Every once in a while I feel like it's less a case of being in the driver's seat than being strung along for the ride. The oppression of the mundane rituals of life weigh me down, and I feel like I don't have control of the outcome. Some of this stems from finances. Some from job and school. Perhaps some of this is a symptom of undiagnosed depression. Regardless, I have been thinking that it is a good time to take a timeout and reevaluate where I'm at and what I'm doing.
Some of the impetus of this decision comes from listening to the book As a Man Thinketh, by James Allen. It's in the public domain and can be found here or here. I've looked at the power of the mind from time to time, and I had high hopes for this book. I wasn't wowed by it, but it got me thinking about making an action plan for making some changes. One of the things I thought about was this talk by Thomas S Monson. The main point I pondered was to "plan your life with purpose." The talk was primarily aimed at youth from 12-18, but he also said, "I might add, plan your life regardless of your age." This got the wheels turning.
While thinking about how to go about planning my life, I thought about the idea of a 5 year plan. 5 years is about how long it would take working 40 hours per week to amass 10,000 hours in an activity. According to "The 10,000 Hour Rule", it takes that long to master an activity. I have heard writers mention a similar idea using word count (a million) in place of hours. Using that concept as a guiding principle for setting goals, a 5 year plan could be transformative. I've never been huge on goals. I like the idea, but I usually stop there. I thought, maybe it is just time to do it. I have a lot on my plate, but I waste a lot of time. Having a plan and goals will be something to work on. So what do I want to work on? There are a few areas that really stick out, and they are Computers, Volleyball, and Writing.
I'm studying programming right now. I'm basically a novice, so I have a lot to learn. I see computers as a viable career option. I have a lot to learn to really be employable. I've noticed that I really learn best when I'm actively working on a specific, self-selected task rather than the homework assignments. The homework is helpful, but I learn more trying to figure out how to make something work on my own. I don't think I'll be blogging a lot about this in particular, but I did want to mention it. I would like to get a program made, and possibly I could put something "professional" out there for mobile devices.
Volleyball will always be a part of my life. I would love to find myself on a college coaching staff in 5 years, but there are a lot of things out of my control there. I would love to coach now at the high school level, but I had to step away this season. Something I would love to do is start a volleyball website to teach the game. An initial roadblock there is going to be the capital (and technical skills) to get something running right. A bigger issue will be to put something together that will make it the valuable resource I would like it to be. Something I can do there is to start generating the content I envision. A short term goal could be to generate one article per week that could go on the site. When the other things fall into place, I could have a significant well to draw from.
Working on writing is something I could sink a lot of time and effort into. I have wanted to be a writer for a long time. I currently have 3 long (novel or longer) fiction projects that I would like to finish in 5 years. There are a bunch of audio fiction works I would like to review, and hopefully bring new fans to some creative types. I would also like to use this blog as a way to work through the sea of meh I'm sailing through. To go with the one volleyball article per week, I am going to set a goal to work on my fiction, blog about fiction, blog about writing, and blog about self helpy kinds of things.
I think that's a good start. It should give me a good amount of writing time, give me a lot of content for a volleyball site, and act as a nice bit of therapy to get me back in the driver's seat.
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