Hey all,
I can't believe it's been over a year since I last wrote here. Perhaps I thought I was doing okay and didn't need to return but I'd like to try again. My wife mentioned to me how well I was doing on everything when I was here and reporting to you all.
It isn't that I haven't been able to make some great progress. I think our biggest accomplishment together this year was that we bought a house. We managed to find exactly what we were looking for in about 3 months. I am truly in love with this home and we have made great strides to make it our own. I've done tons of work on it, including a full clean out of the basement (tearing out the carpet and smoothing out the concrete, throwing away old owner's unfinished repair projects, etc.) and the finished the beginnings of a theater room in the attic. I'm proud of what I've been able to accomplish on the house in this short amount of time.
And yet, I've also been backsliding on my old habits. YouTube is slowly creeping in again as I needed to unblock it for something in the past and haven't blocked it again. I'm going to ask my wife to block it again tonight. Reddit was included in that block, so I've found myself wasting time at night just watching videos and reading nonsense on Reddit.
I also let myself begin listening to podcasts again, but the problem has slowly crept back in of just listening to way too much. I can't hear myself think, I can't concentrate.
These three things have been eroding my ability to work on what matters most to me. I'm still at the same job I've been at since I started writing on here. It has only gotten marginally better. The advent of AI has been an unnerving addition to our workplace. I don't trust our CEO when he says he won't replace people with AI; he's lied before. I've tried numerous times to leave, but nothing seems to work out. Granted, I could be applying to more jobs, but everything in corporate seems less appealing by the day. I don't want to do this anymore. I want to feel some purpose in my work, to feel like I'm truly helping people; no more of folks telling me I'm doing a great job at a pointless endeavor.
I've decided that now is a good time to start my own business, something I've been toying with for a while. It was not prudent to do so while my wife was in residency. Now that she's working full time in a great job, we both feel it's safer for me to explore this option. She is very supportive, which is very important and a significant stress reliever. I've been doing some due diligence on the feasibility of the business and working with a mentor. It makes use of skills I had developed prior to corporate and is more hands-on mechanical work. The market is relatively niche as there aren't many people who do the work anymore around my area.
I've set a goal to leave my current job by the end of 2026 at the latest. This means I need to get things going while I'm working there and begin building up the clientele. I want to try and reduce the risk as much as possible rather than just jumping ship immediately. I'm actually very scared as I'm normally very risk averse. I'm afraid I'll make the wrong choice, but I don't want to live my life wondering what if I'd taken the leap. I'm determined to push through the fear, to prove my courage to myself. And if I lose, then there will be other jobs. But I'll know I tried. And if I win, then it will have been even more worth it.
I can't do this if I'm constantly distracted by meaningless content both audibly and visually. So, I'm going to set boundaries here with some goals. I hesitate to call these New Year's Resolutions, as I feel those are made to be broken. Rather, today is just a new day for me to set these goals and change my behavior. I'm going to look back at my old posts when I was doing well and incorporate those goals in my subsequent posts. For now, these are top of mind:
No YouTube, unless it is specifically to learn a skill (at which point I'll ask my wife to only unblock the the specific tab, not YouTube as a whole). Udemy might be preferable for what I need anyways (circuit board repair).
No podcasts. I've tried the minimalist approach and it just doesn't work. I end up listening to more and more. If I listen to anything besides music, it'll be an audio book or audio scripture.
No Reddit. Reddit can be useful so perhaps I can set a time limit on Cold Turkey for 15-20 min a day to research something if needed. But I can also take the YouTube approach of only unblocking the tab for a limited time if I really need something.
Using Brick daily. I bought the Brick device to block apps and I lock it in a timed safe. It is immensely helpful for stopping bad phone habits.
I'll add more trackers but wanted to start here. I won't be doing all my crazy graphs though, just tracking days/activities. Glad to see some familiar names still posting, it's been a while. I hope to keep up with your journals as well. Thanks and talk to you all soon.
By
FDRx7 ·