seriousjay

Another week, another good step in the right direction! For the most part, I pretty much stuck to everything that I wanted to accomplish. I've also been evaluating how I've done for the whole month and, barring a couple of spicy situations, I've done really, really good. Every week I fulfilled my commitment to the gym. and for the most part I've been eating very well. I'm actually quite excited to see what the results are next time we take some measurements! For the last week specifically, I have officially discovered that I simply cannot reward myself with any candy or something similar. I simply lack the self control at this time to only consume it in moderation, so that is something to be avoided at all costs. To be honest, that's probably a really bad way to "reward" yourself anyways, as it has no nutritional benefit whatsoever while being very high in calories due to all the sugar. I also ended up buying this special kind of pizza when I went to the grocery store, and while in terms of value, it is excellent, I did end up devouring it in like 3 days when it probably could have lasted a week. For now, I'm going to need to rigorously stick to my eating plan and not deviate too far from it. One way I've discovered that I probably can reward myself with food is buying these spicy pepperette things. They are very high in sodium, but I am able to only eat 2-3 at a time, and I really enjoy them, so that is definitely something that might work. Over time, I will need to remove such things from my diet, but for now at least, as long as I can control how much of it I can consume, I think I can allow myself that. The other thing I was thinking about to reward myself with is going to this one restaurant called Gate of India. Indian cuisine is honestly one of my favourite and they have a few dishes there that I really like. It *should* be reasonably healthy to eat there, even if I eat too much, and it isn't too expensive. There's also enough of a barrier to actually get there that there is very little danger of me binging on something like that as well, so that is an option. The idea would be to allow myself to go there at the end of the month, provided I did really well in fulfilling my commitments. It won't be this month, but something to think about for June. Now, as I mentioned previously, I did some thinking about stuff to add in terms of things I want to be doing and I've come up with the following: Personal Hygiene Unfortunately my personal hygiene in some respects isn't the greatest. I don't shave, trim my nails or brush my teeth consistently. My goal for every week going forward will be to shave and trim my nails at least once a week, and brush my teeth at least once a day for starters. The reason why I want to do this should be fairly obvious so I won't go too deeply into that. I think the reason these things aren't a habit for me at this time is simply because I didn't care enough about my appearance. I still kind of don't, but I think as my body begins to look better from the training, I will value my appearance a lot more. Afterall, there's little sense in having a great figure if you otherwise look like a medieval times thug! Coffee In short, I consume too much of this in my opinion. I drink 2 cups a day, which isn't really THAT much, but I want to cut back on it because the way I get it is rather unhealthy (280 cals per cup), and it would save me about $40/month if I went down to one a day. I don't really *need* it to function, and quite honestly I don't believe anyone really does (a good night's sleep and a hearty breakfast should be enough honestly..), so that's something to do as well. Sleep I'm doing very well in getting to bed on time (about 10:00 PM) on weekdays, but I am horrible about it on weekends and days where I am not working the following day. I want to be in bed at the same time each and every day in order to make sure I don't have trouble falling asleep when I really need to go to bed, as well as to make sure that consistency in sleep is there so I don't have situations of varying amounts of energy each day. The time I want to be in bed by is no later than 10:30 PM, and I want to be waking up at 6:00 AM daily at the latest. Success Triggers Course Previously I had tried to incorporate the Earn1K course into my routine and I quickly realized it wasn't going to work. I think part of the reason for that is the Earn1K course requires a long term commitment to spending a substantial amount of time in the week to it, and I think I was just really uncomfortable and scared about that. The Success Triggers course doesn't have such a commitment, and it will still accomplish certain things in terms of personal development. It won't *directly* affect my career path, but it will certainly help with my mindset and hopefully also prepare me better for tackling other things like this that have a higher degree of commitment. So, I want to be doing one module of the course 3 times a week. The reason I chose 3 times a week is because I pretty much have 3 days during the week with nothing going on, so I should be OK adding something to those days. I have learned from previous experience that trying to do too much in one day leads to burnout for me, so I'd like to avoid that. In summary, my new commitments for June: - on Sundays, trim nails and shave - brush teeth before bed every day - be in bed by 10:30 PM - have only one coffee a day - complete one module (and all follow up work) of Success Triggers 3 times a week As before, if I start to feel like I'm burning out and heading back towards how things were before, I will attempt to figure out what's causing that and remove it from my routine. As I mentioned previously, this whole process is going to require a certain amount of time to get it done right and I don't want to compromise my progress. I just have to take the slow and steady approach and constantly push in the right direction, and I know that will take me to where I want to go.

Good luck man I think you're on the right track just keep it going!

Right, my post for this week, I almost forgot as I was so busy yesterday! Yes you're absolutely right, as I learned on Wednesday I suppose. I went to a restaurant (not fast food technically) and justified it by telling myself it's a reward for the progress I had made thus far. To be honest, I didn't really even want to go to begin with so I made up my mind that I wanted to use this experience to see how I'd feel after once more eating how I used to eat. It wasn't a very pleasant experience. I didn't particularly enjoy the food, and I felt like crap immediately after and the day after as well. I don't know if going there added to this issue but yesterday nearing the end of my workout at the gym, I saw a commercial for some new items at another restaurant and immediately thought to myself that I wanted to try it, although I knew it would be a bad idea. I didn't end up getting that particular food, but I did eat my whole sandwich from Subway instead of half of it as I normally would when I got to my mom's house. Ultimately though I think the reason for that was more because I just tried to do way too much in one day yesterday (I was busy almost literally the whole day!). Despite all that I still think it was a very successful week. For the most part I stuck to all the things I wanted to do and I still feel good about all of it. Next week is coming up the day that I wanted to see about making more changes so over the next week I'm going to be thinking about what to do for that. I have a few ideas already and I'm going to spend some time ironing it all out to see what makes sense. I honestly don't have much of anything else to add so looking forward to another good week!

There are people that will tell you this is simply the price to pay for success. It's up to you to decide if what you're doing is important enough to make it worth those sacrifices.

Another week, another round of decent progress I'd say. It wasn't terribly eventful - I pretty much completely stuck to what I wanted to be doing - although I did find myself starting to lose my excitement for it a little bit. For example, a couple of times when I went to the gym, I didn't really feel much like being there. I still stuck with it and grinded out my sessions though, so that was good. I also totally avoided all the fast food I've been trying to avoid, save for a carton of jelly beans. I justified buying it as a "reward" for the good progress I had made, and promptly went through the entire 550 gram carton in about 4 days. That equated to about 100 extra grams of sugar per day - insanity, honestly. More than that, one day I ate a particularly large amount and started to get those cravings for more food. I managed to stop myself from completely gorging out though, and have thus decided that I won't be rewarding myself with any type of junk food from now on. It doesn't seem like a very productive reward anyways. Curiously, I have also started to bite and peel off my nails again, and have been doing so mostly without even thinking about it. What's interesting is that I had completely stopped doing this for at least a good year or so. I'm not really sure what triggered this, and I'm not even sure if it's really all that relevant. Just something to keep in mind and to try to stop myself from doing once I notice it. Lastly, there were some moments when I was feeling really good about myself and started having thoughts of accelerating this process a little bit by adding more stuff to do, but a couple of events brought me back down to earth - namely, the jelly beans and the lack of motivation at the gym. I started thinking that waiting until May 26th to re-evaluate myself was too long, and now I'm thinking that maybe it isn't long enough. I think I'll just stick with the plan for now and keep doing what I've been trying to do - just repeat the things I'm doing enough times so they become instinctual habits that I never really have to think about doing, I just do them. I think I'm still on track for the major ones - going to the gym 4 times a week, staying away from fast food and keeping up with my financial habits. On the gaming front, I've been playing about 2-3 hours a night and a lot more than that during the weekends. I'm not sure that noting this is terribly important at this time but I thought I'd put it here. I don't feel bad about it at all mainly because I've made the conscious decision that I will not be tackling the gaming thing until I've got those other good habits really rock solid. To be honest, I really don't know how long that's going to take, but I know now that I can't rush this process and it simply just has to run its course. I guess that's all for now! EDIT: On a very positive note, I'm starting to see some noticeable changes in my body since I started going to the gym! My belly has reduced in size a decent amount, and my pants are starting to be more loose as well. Looking forward to good times ahead when I don't have to feel so ashamed of how I look! I guess I don't really now - it is what it is and I just have to deal with it - but it'll be so much better when I LOOK GREAT!

OK another weekend update! It's been a very much up-and-down week. On Monday morning I was very sick and didn't think I'd even make it to work but I did and despite being sick all week, I only took one day off. There were days though, particularly yesterday where I was just feeling really bad.. This morning though, when I got up I was feeling so bad and started wondering if all this really is worth it. I honestly haven't seen a great deal of improvement in any area of my life since I started this about a month ago, and it's a little deflating. I realize that what you get is proportional to what you put in, and I have started noticing very slight improvements in my body, I just wish there was more. I know what I'm doing will get me to where I want to be though so I suppose it's just about continuing to push through it. On a positive note, I managed to stick to the things I wanted to do and (so far) haven't gotten any fast food (beyond what I've been allowing myself as part of my transition to making my own food), and I haven't skipped a gym session. I was planning on going to the gym today but I've decided to take the rest of the day to relax, so I'll go tomorrow. I also finally bought a computer chair! It was a little pricey but I figure you only buy one of these every blue moon so I might as well get a good one. I do have 30 days to return it if I end up not liking it, and admittedly so far it's not perfect, so we'll see how it goes. I also am observing that I either need to stop playing Hearthstone completely or find a way to tone down how much I play when I do. A few times already I've stayed up way longer than I would have liked playing that game. I don't know if it's because I enjoy it or it's that addicting or what.. but it is definitely interfering with real life beyond what I can tolerate so something definitely needs to be done about it. I don't really find this with any other game I play, just Hearthstone. Anyways, not much else to say! Time to enjoy the rest of the weekend. EDIT: As an added note, I've found that it was a very positive decision a couple of weeks ago to scale back what I've been trying to accomplish. At the time I really felt I was pushing beyond my limit, but since then I've largely been able to maintain my goals. I've set May 26th as the date that I will re-evaluate where I'm at and see about adding some extra tasks to accomplish throughout the week.

Quite honestly it seems to me more like he isn't there by choice. Tom, do you *really* want to be in school studying what you're going there for? You have to remember that it doesn't end when school is over - after that, you have to go out into the field and do the work. If you absolutely despise what you're studying, you need to strongly consider going in a different direction. If you have no idea what that could be, I recommend you keep doing your best at school until you find something you're passionate about and want to pursue as a career. Just make sure when you do that it is something that you can make enough money off of. I suppose it's also possible that these feelings you're having are just temporary because of how lousy you feel about yourself. When you feel bad about yourself, you then start to get miserable about everything else. It is critically important that you find a way to love yourself again. You have to really believe that you deserve everything good that comes your way. I get the sense that your state of mind is pretty much the exact opposite of this. I was like this once and I hated every minute of it honestly.. Let me know what you think of this and I'll see if I can try to give you some advice on how to deal with it, if it is indeed how you're feeling. And of course if you're willing to take some advice on it.

The tipping process is different here than to North America. GST and payment for services (e.g. for the waiters at a restaurant) are all included in the shown price. Hence there is no requirement to tip, tipping being optional and only on occasions do people tip in restaurants, and do so because they want to show gratitude for exceptional service. I get paid minimum wage ($15.75 New Zealand Dollars) per hour, compared to the minimum wage in the US of $7.25 USD per hour. Because of this, I'm not complaining, I probably earn much more in comparison. You make about $10.89 USD per hour (today's rate). I'm sorry to say but I think some waiters in the US make more after tips, depending on the restaurant. In some very high end restaurants the tips go to over $100.00. Either way, I think it's bogus that the restaurant keeps the tips. The tip is for YOUR service.. not THEIRS. Why are they taking money that you've earned for making the customer happy? Either way, I think the whole tipping thing in general is just nonsense. From my point of view, I only see it as an excuse for restaurants to not pay their workers a proper wage and save on taxes, because from what I've read, tips generally don't show up on tax forms (not sure if it this is legal). Even then, there are still some restaurants in North America that keep at least some of the tips anyways.. it's such a stupid and corrupt system, honestly.

Thanks Cam! Even if I disappear for a while, I am *never* giving up on this journey. I may backslide at times, but I'm always thinking about a way to push forward. The way I've been telling myself is that from age around 5 or 6 up until around 25 or so, I pretty much just coasted through life doing the minimum possible with no accountability from anyone whatsoever. Sure, my parents would yell at me from time to time, but they *never* followed that up by actually making sure I did whatever they wanted me to do. I can count on a single finger the amount of times I got punished for doing something they felt was wrong. I'm not using any of that as an excuse for my situation, but it was always going to take a long, long time to unlearn those poor habits, and failure was inevitable at times. The way I saw it though, as long as I never gave up, eventually I would end up where I want to be. I think where I'm at right now is just a culmination of all the positive and negative things that have gone on my entire life, and for the last few years, there have been far more strides in the positive direction than the negative.. and thus, I'm in a good place. I just have to keep reminding myself that this is a marathon, not a sprint. I am a little anxious due to my age, but I just have to keep reminding myself that just like training your body, there are no shortcuts with developing yourself. You have to take it one day, one step at a time and keep making all those small decisions in a positive direction. The important thing to remember is that it's not going to take as long as you think it will as long as you keep the momentum going! Here's to keeping it going!

Just to be clear, I don't think what you're feeling is wrong, at all. If he decided to just drop everything with no real purpose for doing so, I bet even Cam would strongly consider going back to video games.

Bingo. You hit the nail on the head right there. Video games are so easy to get into partly because you don't need to think about goals or aspirations - they are handed to you on a silver platter, and you just have to chase them down. If you're not striving for something in real life, it's no surprise that video games suddenly become an attractive option. Especially since you're spending so much time working and studying - it's so easy to justify "I work so hard for so long every day, why shouldn't I enjoy myself a bit?" And honestly, that's not a wrong point of view. It just depends on what you choose to do to enjoy yourself.. Do you really, truly, desperately need the money from your job? Because based on what you've told me about how much time you spend on schoolwork every day, I would really recommend you quit your job and repurpose that time for something else. Obviously I don't know what you truly want out of life or what's really important to you, but I suggest you figure out a direction to go in with that in mind.

The restaurant keeps all the tips? Are you serious? I hope they are paying you a better-than-average wage then. I'm pretty sure it's illegal for restaurants to do that, at least in NA.

Alright, I'd just like to post about how things are going right now. I'm also gonna try to post once a week with a status update from now on because the daily thing obviously hasn't worked too well thus far. Although if I really think about it, I'm not even sure why I'm journaling to be honest. It doesn't feel all that important to me at this time. I guess for now I'll just keep at it and see if a compelling reason shows up later on. Not much to say about the apartment, I've largely settled in and things are progressing quite smoothly on that front so far. Some big changes in other areas though. I've decided to take a vastly different approach to personal development than I have in the past. Before I would make changes to 1 or 2 things, and when I saw those were going good, I would quickly start piling more and more stuff on top. It would quickly become overwhelming and I would just give up, which was really frustrating for me. Part of the reason for that frustration is because of my age. I want things to progress rapidly because I'm already 30 years old and basically just now getting started on life. However, I've come to learn that when it comes to major change, it can't be rushed. You still have to take the appropriate amount of time to make changes into habits. So I've decided I'm going to focus on 2-3 major changes at a time and shelve everything else. The reason I came to this decision is because of what happened last Saturday. A few weeks before that, I had started going to the gym again, as well as making some changes to my eating habits, and it was actually going pretty good. So I decided to pile another thing on top of that, and last Saturday I started to feel like giving up again because it was too much on my mind. I actually skipped a gym visit because of that. There are many things I want to do or change in my life: - quit video games - read more personal development material (currently: none) - go through all of Cam's videos - go through all the bookmarks of positivity and personal development stuff I've collected - complete the courses that I've bought - find a girlfriend - go hiking at least once a week - quit drinking caffeine I'm sure there are a lot of other things as well.. and all of this is going on the shelf for now. Both mentally and physically. For now, I'm just going to focus on the following (and I know I need to make them a lot more specific): - control spending habits - above goes hand in hand with controlling my eating habits, because the vast majority of my spending was on food - commit to the gym 4 times a week I really feel I can handle the above with great consistency. So far it has worked. My plan is to make those habits rock solid, and then move on to other things once I am very confident I won't backslide from them. I might set a date of May 31st to re-evaluate how things are going and think about adding some more changes. Even if it doesn't work, I can always do what I did last yesterday: take a step back to what was working to that point. EDIT: I should probably get into why I chose these specific changes to make. The long and short of it is that they offer the most compelling reasons for me to actually do them. Spending habits: Should be obvious. Can't do anything if you're broke. I want to take it a step further (and am currently doing so) by tracking exactly how much I'm spending, so I know exactly how my money is flowing. I'm not real great with budgeting up front, so tracking my expenses will at least give me a way to get a great overview of what's going on with my finances. Becoming financially responsible is quite important to me so this was obvious. Nutrition: Another no-brainer. I want to be like Christopher Lee - be able to do whatever I want, whenever I want, even when I'm 90+ years old. That's not going to happen with the way things were going. In fact, with what I was doing before, I would probably end up in a wheelchair with who knows what kind of diseases by age 45. Gym: You don't necessarily NEED to go to the gym on a consistent basis if your eating habits are rock solid, but I don't believe that eating right by itself is going to make you healthy long-term. Any part of your body that isn't used for a long period of time will eventually atrophy. Going to the gym not only helps to avoid that with certain muscles, but also helps to build up my strength and endurance so I can, again, be like Christopher Lee when I'm 90 years old.

Tell me about it.. lol. I have no idea what to expect so we'll see what happens!

I realize I haven't posted here in a while but I have some huge news. In a matter of weeks I will be moving out of my mom's house into an apartment. My dad proposed I move in with my 12 year old sister and look after her while she goes to school here, so that's what's going to happen. I'm a little bit apprehensive about this, but there's not ever going to be a better time to make such a huge change in my life. I'm going to receive all the support I could possibly want or need, so there's no logical reason not to do this. I just have to overcome my anxiety about it and that's that. More importantly, if I don't do this now, when will I ever do this? The timing will never be just right. Opportunity doesn't care if the time is right for you, when it shows up, you just have to decide whether to take it or not, and figure out how to do it later. So that's going to be my approach here. I realize that taking on the responsibility of a young child is a huge deal, but my dad insists that it won't be a problem as my sister is already quite independent. I suppose this will also be an opportunity for me to explore life with a teenager around. Looking forward to good things here!

How's it going, Alex?

Alright well, today I got basically nothing done. When I attempted my meditation, I was horribly distracted the whole time. I knew days like this were going to happen, where powerful cravings and urges would pop up and I'm sad to say I gave in to one of them. Afterwards instead of being extremely hard on myself like I normally might have been, I just decided I'll take the rest of the day off. Just for now, I think it was the right call, but I'll expect to get back to it tomorrow.

Can you be more specific? I realize I need to plan for those things but how? I am honestly at a loss.. Focus on IF THIS, THEN THAT Example: If the place I'm moving into LA falls through, THEN I will do _____________ Thanks! I will see what I can come up with. When Mists of Pandaria was released for World of Warcraft my friends organized a LAN to celebrate. I'd been relatively clean from Warcraft since Wrath of the Lich King, but I was really excited. Like, a kid at Christmas excited: It was a chance to re-connect with old friends I thought... I'll have so much fun I thought! And it's coming out in September! It's a new semester of school, I won't really be that busy! To my shame, I attended the LAN - We played for 20 hours straight, drank lots of booze, ate crappy food. - And you want to know how I felt when my girlfriend came to pick me up the morning after? - PHYSICALLY AND MENTALLY ILL. I feel lucky in a way. I'd gone back to school and was maintaining a 4.0. - I realized I wasn't willing to compromise that, I knew I needed to go through recruitment for Accounting jobs and I needed to keep doing well at school. It was literally one thing, one good thing about my life I wasn't willing to compromise. This is my suggestion: Can you think of one thing about your real life. The life you're living right now, that is worth giving an extra 10% for in exchange for not gaming? It's easy to think: "Well I can game, and keep maintaining that thing anyway." -- But there's the trap. Because life develops slowly, it requires less care, but constant care. And when you start gaming you lose your vigilance. At first you're gaming, and still growing your passion. Then you're gaming, but it's still okay because you're maintaining all the things in your life. Then one day you drag yourself out of bed at 10AM - You realize everything you were passionate about has been declining. If you're lucky it's all still there, simmering away on a backburner, but it's evaporating. And what do you have to show for it? "Champion" ... "Legendary" ... "Gladiator" ... It's not worth it. Life is slow, but it needs your care and attention, and it's worth it. Give it all you've got! I see what you're saying. Thanks for the advice!

Can you be more specific? I realize I need to plan for those things but how? I am honestly at a loss..

Hey guys, very simple question requiring a rather complicated answer potentially. Obviously I'll take any advice but am hoping to hear from people who have run into what I'm running into time and again and eventually overcame it. Long story short, how do you overcome major hurdles that you KNOW are coming and could last for a prolonged period of time? One example would be a major hit of nostalgia that could last days or even weeks. How do you prepare yourself to give yourself the best possible chance of overcoming such obstacles?

Yep. Sometimes you experience all 4 seasons in the span of a few days.

OK.. post for today. I managed to fall asleep around 4 AM last night, and woke up at 9 AM with a major headache coming on. I felt like doing absolutely nothing, not even getting out of bed. But I remembered from the positivity blog about what to do if you ever felt that way. Think of some positive memories, and ask yourself what you can be grateful for and what small step can you take right now to get yourself going in the right direction. I did that and managed to make a pretty good day out of one that started quite awfully. I feel like this was a major win for me. Nothing really special in a vacuum but considering where I'm at.. well, this was one of those days that would usually have seen me caving in to several temptations just to make me feel better about myself. So yeah.. big win. With that, I managed to finish just about all the daily tasks I set out for myself and added a few new ones. It's a little messy but it looks like this right now: morning: - meditate 10 minutes - watch inspiration video - read top performer agreement out loud - read commitment to change out loud - go through at least 2 positivity emails per day until caught up (and make notes) for tomorrow: figure out all the things I'm being guilty about and list the reasons why <- relates to success triggers course afternoon: - daily walk (at least 10-20 minutes) weekly: - do one chapter of success triggers and apply it - do one week's worth of self esteem course and apply it I also read chapter 3 of Respawn. Not going to lie, reading it through brought up some gaming nostalgia but I want to complete the guide fully, which I actually haven't done yet. One fun exercise I did last night was listing a number of strengths and weaknesses in various areas of my life, and then being challenged to reword the weaknesses using more balanced language. It's interesting because I think if we are to think of anything negative about ourselves, we tend to think of them in as damning a way as possible. It was a bit of a challenge thinking of ways to "sugar coat" those weaknesses and put them in a kinder way, but I think it's a very good way of modifying how we usually think of the attributes of ourselves we aren't so proud of.

Have you actually tried being grateful for little things like that? Or do you just dislike the idea of becoming the type of person that appreciates those types of things? One thing you'll find is that even if you're a hugely optimistic person, there are going to be days where you need to fall back on small things like that in order to keep going. Take today for me, for example. Couldn't fall asleep last night until about 4 AM, woke up at 9 AM with a pretty bad headache and felt really lousy and like doing absolutely nothing. Now, I didn't stop to appreciate my socks or the sun or anything like that, but I did find something small to draw some positivity from and that in turn led to me trying to make the most of the day. One thing I will say for sure: if you go on a journey to become a much more positive person, you're going to see some major changes to the way you think and act. I would strongly encourage you not to immediately resist any of these changes. Acknowledge them, explore them, and once you have the experience of seeing how those changes affect you, you can be justified in either accepting them or denying them as you see fit. If at the end of the day you draw a lot of motivation from negative energy, who are we to say that it's wrong for you? But you certainly won't know one way or the other if you've only experienced one side of it. Also, to hit on one point you've mentioned, even if you begin to accept and appreciate your current life situation, that doesn't mean you have to like it. I have accepted my life situation, but I have also accepted the responsibility that it's now up to me to get to where I want to go. Accepting where you are is not a sign of weakness. It is, in fact, a sign of true strength and courage. It means you've gotten past the stage of denial, of blaming everything except yourself for where you are. This is going to be hard to accept at first, but 90% of the reason you're in the situation that you are in is because you allowed it to happen. However, there is a GREAT amount of comfort in that - because the flip side is also true. It means that it is 90% (and some would say 100%) in your control as to how successful you are in life. Your life is in your hands and you are the only who gets to decide where it goes. And one more note. I was scared at first of what I would become if I went on this journey of self improvement. I was scared of losing my identity, of losing things that I currently value. However, there are two things to remember. One, going on a journey of self improvement is also going on a journey of becoming the best version of you that you can possibly be. I would be shocked if you could find someone that actually turned out worse after a serious journey towards self improvement. Two, I realize that maybe negativity and cynicism and whatever else you hold dear is valuable to you, but remember.. those things are part of the reason you are where you are. They've served a certain purpose in your life, but now you're in the process of challenging whether they are still useful or not. You need to figure that out for yourself, nobody can do that for you. You need to figure out what's still important and will continue to help you and what isn't, and move towards replacing the habits and thought processes that no longer work for you. If I'm reading your situation right, it wasn't all that long ago that I was in the same boat and that time was really hard for me as well. I really feel for you. But I want you to know that as long as you don't give up and keep moving towards that ideal version of you, success is inevitable. And it will be worth it.

Post for yesterday. Not much to say, I didn't do a whole lot. I spent a great deal of the day doing research for this hockey all time draft I'm participating in, but I did manage to get most of my daily tasks completed.

From my perspective, it seems like she's using you. I would strongly recommend distancing yourself from her. If she tries to get close to you again after that, you can remind her that when you tried, she pushed you away. I've honestly heard this story so many times and the answer is always the same..