
These two are intertwined, I believe play is something a lot of people forget (how) to do, and I want to remind and them show them!
Pictured are people playing urban games, which is part of what I specialize in.

Produce & Mix Music
This is something that popped up between boards. I started making mixtapes and live mixes and I realized just how much I love music. I want to make it!

Animate my own shorts
Reflecting on this maybe this doesn't cover the whole spectrum, I love making timelapses too, and have tried stop motion. I also do motion graphics.
ANYWAY, this too is something that popped up between mixes. There's almost nothing more satisfying than making my own shorts; to evoke raw emotion with moving images.

Travel the World
The world is so big, and so gorgeous, and there's so many people with interesting stories to tell! There are so many places to see, so many things to do! I want to do EVERYTHING

My Own Studio
just
I want to have my own studio so that I can make the games that I want to make.

:3


Get a sportscar, do this
I've been a carnut since I was young. I knew all the makes and models. I love the sound of roaring V8s, when I sit in the bus which runs on natural gas I get all giddy because it sounds like it has wastegate flutter

Share & Inspire
Ever since I started my journey I've been coming across so many wonderful things, I've learned so many lessons that I think would help other people out. I want to share those and inspire people to look at things differently.

Center

Make this better
This gets front and center, because this is what matters. This is why I do what I do. It's is so much fun, and it makes me so happy to have a positive influence on the world.

[Venusy]

I know there are no right answers, but I'm really not sure I've done this right.

[!saak]

You're doing a great job

To me it seems you've recognized a key goal: getting a paid job. You've mentioned that a lot hinges on it: in other words many of your major goals are dependencies.
You could see getting a job as a subgoal, or a milestone, on your path to achieving what you want most.
If you're wondering how moving out and getting a house works, you could find a resource which will help you figure it out. Like your parents, or a friend, a family member, or someone/something online
Make your plan and then get feedback on it.

Like everything. you get better at setting goals and pursuing them with practice. You could practice for instance using your game development project!
I could get you in touch with people and resources if you want. Oooh, Twitter is great, tons of gamedevs use it! And let's not forget the thread right here on the forums.

I'm not sure this answers your question, so if you have any more: fire away!

[Brunellus]

Why, never! You can join in anytime!

You might surprise yourself.

Just did the first three days. Not sure if I'll be posting it though. A lot of it is stuff I was already planning.

[Angora]

I think I'm dropping out because I just lost my job and have to reevaluate my priorities

[!saak]

Just did the first three days. Not sure if I'll be posting it though. A lot of it is stuff I was already planning.

Sweet Don't feel obligated to share, only share if you feel like it.

I think I'm dropping out because I just lost my job and have to reevaluate my priorities

I'm sorry to hear you lost your job
It's okay to feel bad, but don't let it stop you from living the life you want to live

[!saak]

Alright, I can finally tick "change up the 30 Day schedule" on my list.
It's good that I managed to make the switch just now, because it's going to be a task for the entire day!

This be tomorrow's challenge!


Day 7: Take Action on Your Action Plan

Okay, I think I've worked the Action Man joke out of my system

Yesterday you planned your path towards one of your goals, naming steps, milestones and identifying your biggest obstacles and resources.
The point of the plan is to give you a sense of what you need to do to achieve your goal. Think of it as a quest you're given in a game. You need to save the world! But to do that you need to find people to help you, get your hands on the macguffin and vanquish the evil villain.
In a game you're always aware of what you need to do next, which gives you an enormous sense of clarity and focus.
But now you're the one determining what needs to happen to fulfill your quest. Pretty cool huh?

You might've tried to overplan things, filling out every detail you could think of. Or you might've been hesitant, wondering whether your plan actually works.
I'm familiar with both of those.

Overplanning doesn't work. You might want to include every single detail. It's impossible to foresee every single thing coming your way, there are things you just simply can't account for. There's a point stops being useful. You need to take action, that's the whole point!
Plus, if you overplan you work yourself into a corner and you make your life revolve around your plan. You own your plan, not the other way around Allow for freedom, allow for serendipity, allow for spontaneity! Without it you're blocking yourself from getting inspiration, from getting ideas. Your plan is there to give clarity and to allow you to make things happen.

I started out this challenge with a rough idea, then as it evolved I learned new things which I've begun adding into challenges and I slowly got the hang of it. I've had some of the most amazing a-HA moments I ever had and I wouldn't have had them had I planned myself into a corner.

On the other hand if you're not sure whether your plan is up for it, you don't have to worry. Take the first step you feel is right. After you've taken it you will have a new set of results to learn from.

Here's a little diagram I drew just now, which I've dubbed 'The Funnel'.



This is a diagram I sketched in my notebook while working on our Uni grad project. For our project we're using a highly iterative development approach, called Rapid Prototyping.
We basically test everything. We build something, then throw it at people to see if it works.
At first, in the beginning stages of our project, we have only a faint idea of what we should make. Then as we start developing and testing we move through a funnel of sorts. As time goes on we try all sorts of new and different things, taking into account the results we got the previous times. We continue the cycle of prototyping, we hone our product and our goal. At the end we end up with a highly tested, focused and innovative thing of awesome.
Pursuing your goals, or your life even, is much the same like this. Take that first step, get a sense of what's what and then go from there. You might take a wrong step here and there, but you can learn from that as much as you can from making the right step.

Just take that first step, it'll become much clearer as you keep going

Your plan is dynamic, just like your goals are dynamic, just like you are dynamic!
So update it whenever you feel it's necessary!

Let's go and do today's task!

Step 1: Take action!

Turn to a new page on your notebook. Refer to the actions you laid out as part of yesterday's task and write them down. If you feel they could be more clear, break them down into little steps.
And... go!
Go, the challenge will be here when you get back.

... Yeah, maybe reading Step 2 is helpful, that'll make it a little milestone for the day

Step 2: Reflect on your day

Do this step at the end of your day. Check your progress for each step and mark whether they're completed or not. If you didn't get to complete a step, think about what to do with it.
It's okay if you didn't complete all the steps, don't stress yourself! Instead learn from it, why didn't you complete it? What do you need to change to complete the goal?
What did you learn? What insights did you gain?

--

Tomorrow is going to be a day of review!

[Ponder]

Day Something:

I'm lazy, and have kind of mashed all of the steps together. I had a written conversation with myself. It might not look like a lot, but it still took almost an hour and really got my brain working.
I picked a goal, I identified key steps, I kind of addressed some obstacles, and I have some stuff that I can do tomorrow to help me toward achieving said goal. Feels good.

[Momo]

Izzy, either you're a timelord, or you just mislabeled day 7.

[Momo]

Incidentally: For those who are still spinning their wheels on Day 5: Your desktop wallpaper makes a handy vision board. Just keep adding to it.

[ScionVyse]

I sorta skipped the past few days because I'm lazy and really busy with lots of things.

But I sort of did an action plan for a few things immediately.

Getting a job:

Step 1: Apply to EVERYTHING EVER.
Step 2: Get an interview
Step 3: Nail it!
Step 4: Job.

Not a lot of steps, but there isn't a whole lot of finesse to applying for jobs. I've done most of the gruntwork already.

Expressing my creativity:

Step 1: Write good music
Step 2: Record music
Step 3: Show music to people
Step 4: Build confidence
Step 5: Repeat steps 1-4 until time ends or until I'm confident in my work
Step 6: Send music to producer friend and see what steps I need to take from there.
Step 7: If quality, proceed to step 8, if bad, return to step 1
Step 8: Work on making making music sellable (i.e. production, posting on youtube, tossing cassettes at drunk bands in bars etc.
Step 7: Starving artist Profit.!?

What I'm probably going to do is end up posting a bunch of my terrible terrible music on this forum somewhere, and see if everybody dies. (Showed some of it to doodlesplat who is apparently not dead) If no, Then I may be on to something. If yes, then I have a future as a dictator.

[Ponder]

Hey Scion, what are your thoughts on Bandcamp? It may be relevant to your interests.

[ScionVyse]

I've heard of bandcamp before, but never really thought much about it. It's really cool, but I'll probably stay off it until I can get a little most sophisticated tech behind my stuff instead of a Blue Snowball & Audacity, as that's the best I can do right now.

[Hi.]

Dear Isaak,

I am sorry for ending up a day behind again. I was out all day celebrating, and now I'm way too stoned tired to do day 6's. So I will try and do it tomorrow morning, or may have to double up tomorrow night.

[!saak]

Day 5:

I'm lazy, and have kind of mashed all of the steps together. I had a written conversation with myself. It might not look like a lot, but it still took almost an hour and really got my brain working.
I picked a goal, I identified key steps, I kind of addressed some obstacles, and I have some stuff that I can do tomorrow to help me toward achieving said goal. Feels good.

"Failing to art is only possible by doing nothing."

Wow

Izzy, either you're a timelord, or you just mislabeled day 7.

Aaaaaaahhhh!!!! Is there a Doctor in da house?!

I like being called Izzy, it makes me go all...

I've heard of bandcamp before, but never really thought much about it. It's really cool, but I'll probably stay off it until I can get a little most sophisticated tech behind my stuff instead of a Blue Snowball & Audacity, as that's the best I can do right now.

May I suggest Soundcloud?

Dear Isaak,

I am sorry for ending up a day behind again. I was out all day celebrating, and now I'm way too stoned tired to do day 6's. So I will try and do it tomorrow morning, or may have to double up tomorrow night.

Aaaaahhhh Vancouver
No need to be sorry. I'm behind too How ironic is that? Do them at your own pace, no worries.

[Aracat]

Day 5:

It's hard to find images for some of the abstract things I want. Making it and looking at it when done gave me a few ideas and more concrete goals.

Day 6:

Project: daffodil and daisy sandwiches

I want to cook for at least four (of 21) meals a week. Leftovers allow for multiple-whammies, potentially eliminating the difficulty of preparing small portions. I want variation in the meals and to get away from prototypical midwestern cream-of-X type recipes. I don't seem to have a lot of time, so ease of preparation is important.

I'm getting tired of crummy lunches or going out. I want to learn to cook more things and think my diet could stand to be improved. I might spend less on food, and I could host events and cook for people (no more of this havin' a party? LET'S ORDER PIZZA! crap)

Subtasks:
Do some research about ingredients to avoid (trans-fat, refined sugar, stuff in cans)
Find new recipes
Find/schedule time to cook
Increase number of meals, with a practical limit of about 8 per week

Known problems:
General lack of spare time in evenings
I don't have a lot of easy, healthy recipes on hand
I hate buying ingredients that are only useful for one recipe if they don't keep
Issues reheating stuff for lunch

Tomorrow (read: today): do research, possibly cook something depending on the outcome of scheduling

This has been a loose goal since last year, but now I'm getting off my butt.

Shoving day 7 in here too

Turns out that I hate alarms and my sleep schedule for the weekend went on vacation. I spent some time thinking about where my time generally goes on any given day and was very annoyed to find out that I only have about four hours of time to mess around.

I figured out when I should be cooking to hit as many days as possible without messing up the rest of my schedule. I did cook something, no research and no recipes found, but it's not the end of the day just yet.

[Momo]

Hey cool, I was flaking on the Day 6/7 challenges because I was doing my taxes - and that's one of my goals!

Lookit me, still doubling up on homework wherever I can.

[Robotzor]

I didn't see where those 30 days had to be consecutive

[!saak]

I didn't see where those 30 days had to be consecutive

Next task will be on the 23th.... of September... in 2017

--

Since I was behind I laid out my goals this morning and acted on it. Now I'm fooling around in an audio program and watching tutorials

[!saak]

Day 8: My Little Review
Wait, how can this be day 8? Didn't we start on Monday, so shouldn't this be 7?
Oh wait, the first Monday counted was "1"... Right!

Yesterday was your Day Of Action! What did you do? Did you make something cool happen? Did that thing you always wanted to do? Did you have fun?

Maybe you weren't sure whether your actions were the right ones at first. But doing things is what gets you closer to your goal, even if it seems like you're moving away from it. You'll learn valuable lessons along the way, lessons that make you that much better at what you do. So it's actually a really big step forward.

You'll learn about your pitfalls, recognize new obstacles, meet all kinds of people who might be able to help you.

When you're deeply involved doing what you want to do, it's very handy to take a step back every now and then to get a sense of how far along you are and whether your goals or actions need some tweaking.
Today's task is all about reviewing.



This right here is the Creation Spiral, a visual representation of any creative process.

It's something you can apply on a micro and macro level. It's something people go through subconsciously in the morning getting their coffee, or how large scale, multi-year productions happen.

You start out with your goal, your wish, your dream. Like you want to make music. Then you visualize it in a mental image. What would making music be like? What would that make you feel like? As you do this you start to believe in your goal, and realize that you believe.

Then you express your goals, either on paper, on a vision board, or to your friends and family. You research what you need to make it happen, the steps you need to take. Then you plan them. And then you decide what actions to take first.

Decision is important, because it also means you decide not to do things.

Then you act on your decision, you persevere, keep going and going until you finally recieve what you were after. Then comes appreciating what you achieved, appreciating yourself, you being appreciated by others. Finally you can relax and charge up for your next big thing.

Everyone usually finds at least one of the steps difficult. With me it's Planning & Deciding and a teensy bit of Persevering.
For the past week you've been going through this spiral all the time, on a small scale with every challenge and on a large scale with your entire life.

Take this model into account when doing today's task.

Step 1: Review Your Previous Days

Turn to a new page in your notebook and title it something cool.

Spend time looking through everything you've done for the challenges of the previous day. See if there's anything you'd like to add or edit.
Review your progress on the challenge as a whole too. Take the opportunity to tie up any loose ends. Think about the coming week, how will the 30 Day Challenge fit into that?

Do you have trouble finding time? Are you afraid to take action? Maybe you lose interest after taking your first couple of steps? Write down anything you think you could improve on.

If you've done everything so far, that's wicked! How can you keep this up for the next 20 odd challenges?

Step 2: Set a Review Session

Get into the habit of reviewing your goals and your actions. Allocate time on a weekly, biweekly or monthly basis to help keep you focused on your goals.
If you feel like you could use some extra structure, set it weekly. Or multiple times a week even. Make it a recurring appointment with yourself in your calendar!

Hi!
Hiya! Long time no see!
I know, how have you been?
I'm doing great! I've spent time looking after Pumpkin & Pound Cake! And I've been rehearsing a new song for next week's big event!
Great, anything you've run into?
Well, the piranha costume makes jumping from roof to roof tricky, so I'll need to figure out a solution.
Awesome! Get to it.

And that's how Equestria was made.

Your review is something important, so make some time for it. Even if you didn't do anything with your goals that week, take the time to reconnect with them and see where you're at.

What to ask yourself during Review... Half... Hour... Or whatever time you feel is appropriate

Am I meeting my expectations? Exceeding them? Or do I need an extra boost?

What's helping me achieve my goal? What's working & why?

What's not helping? Why? What can I learn from this to become better at what I do?

Consider whether you want to change your goals. Do you want to drop one? Add one? Adjust one?

Reflect on Today's Task

How was today's task. Did you like it? What have you learned?

--

Yay, I've made the switch to my new schedule!

[Demeh]

Dear Isaak,

I am sorry for ending up a day behind again. I was out all day celebrating, and now I'm way too stoned tired to do day 6's. So I will try and do it tomorrow morning, or may have to double up tomorrow night.

Oooooh, right.

420

[Venusy]

To elaborate on the A+, imagine this, but with CPUs, mobos, RAM and PSUs instead of football.

[Lhet]

I fell a bit behind over the weekend, here are the last couple days

Day 5: On another computer.

Day 6:

The Goal:
-Lets go with music making

Specifics:
-I want to be good at creating music.
-I want to do a collab with somebody and contribute just as much or more to the song than the collaborator.
-I want to post songs and have people say "this is awesome" or "I can't stop listening to this".

Time:
-1 year from now should be sufficient for the above.

Motivators:
-I want to always have a creative outlet.
-I want a goal that I can pursue in several different ways (to be able to keep it up without burnout).
-I want to be able to talk about the sort of music I like from an experienced perspective.

Name the project:
-Project:....Will think of something maybe

Action plan goals:
-30 minutes of creative effort every day! (Action: Do it)
-Post a song sketch that's arguably complete, even if not great
-Post another song sketch
-Refine a song sketch (Action: Watch tutorials)
-Remix a thing
-Start a collab with somebody (Action: Actually start talking to music making people about music making)

Obstacles:
-Getting bored/burned out (pretty much the only one I'm going to worry about)
Solution:
-The 30 minutes of creativity can be whatever clause means I can take a break if needed without breaking the habit of daily creative effort.

Day 7:

Goals:
-30 minutes of productive music making
-Watch a tutorial
-Take notes on a song

I think I need to wait until the end of the Day 7 goals to start Day 8, but I should be up to date tomorrow!

[!saak]

It's fun reading your thoughts Venusy, I love that you're sharing so much
Also, it teaches me how to read my own handwriting, because it can get pretty bad. Yours isn't... super... legible
But mine can get worse.

I think I need to wait until the end of the Day 7 goals to start Day 8, but I should be up to date tomorrow!

Wicked! Maybe we can make music together, or learn together!

I've still doing the challenges But I'm a bit more conscious about what I post and what I don't. Not that I don't want to share, but my handwriting is terribad and typing everything out is actually lotsa work.

--


Day 9: Your To-Do List

(I nearly called this Day 8. But I caught you before I finished you criminal scum!)
How was your review yesterday? Was it helpful? Did you learn something new about yourself?

A review can be very constructive, it allows you to put your efforts into perspective and recognize where you're doing really well, and where you can grow.
The Creation Spiral is something I know since last week, and the prof who shared it with me told me the following story when she explained how it worked:

There was a road racing cyclist who wanted to win a major event. He worked really hard to achieve his goal. He was driven, focused and worked dilligently to become the best.
He raced his legs off, beat the competition, won the prestigious event he always dreamed of winning and... felt nothing.

That was weird. Why did that happen? Why did he feel so empty?

It turned out, after a long period of introspection, that he hadn't set the goal for himself. But rather for his father. He didn't wish to become a great bicycle racer because he wanted it, but because his dad wanted it.
It's an example which nicely illustrates the idea behind the Creation Spiral: each step affects one another, going through one step doesn't mean you can just keep going. Maybe you get a result which calls to re-evaluate your previous steps.

This is what a review is really good for!
With that, let's get to today's task!

Transformers, Prioritize!

How do you plan your to-do list, your steps towards your goals? Do you write everything down you need to do and then tick the boxes one by one?
You might make a laundry list (I know I do), writing down all the tasks (all of them) you need to do. You then race to get as much of them done as you can before the end of the day.
This is an approach which works fine when doing things like grocery shopping.

But a laundry list is not the best way if you need to prioritize. Having a laundry list means you're giving all your to-dos the same level of importance. Your productivity is equaled to the amount of things you cross from your list. The more you finish, the more things you get done.

Right?

When you do this, you risk falling into the trap of Not Actually Getting Anything Done. You might make "Replying to email" or "Checking for Facebook messages" as important as "Prepare for Job Interview" or "Improve my Drawing Skills". Those big, awesome, meaningful projects you love so very much then get sandwiched between all the noise and might even get pushed back.

A laundry list is excellent if you need to run an errand, but it's missing one key component: a way of measuring the importance of a task.

You might be tempted to finish small tasks to get those out of the way for the Big Ones. But you end up biased to finish those, instead of working on that thing you really want to work on and give you long-term results!
If something has the ability to create huge, impactful results which lasts for years, then clearly that task is really important.

So when evaluating your to-do list. Ask yourself:

What impact does this task have in my life in 6 months, 1 year, 3 years, or even 5 years?
Which are the projects that will improve your life when you complete them?
What are the things that will have a significant impact even long after you complete them?

These are your high priority tasks. A good of looking at it is the 80/20 rule, otherwise known as the Pareto Principle.

It posits that 80% of output is generated by 20% of input. When applying that to your goals: 20% of your goals amount to 80% of value, meaning & growth.
It makes the most sense then to invest your energy into the top 1/5th of your tasks.

There's a certain joke here about percentages that I'm sure has crossed your mind

Task: Make Your To-Do List 80% Cooler

There, I did it

Step 1: List all of your to-dos for today
Think about all the things you want to do today. Write down all your tasks, from checking email, doing the 30 Day Challenge, appointments, errands and so on and so forth.
The more detailed the better! If you're going to work today, don't write "Work". Write down what you're going to work on; tasks you'll be performing.

Step 2: Classify them as 20% Lamer or... err wait... 20% tasks or 80% tasks

Assess what tasks you've got for today. Make for instance a column titled 20% and 80%.
Remember the 20/80 distribution to streamline things
There should be more tasks under 80% and less under 20%

Step 3: Improvise on your to-do list

Can you add or create more 20% tasks? Take action on your action plan from Day 5. Work on any of the other previous challenges you feel could use some polish. Work on new action plans for your other goals. Go and have fun with a friend.

Reduce your 80% tasks. How can you reduce these? Think about delegating them, or consciously procastrinate on them. Allocate an amount of time for them and do them all in one go.
Or simply dump them. This might be hard, but it could also mean you're cutting out a lot of noise.

Step 4: Enjoy your day!

Now that you've focused yourself on what tasks really matter, see how that works for you. If you find yourself getting distracted by your 80% tasks, remember why you're doing what you're doing.
If you come across any new tasks during the day, write them down and sort them out later today.

Step 5: Review!

At the end of your day, review your experience.

Has today been more productive? Or less? Did you find yourself getting distracted? What distracted you? What did you learn?
How was today's task? What insights did you gain?

Your Action Plan

Remember that your action plan is still ongoing! Do you have something planned for today? Do them with awesome.

[Hi.]

Okay. Catchup. I'm gonna do review tomorrow morning when I'm not so tired, but day 7 and 8 were straightforward. My main goal is to lose weight, and I'd already been making plans to take the actions necessary to do so (and have already been for a few months now~).

Nonetheless, I'm nailing down the goals a bit more, and moving my weight goal up a month. (Had originally been <300 by the end of July, and I am pretty sure I can hit that by the end of June, instead.)

So, anyway.

[Aracat]

Day 8

This is yet another thing I've more or less been doing anyway, except for maybe the life wheel entry. I did stop and consider life in general but I should probably do so more often. Calendar event time!
I left a question or two open that I really should sit down and address but I end up thinking about them now and then throughout the day anyway and haven't made up my mind yet.

I'm always lacking for time but I made some changes to help that out, like mister calendar, and the days seem to be getting easier. Some of the challenges I find to be a bit cheesy and maybe I'm not putting as much effort in to them, but they're getting done.

Meeting expectations? I think I'm doing ok. I'm falling off the ball on a couple things - small, less important things - because I don't have them on my calendar. As mentioned above, I'm not really following the spirit of a couple of the challenges.
What's helping? The calendar. A few of the early challenges were revealing.
What's not? Some of my goals will stretch for years. These challenges don't seem to be set up to deal with that but maybe one of the later challenges will address that?
Changing goals? Been there, done that.