AlexTheGrape

Post-Detox Day 240 (Part 2) Today has been a relatively good day. It was much better than yesterday in that I awoke at 6am (not intentionally though) and didn’t let myself sleep in. I was a little tired, but I’ve had plenty of sleep this week to lend me a helping hand to overcome that today. I made my first loaf of bread using the machine at home today, although it took me a while to figure it out I’ll end up doing it much faster in future. I’ve only got one more morning (tomorrow) of being justified to do nothing for exercise, then I’ll be back into the Forcefit plan with my friends (simply because I will be living sufficiently close to train with them). I did my meditation and cold shower, but again not much else in terms of habits. I actually gave myself permission to relax today, which I haven’t done these whole holidays. Previously I was in a state of trying to be productive and when I couldn’t do my best I would feel guilty. Now I have actually given myself permission to relax (although still doing many queued tasks) and this way I know I’ll actually become prepared to work heaps at my workplace and with self-development in general. It may seem counter-intuitive to rest to get better at these things, but I haven’t given myself permission for a proper break after all my exams! Gratitude journal I am grateful for generous friends. I am grateful for a superbly organised workplace. I am grateful for printers. One amazing thing that happened/I did today: I had a think about where the relationship between myself and my little brother is going. I’ve been very occupied with studies until recently and so haven’t been putting myself out there to engage and have fun with him. I decided to act on it again today (after a failed attempt the other day when he simply declined to do stuff with me) and we played on the trampoline together for some 15 minutes. The real miracle was that I was able to get both my brothers outside playing with the Nerf guns together for the same amount of time (if not longer) despite my twin having lost interest a while ago (playing video games instead), and them both wanting to do it more often now! It required some quick improvising and a little planning, but I set up a CSGO type game in which we had terrorist and police sides, and the terrorists had the objective of planting a bomb in one of two destinations. This provided the strategical opening to get my brother interested and the teamwork and ‘togetherness’ kept my little brother really interested as well. I plan to do similar things with more time with them soon, but at the moment things are looking well for the holiday programme so it can simply be a part of that. Workout/run Nope. Daily task planning ahead of time Yup, briefly. Exercise planning I’m not planning to do exercise (last day of relaxation). Meditation Yup. Visualisation Nope. Daily affirmation Nope. Fully cold shower Yup. Reading + taking notes Yup. Getting to bed before 10:10pm Nope. Daily application of self-development skills Keep proactive, and TAKE DUMB ACTION! Weekly Goal(s) Spend at least 30 minutes of time playing with my brothers every day possible. Use my flash cards daily for learning Japanese. Exercise every day Organise all meetups for this month and the next by Wednesday Monthly Goal(s) Have at least one video of my holiday programme on YouTube with a dedicated channel. Have gotten to know the inhabitants of 10 neighbour households. Old 3 Month Goal (1 month left!) My three month goal is to develop my leadership skills enough to confidently coach a sports team or lead another form of community group. 3 Month Goal Expand my holiday programme to a running business/be running my own community group within my neighbourhood. Know my neighbours from at least 100 households/have them as contacts for my holiday programme. 12 Month Goal Be running my own community group, hosting public events (more detail needed) 48 Month Goal Have grown my holiday programme/community group to be accessible by at least half of the NZ population. Have the skills (namely leadership) to have my options open for being an entrepreneur or having a normal job. What went well today: Making the effort to get both my brothers outside despite all the grumbles, and having fun together as a family as a result. What didn’t go well today: Procrastination again, but it is a relax day after all so I can’t be too hard on myself. What I could have done to make my day better: Getting more sleep! What I will do differently tomorrow: Getting to sleep on time, setting timers for tasks I want to get done quickly. Photo Stream Here is a sneak peak at a small part of what's involved in my holiday programme... It'll be revealed once I get some footage of what it involves after launch.

Post-Detox Day 240 (Part 2) Today has been a day mostly spent at home. Despite my best intentions to get up and get on with the Forcefit plan I set up, I turned off my alarm and slept in. I did my meditation, a cold shower (I’ve been doing well with those actually), but not much else in terms of habits. I talked to my parents about this consistent lack of achievement of my habits, and they were surprised I was attempting to do so in the first place near the start of my holidays and after a whole week of work. I’ve decided that it’s ok to actually give myself a break in times like these, but I only have one whole day left before I’m back to work! Anyhow I’ve been organising a road trip/batch stay with some of my friends this week and it seems to be finally coming together. I also went Christmas shopping again today but I still have some gifts to buy. Things are looking well! Gratitude journal I am grateful for The Warehouse. I am grateful for self-awareness. I am grateful for the internet. One amazing thing that happened/I did today After I had a cold shower today I was able to do many things on my to-do list quickly, and taking ‘dumb action’ of attempting to do them fast without perfectionism. Workout/run Nope. Daily task planning ahead of time I managed to do this two days ago, but not for today. I’ve now done it for tomorrow! Exercise planning I’m not planning exercise tomorrow. If I am, it’ll be small. Meditation Yup. Visualisation Nope. Daily affirmation Nope. Fully cold shower Yup. Reading + taking notes Yup. Getting to bed before 10:10pm 10:15, not bad. Daily application of self-development skills Tomorrow I’m going to use my habit streak to make the most of my productivity time. Weekly Goal(s) I made new ones, but I need to get to bed, so maybe next post? Tbh I’m not likely to achieve them because of my relaxation week in general. Monthly Goal(s) Have at least one video of my holiday programme on YouTube with a dedicated channel. Have gotten to know the inhabitants of 10 neighbour households. Old 3 Month Goal (1 month left!) My three month goal is to develop my leadership skills enough to confidently coach a sports team or lead another form of community group. 3 Month Goal Expand my holiday programme to a running business/be running my own community group within my neighbourhood. Know my neighbours from at least 100 households/have them as contacts for my holiday programme. 12 Month Goal Be running my own community group, hosting public events (more detail needed) 48 Month Goal Have grown my holiday programme/community group to be accessible by at least half of the NZ population. Have the skills (namely leadership) to have my options open for being an entrepreneur or having a normal job. What went well today: Getting on with daily habits. What didn’t go well today: Sleeping in, procrastination. What I could have done to make my day better: Getting up on time. What I will do differently tomorrow: I will make sure to get up on time!

Haha that's a funny thing to happen, although in a really positive way. There is something to be said about the feeling of doing physical work to make things clean, sometimes I feel it has its own cleansing effect on one's feelings/mood. Haha thanks! I cooked with my brother the other night, but I'll make sure to take photos of what I cook from now on! Also framing your letter from Cam is a really good idea, I am going to do that soon too!

Post-Detox Day 238 Today has been a rather relaxed/uneventful day. I got on with setting goals for the week, although they were a little rushed. I didn’t get on with the exercise I planned to, which wasn’t good at all. However I still did my meditation and visualisation. It is taking longer than I thought it would to organise the holiday programme I’m making, but I’m getting there. Post-Detox Day 239 Today has been another relaxed but uneventful day. I started by reading a D&D manual for a few hours, then spent a few hours experimenting with Adobe Illustrator trying to develop a resource for my holiday programme, and then spent some time with my little brother in the afternoon going Christmas shopping. I keep going through phases of being interested in Dungeons and Dragons (the tabletop game) and then stopping reading about it, but I’ll write about that in the next paragraph. I planned to do some exercise in the morning, but failed again after I turned my alarm off in the morning and slept in. I am finding it very difficult to keep accountable for this stuff when there’s practically nobody at home and I’m not posting regularly, so I simply need to take action and get on with both those things. Post-Detox Day 240 Today hasn’t ended yet, but I’m writing here because I’m committing myself to taking action on whatever I can, every day. This is ‘the zone’ I get in when I’m happiest, as I know I derive happiness from making progress. I am honestly disappointed with the lack of progress and laziness I’ve shown this week so far, I’m going to make sure I make the most of the rest of the week by getting on with the things I’ve planned. If needed I’ll go to a library to do these so that I don’t have many distractions and actually have to be prepared for it the day before. The only day that would really be possible is tomorrow (I’ll be working and have other events planned on later days up until about the 28th this month!) but even then I have a planned meetup with a friend tomorrow. I’ve written a pros and cons page of whether or not I should continue with D&D in general until any planned event of playing, and I have decided that I don’t want to waste any time with it. Although playing the game would likely help me with my creativity and improvisation skills, and possibly even my social skills, it seems that at least 95% of the time I’d be preparing for the game by reading resources and browsing the internet reading about other people’s stories with only 5% of the time actually playing the game with friends. Furthermore it gamifies imaginary things and is completely fantasy, and having such an escape from reality would likely bring back desires to play video games. I even had a friend talk to me about how similar D&D is to gaming. Because of this disproportionate time wasted and the gamification involved in this tabletop game, I’m deciding to put the box away with my brother for him to look after until about the 10th of January, then I can make a further decision on how what I should do then. Gratitude journal I am grateful for summer. I am grateful for pen pals. I am grateful for self-awareness. Photo Stream This photo is of my pros and cons sheet I used to assess whether or not I should continue reading about D&D, to give you an idea. I'm grateful I have the skill to be able to do this though, many other people will just deal with life through their feelings.

Post-Detox Day 237 Today has been a pretty good day, because it’s been a turn-around back into a productive lifestyle. I wasn’t near as productive as I’d want to have been, but I made dinner with some help and got on with all my habits so it was a good step forward in the right direction. I started out slow and sluggish, but after a good talk with my accountability partner I got on with researching why I should have a cold shower, and that I hadn’t reached most of the goals I set this week. I realise the same type of thing happened after my last accountability call, but I’m now needing a kick in another area so I’m working my way up again. My goals for the week may have been too hefty because I was quite busy this week, so I plan to keep my goals more realistic for this week. Gratitude journal I am grateful for the freedom I have with my time. I am grateful for vacuum cleaners. I am grateful for living in a first world country. One amazing thing that happened/I did today I gave my run today heaps of effort, and finished the run in around 10 minutes (which is my goal!) and I felt awesome afterwards. I then had a cold shower, and it made it much easier to get on with things by getting out of my comfort zone that way. Workout/run Yup. Daily task planning ahead of time I’m adding this one because I’ve found that I will procrastinate my tasks if I decide to do them within the same day, or I’ll simply not organise them. I am going to start queueing the tasks I’m doing for the next day to make sure I have reason to get on with them as early I can in the day. I’ve now done it for tomorrow! Exercise planning Tomorrow morning I’m going to get on with the Forcefit plan for Monday. Meditation Yup. Visualisation Nope. Daily affirmation Nope. Fully cold shower Yup. Reading + taking notes Nope. Getting to bed before 10:10pm Yup. Daily application of self-development skills Tomorrow I’m going to use my habit streak to make the most of my productivity time. Weekly Goal(s) Complete all the planning stages of my holiday programme so that it is ready to deploy. Learn the skills to, and undertake, the conversion of my python program to a .exe file. Learn 5 new Japanese words. Get to know the inhabitants of 4 neighbouring houses. I’ll respond to these next post. Monthly Goal(s) Have at least one video of my holiday programme on YouTube with a dedicated channel. Have gotten to know the inhabitants of 10 neighbour households. Old 3 Month Goal (1 month left!) My three month goal is to develop my leadership skills enough to confidently coach a sports team or lead another form of community group. 3 Month Goal Expand my holiday programme to a running business/be running my own community group within my neighbourhood. Know my neighbours from at least 100 households/have them as contacts for my holiday programme. 12 Month Goal Be running my own community group, hosting public events (more detail needed) 48 Month Goal Have grown my holiday programme/community group to be accessible by at least half of the NZ population. Have the skills (namely leadership) to have my options open for being an entrepreneur or having a normal job. What went well today: Getting on with daily habits. What didn’t go well today: Procrastination in general. What I could have done to make my day better: Planning ahead. What I will do differently tomorrow: Use my plan for tomorrow to get on with stuff fast! Photo Stream Here’s an old one from my time in Australia.

Post-Detox Day 236 Today has been a pretty relaxed day, I had a very late night last night at a party and so was recovering in general. I hardly got out of the house, and was a terrible day in general in terms of habits. I got more done on organising my holiday programme, but it seems that the actual making of resources and organising rewards will take the bulk of the preparation time. This post is written the day after, but I’m getting back into the daily habits so I’ll write in full soon. It really sucks to be down to this level of self-development, as I'm getting nothing done and I have little energy for much else. It is not a place where I want to be, so I'm picking up from where I am now.

Awesome to have you back! We'll be with you man

Hi Zeeko, just thought I'd see your journal and help where I can. Relapses happen, but they can be very valuable learning experiences if you make sure to avoid/change what you were doing that influenced your decision to relapse the most. I relapsed a couple of times during the detox, and I learnt something each time. It doesn't make relapses okay, but you can take something away from them that you might otherwise not figure out. All the best for getting through the detox!

Awesome to see everything is going well for you! Being able to do chores more easily, have more 'normal' responses, and being able to enjoy previously 'boring' activities become possible without the hyper-stimulation of gaming, so it is wonderful to see those coming through. It's fantastic you're doing your own cooking, it's a really valuable skill. I keep telling myself this but haven't yet managed to cook consistently, so good on you for actually getting on with it. All the best man!

Haha bet that felt amazing to receive your pay. Money is very nice to have. Thanks! Yeah it did. It is nice to have that security and I can start saving for things I need (and run my car haha).

Post-Detox Day 235 Today I have worked through lunch hours and evening hours, so I didn’t have much time for life in general. I finished off a birthday card and gave it to my friend, and they were very grateful. I had to do some late night driving to swap house I’m staying at, and that hasn’t worked well for me as it has made me really tired now (day 236). I’m glad I’m filling up my bank though, it’s a good use of my holiday time to be saving up money. I went out with the exercise group again, but it turned out I was the only one who turned up! After making some calls I got one person in the group to come along though so it was still a group exercise.

Today I slept in a little, went to see my grandparents, and sorted out some banking issues. I felt bad that after all that I immediately had to get ready for work and leave, as I feel I haven’t adapted properly to working in the evenings. This photo was of my car parked on the school field after all the other cars left (it was prizegiving for middle school so I was directed to park there, and all the cars left hours ago). It makes my car look really important, so was a good photography opportunity!

Post-Detox Day 233 Today has been a cool day of meeting up with a friend for kayaking and hanging out for the day to catch up on what’s been going on. This person has the exact same personality type as me (ISTJ) and we happen to get along really well because we value the same things in conversation. I am very grateful for the number of things I have that allow me to do this: Free time, a car to drive, a licence to drive, money to spend, and a friend to see. Without any one of these things it would have made this much more difficult. In the afternoon I didn’t do all that much, but I only had an hour or two before I needed to leave for work. I also got my first full monthly pay, which almost immediately convinced my brother he needed to apply for a job. In the morning I did my first workout with my friends in the morning, and my brother came along too. It was a great opportunity and experience to do the exercises together because it makes the activities more engaging, entertaining (we joke whilst we do it), and keeps us more accountable.

The following are some short descriptions of the days this week. I can’t pinpoint exactly why I’m not putting in the time to post, but it could be because I need smaller sized journal entries at the moment to account for the reduced hours I have (since I have been working a lot). I’ve been working every day this week except for Monday, because the restaurant is closed. Post-Detox Day 232 Today has been a day I spent at school, and it although it was rather boring I got a lot of things done. I finished and gave “DY DX” number plates (made of cardboard and paper) to my maths teacher as a way of saying thanks for teaching me this year. I got a lot of software removals and installations to my computers finished as well, which took most of the day. I drove home to have about an hour of free time before going to work. It was the last time I am ever going to be wearing school uniform, so I can now look back on my school years as memories.

Post-Detox Day 231 Today has been a superb day! I started off by completing a high priority task, then went to a farewell lunch for a friend of mine that’s leaving to study in Australia. I was able to drive around my mates to the destination as I have my full licence in my new car (yay!) and so opens up a lot of doors to doing things with friends. I ‘sorted my life out’ this afternoon by assessing my roles as a person, prioritising those roles, creating tasks from them, and then creating SMART goals for those tasks. Amazingly the group of friends I was driving today had actually started using the ForceFit plan a couple of weeks ago and exercising together only a two minute run from my house, and that was exactly what I was using to do my own exercises! This will make for a super convenient way to keep accountable for exercising. I also asked my brother to be an exercise buddy yesterday, but this is so much better (he’ll be joining too). I finally managed to do a (what should be weekly) reflection and weekly goal setting, and this will help put pressure on me to get done what is most important to me by creating deadlines for them. Gratitude journal I am grateful for having a car of my own. I am grateful for having amazing friends. I am grateful for the opportunity to say goodbye to my friend. One amazing thing that happened/I did today My friend was very grateful that I took the time to make her a farewell card, and it made for a better time together. I’ll fondly remember getting the biggest hug ever today! I really should have taken a photo of the card though, it was really good… Workout/run Yup. Exercise planning Tomorrow morning I’m going to exercise with my friends in the park, and show them who’s boss! Meditation Nope. Visualisation Nope. Daily affirmation Nope. Cold/partially cold shower Nope. Reading + taking notes Nope. Getting to bed before 9pm I’ve created a new schedule for mornings and evenings that is more realistic than before, as I need to account for frequent late nights working. I’m now going to be getting to bed before 10:10pm ideally. Daily application of self-development skills Tomorrow I’m going to make sure to do all I can to make the best positive experience for others and myself out of the workout experience. Weekly Goal(s) Complete all the planning stages of my holiday programme so that it is ready to deploy. Learn the skills to, and undertake, the conversion of my python program to a .exe file. Learn 5 new Japanese words. Get to know the inhabitants of 4 neighbouring houses. Monthly Goal(s) Have at least one video of my holiday programme on YouTube with a dedicated channel. Have gotten to know the inhabitants of 10 neighbour households. Old 3 Month Goal (1 month left!) My three month goal is to develop my leadership skills enough to confidently coach a sports team or lead another form of community group. 3 Month Goal Expand my holiday programme to a running business/be running my own community group within my neighbourhood. Know my neighbours from at least 100 households/have them as contacts for my holiday programme. 12 Month Goal Be running my own community group, hosting public events (more detail needed) 48 Month Goal Have grown my holiday programme/community group to be accessible by at least half of the NZ population. Have the skills (namely leadership) to have my options open for being an entrepreneur or having a normal job. What went well today: Prioritising my life has helped a lot. Heaps! What didn’t go well today: Not that much, perhaps leaving my run till the afternoon. What I could have done to make my day better: Not much. Getting more sleep I guess. What I will do differently tomorrow: Use my new schedule, exercise with the group, and continue doing my tasks according to priority. Photo Stream No new photos... Time for a queued old one! No rioting please, I hope to take photos within this week!

Quick update: So the past few days have been a blur of activity, with my schedule being completely full with work, my school graduation dinner, and other things. I haven’t yet adapted to this new cycle of staying up late for work or whatever, and as a result I’ve been getting up late and throwing off my entire morning schedule, including that time taking up my journaling time. I had an amazing talk with my accountability partner yesterday and I’ve come to realise that not being accepted to be an engineering officer has been a turning point for me because I no longer had the need to continue exercising to prepare for any sort of test, and so it is important for me to set myself a new vision, with new goals, so I have a real direction now. The past couple of weeks I’ve been simply surviving late work nights and knocking off tasks I have queued, however many of my habits have fallen to the side. Tonight I plan to have completed this planning and as a result will have the necessary goals to add to my daily journal.

Post-Detox Day 231 Today has been a good day of ticking off to-do tasks. I got in a long run (largely because I dropped my house key and had to retrace my whole run to find it), and responded to a couple of pen pals. My start to the day was rather slow, and although I tried to segment my day it simply didn’t work when there aren’t any real time restrictions or deadlines for the tasks I’m doing. I think I’ll just try to do those a little faster tomorrow. Gratitude journal I am grateful for the technology of keys and locks. I am grateful for getting back my headphones. I am grateful for having a day without work. One amazing thing that happened/I did today Nothing spectacular happened today, but I spent some good time with my dad in the evening. Workout/run Yup. Exercise planning Tomorrow morning I’m going to do a short run, and whilst I’m at it do 3 x 50 pushups, 3 x 30 sit ups, and 3 x 8 pull ups. Meditation Yup. Visualisation Nope. Daily affirmation Nope. Cold/partially cold shower Yup. Reading + taking notes Yup, no notes. Getting to bed before 9pm Nope. Daily application of self-development skills “Start using my notepad again and record any times I notice I could be doing something more effectively/efficiently or am not doing something I’m supposed to. This should be a good practice of raising awareness.” In the weekend I did manage to do this, and it seems I waste the most time listening to music at my desk. At the moment I don’t want to take away music whilst at my desk, however if this problem persists I’ll make a change. Weekly Goal(s) Will be decided tomorrow. Monthly Goal Failed: This month I want to have exercised for at least 20 minutes every day, and I’ll leave an error margin of 3 days in which I won’t fail this goal by not exercising (-2 error days left). 3 Month Goal (2 months left!) My three month goal is to develop my leadership skills enough to confidently coach a sports team or lead another form of community group. What went well today: Generally ticking off to-do tasks. What didn’t go well today: Not doing my morning schedule. What I could have done to make my day better: Do my morning schedule properly, not read in bed for so long. What I will do differently tomorrow: Needing to work late these past few days has thrown off my normal routine, so I’ll need to make alternative plans for ‘recovery days’. Photo Stream One of my best waterfall pictures I've taken, however this one isn't new (please no rioting, I'll post a new one soon!)

3 months and 27 days and I can say the same! Are you continuing studying in the same school or moving to university-level of school next semester? Happy holidays! Awesome, that's not too far away! I'm moving on to university now, so I'll be coming back to school a couple of times to return books and such but otherwise I'll not be needing to come to school again!

Oh don't worry, at school we get regular holidays too! We tend to have the year split into 4 'terms' with 2 week holiday periods in between them, and 6 weeks or more for the summer holidays. 9 x 50 minutes will be substantially harder for you because you have so many other commitments, so best of luck with that! Haha I don't know if there will be a NZ GQ meetup in NZ the next few years at least, but if there is I'll be sure to let you know! I'll be writing myself a detailed weekly plan today, so I'll let you know ho that turns out and if the role prioritization helped.

The past few days have been relatively unstructured, and because I was working at my job in the evening every day, my daily journal writing was interrupted. I didn’t manage to write a post in the morning for whatever reason, but I’m now creating a bit more structure in my day as that has been what I do most successfully with. Post-Detox Day 228 Today has been a day mostly at home trying to tackle my long list of things to do these holidays. I reorganised and cleaning my room, however this took much longer than it should have. I tried to organise a couple of meetups with friends and others, and got a few important things done that I had previously postponed. I got done that long run in the morning I wanted, and it was quite nice. I had work in the evening. Post-Detox Day 229 Today has been a day of searching for cars online, getting contacts, and driving around to see and test-drive cars. It went pretty well, and I feel I’m getting really close to finally being able to choose a car that’ll last. I think I did some great exercise, but I can’t remember exactly what it was. I worked again in the evening. Post-Detox Day 230 Today has been a relatively balanced day: I got some good exercise done, whilst ticking off a few more to-do’s and seeing another car. Not all that much happened, actually, but that’ll hopefully change tomorrow. This photo I took on Friday on my long run. Focus: wood!

Thanks Jeremias, I'm glad I could help. Awesome, that's great you liked the video I was in, it gives a good picture of what gaming really does nowadays for the best and for the worst. All the best for getting through your detox!

Thanks, I'll keep that in mind. Yep I hope the project will be a blast!

Thank you very much! Haha yeah I am finally free! Yeah most of the student world right now is partway through some type of semester/term, but I'm in the southern hemisphere so summer time is the same as Christmas time, so it is pretty much the ultimate holiday period. Yes you're right, the 9 x 50 minutes is a goal that I haven't deleted yet! I change that one weekly, so it is going to sit there for now. I go on a school bus, but even if I was on a public bus I could simply tie my bags around my legs so they won't be taken without me noticing, and I could keep my hands in my pockets so that no other hands will fit in there. There's solutions for everything man! Haha yes I'm guessing those are native trees, but pine trees and such from Europe still grow normally here, probably just a little faster

Post-Detox Day 227 Today has been refreshing, for a few reasons. I was asked to help out my grandparents for the day, so I did just that. It included everything from putting in insulation in the ceiling to washing the windows to transferring computer files. By the time I got home it was about 6pm, and I’m glad I got to spend that quality time with my grandad. I haven’t made much progress with my planning today, but it has undoubtedly been a day well spent. I didn’t manage to get the run done I wanted to, so I’ll be doing that first thing tomorrow morning. Gratitude journal I am grateful for having amazing grandparents. I am grateful for having the freedom to drive. I am grateful for a special opportunity coming my way… One amazing thing that happened/I did today Putting insulation in my grandparent’s ceiling was a surprisingly unique experience. I needed to wear overalls and an air mask because the air was so dusty, and wore a headlamp because there was hardly any light getting in. It made for an experience similar to being in a mine because it was only safe to stand on certain places, there was a low ceiling, and a few other things made it very interesting. I reckon I should have taken a photo! Next time I guess. Workout/run Nope. Exercise planning Tomorrow in the morning, I’m going to go on a long ass run, lets make it 40+ minutes! Meditation Nope. Visualisation Nope. Daily affirmation Nope. Cold/partially cold shower Yup. Reading + taking notes Yup, no notes. Getting to bed before 9pm Nope. Daily application of self-development skills “Start using my notepad again and record any times I notice I could be doing something more effectively/efficiently or am not doing something I’m supposed to. This should be a good practice of raising awareness.” I packed my notepad, but didn’t write anything in it. I’ll give it another go tomorrow. Weekly Goal(s) I want to make sure to do 9 x 50 minute study sessions daily, with exceptions for days in which I don’t have the full amount of time free for studying (i.e. working or other necessary activities). Monthly Goal Failed: This month I want to have exercised for at least 20 minutes every day, and I’ll leave an error margin of 3 days in which I won’t fail this goal by not exercising (-2 error days left). 3 Month Goal (2 months left!) My three month goal is to develop my leadership skills enough to confidently coach a sports team or lead another form of community group. What went well today: Helping out the family. What didn’t go well today: Procrastinating getting to sleep last night. What I could have done to make my day better: Getting enough sleep. What I will do differently tomorrow: Go to bed on time, do my morning habits on time. Photo Stream I took this one a few weeks ago, on a very steep hill! I gotta get that camera out now

Post-Detox Day 226 Today has been a relatively action-packed day, but a good one overall. It has been the day of my final exam, and it is finally over! As soon as it finished I ate my lunch and got stuck into planning out my holidays and tasks I want to get done. I then had an hour at home to relax a little, have a run, and eat before working until 10pm. There’s still so much more planning to do, but I’m glad that I have so much I want to do (compared to doing not very much my last summer holidays). There’s a holiday programme I’m in the process of planning and developing which is for my family at the moment, and if it works out well I already have plans for expanding its usage to my neighbourhood. Watch this space, there’s going to be interesting things going on soon! I’m trying out this new style of writing for now, but I think it adds just a little bit of character to the words I say here. Gratitude journal I am grateful for having great colleages where I work. I am grateful for getting a whole fried crab in my dinner box (work perks!) I am grateful for being free from school exams and starting my holidays. One amazing thing that happened/I did today Strangely, planning out the development stages of creating my holiday programme (it is going to be complex from an organiser’s perspective, but it’s going to be great!) was very engaging. I could keep working on it and feel amazing, it is great I have developed the confidence and drive to do this type of thing enough that I am motivated to do it. Workout/run Yup. Exercise planning Tomorrow in the morning, I’m going to go on a long ass run, lets make it 40+ minutes! Meditation Yup. Visualisation Nope. Daily affirmation Nope. Cold/partially cold shower Yup. Extra long for cold this morning because I felt a little sleepy. Reading + taking notes Nope. Getting to bed before 9pm Nope. Daily application of self-development skills “Make a new friend I am not even aquainted with by initiating conversation.” I had a go at this one today, and I thought I did really well with a smooth conversation. However this person simply wanted to listen to their music by themselves, and although I introduced myself they did not bother to introduce themselves. I’m glad a gave a crack at it though! Tomorrow I’m going to: Start using my notepad again and record any times I notice I could be doing something more effectively/efficiently or am not doing something I’m supposed to. This should be a good practice of raising awareness. Weekly Goal(s) I want to make sure to do 9 x 50 minute study sessions daily, with exceptions for days in which I don’t have the full amount of time free for studying (i.e. working or other necessary activities). Monthly Goal Failed: This month I want to have exercised for at least 20 minutes every day, and I’ll leave an error margin of 3 days in which I won’t fail this goal by not exercising (-1 error days left). 3 Month Goal (2 months left!) My three month goal is to develop my leadership skills enough to confidently coach a sports team or lead another form of community group. What went well today: Meditation on the bus. What didn’t go well today: Not much, actually. I should have gotten to bed sooner though. What I could have done to make my day better: Getting enough sleep. What I will do differently tomorrow: I’m going to make sure my alarms are set so I get to bed on time. Photo Stream Here is a photo I took whilst on my run this afternoon.