arup’s blog

May has been a very stressful month. Having missed study during April I was keen to take it up again in May but the website work has been quite demanding and more than anything I have put pressure upon myself to complete the brief to the standard required. I got to the point where I felt I could no longer cope with it and sent a letter of resignation. But following this I had a good discussion with the client and I felt a lot more relaxed and was able to work at my own pace. I’ve learned a hell of a lot though. I’ve learned about negotiating and thinking carefully before giving discounts. I’ve learned a few more css tricks, about the whole @font-face implementation and loads of javascript. It has put the final nail in coffin as regards web design though. I have spent so much time on this project knowing all the while that wouldn’t be getting paid any more for it and that I could have been spending that time studying or doing something that was a lot more fun.

Having commissioned my custom made to measure frame from Racer Rosa bicycles, it got me thinking about the other things that I need in my life. Due to my low income I’ve put off buying some essential or required items and have been considering them to be luxuries. So I applied the procedure that I applied to my thinking before committing myself to purchase the frame build which was to cost it out exactly. Having seen the figures for these items and the total amount for the year it didn’t seem at all expensive. I had been telling myself that they were all luxury goods and that I couldn’t afford them but in fact they are required. They are items such as my bike bag which is used all the time and my computer. This has given me a great boost in confidence and I don’t seem so beat down by money any more. It also feels like a bit of a treat as well especially as I’ve been denying myself purchases because they are luxuries. This feeling of treating myself and of feeling more confident about my finances will be a nice set up for getting back into the programming.

120 miles

Still no speedo so no way of knowing but I suspect that because I’m doing the same old commutes I’m averaging around the 90 mile mark. My new custom frame is almost ready and I will be having a speedo on there. So this one is sort of on hold at the moment.

Meditation

I have been doing my short sits after the pages but not on all the days and have completely missed my Wednesday morning sessions and Sunday afternoon sessions due to feeling under pressure to get this website done. In fact the meditation would have been the best thing to do to calm me down and gain some perspective on the whole thing. I put the brakes on resigned with the site but I can see how people get more and more stressed.

Yoga

Did I do my own practice? Er, no. Not really. A few stretches here and there but that was it. I think because I so want to quit teaching that doing yoga in any form just feels like going to work and I don’t really want to do anything work related when I’m at home.

Friends

Due to being very busy I really have let this slip in May.

De-clutter

Keep thinking about it but not doing it. Sorry to say that more stuff has entered the premises.

Java programming

It’s been all about planning to do it and setting things in motion so that when the time comes at the end of June I’ll be able to hit the ground running. But there is a danger that the motivation will be waning by then. It’s been frustrating that I’ve spent so much time learning web programming rather than Java which I won’t really be able to use unless I do more web stuff. What I’ll need to do throughout June is to maintain a small amount of study so that when I have the allocated time it doesn’t feel so much like a blank page.

The wheel log

It’s still on the list but I think it’s time to remove it. I thought it might have been a mistake to put it on there but it was worth a try.

Strength training

I had a bit of a break after pulling a muscle in my lower back at the start of the month. This was a continuation of a break that was part of my cold / hay fever episode. But now I’m back on track. Got a slightly new routine and am now doing it three times a week instead of two. Still only takes 15 minutes and am really enjoying it.

Reading a book a month

The book that I’m reading at the moment is Anna Karenina by Tolstoy and is quite a long one and so I haven’t finished it this month. I also didn’t have my reading day either. So even though I’m sort of keeping up with this one I am a little bit behind. But the urge and the intention are still there.

Easy to grow vegetable

The rocket seeds that I planted last month have come up nicely but I’m sad to say that I haven’t really been keeping much of an eye on them. But I did plant a few coriander seeds too.

Raw food and meal planning

Not so much the raw food but the meal planning is certainly starting to take shape. Fish on Sundays, spinach with noodles on Saturdays etc. It’s not quite as healthy as I would like but a huge improvement on what was going on before. So it’s all moving in the right direction.

Tech free periods

I’ve been so busy working on websites that I’ve had hardly any time to be away from the computer. Even on the days that Maya has been here I’m still watching movies and that means two computers: one for her movies and one for me doing my thing. But I have had some time in the park and in the garden and also a trip to the woods.

Proper holidays

Not even a day off. Like a proper day off. My plan was to use the time that I have with Maya as my time off so that I’m not really thinking about work. But that wasn’t really possible during May and I felt very much under pressure to get those websites done and couldn’t really shake that pressure when I was spending time with Maya. She did notice and didn’t really like it. But I guess it’s good for her to see daddy in his various modes of operation and not just in holiday mode. A real shame that there was no reading day in May.

Having just read through the year plan for 2011 it is obvious that many things have changed in just four months. Toward the end of the plan I summed up by saying that this year would be characterised by a lack of ambition and looking after myself. Taking the time to enjoy this lovely flat as I don’t know how long I will have it. But since my Java intensive in March I have become very ambitious indeed and have been looking for ways to cut back on other activities in order to be able to focus more on the Java and undertake another intensive.

Whereas March was focused and steady, April has been running around playing catch up and taking on board what the March Java intensive was all about. The wheel orders had been fairly quiet in March but they have picked up again especially as the weather has been gorgeous. A barbeque Easter as some people called it. A new website project that has been fairly demanding and being ill. One of the reasons that I have felt behind this month was that I was quite ill. Nothing serious, just a heavy cold but heavy enough for me to cancel things. On top of that I was away which was really lovely but again meant that I couldn’t get on with stuff.

Luckily April has had lots of public holiday so clients have been a bit lenient in terms of deadlines but it has made me sit down and think about my life and where I’m going. At first I just wanted to sit back and relax but I’ve realised that whether I plan to do so or not I am actually going somewhere. I would like to have a bit more control over my destination rather than just end up somewhere.

120 miles

Still no speedo and hence no way of keeping track of my mileage. I imagine since nothing much has changed in terms of my commuting I am still clocking up something like 90 miles a week. In a sense the numbers themselves don’t matter so much as getting out and riding. But lately my bike has felt more and more uncomfortable. Luckily there is a new bike in the pipeline which should be ready in May sometime. I’m hoping that it will be a lot more comfortable and will encourage me to get out and ride a bit more. But yes, I will get a speedo as I do like counting my mileage.

Meditation

Being away, being ill and being snowed under with work has meant that I have neglected my meditation sessions this month but my daily short sessions have continued.

Yoga

Day by day the urge seems to be diminishing. I have done a few short sessions but wouldn’t call it practice. Now that I have my new career path mapped out I am thinking about cutting back on even more classes in order to focus on study and looking forward to the day that I can stop teaching yoga altogether. The class I teach at City University is about to finish at the end of June. They are refurbishing Saddlers Sport Centre. They offered me a choice of whether I wanted to continue teaching the same class at the main university building or take a severance package. I took the severance package. I had been wanting to give that class up for a while and have an extra day especially now that I have extra time with Maya. I can then use that day to either work on study or build wheels.

It seems that yoga teaching and practice have become very much intertwined. When I teach I am frustrated that I don’t practise very much and when I do have the time to do practice I would really rather do something else. You could call it laziness but I think it’s to do with the fact that I need a break from yoga altogether.

Friends

On the second weekend in April I went down to Brighton for a few days to see friends. I stayed with one friend with whom I lost touch for a while. I stayed in the room where I used to live before I moved to London. It has changed a lot now but I could remember where I used to have my things and I recalled some events that took place while I was living there. It felt as though I had come full circle and closed the loop. I remembered how in that final year I had been away almost as much as I had been there. And I remembered how I had finally come to the decision to move to London.

I like the fact that when I go to Brighton to visit friends I stay with one friend and then see others. That way I get to see one friend a lot and catch up with others. With three friends abroad and two others who were away I only saw two friends including the one with whom I stayed. Still, it was lovely to take a break, catch up and enjoy the fantastic weather.

De-clutter

I thought about getting rid of my xbox but now I’ve started playing it again. I’ve been playing it with Maya. She’s a bit scared of it but still wants to watch me play. A bit of a thrill seeker in the making I think. I have watched a few YouTube videos on people minimising their possessions. Some have this challenge of getting down to a hundred things. I’m not sure that I want to go that far but I do have a lot of stuff that I never use, especially all the music gear. It has been a good three or four years since that got touched. But de-cluttering is not just about physical items it is about mental and emotional stuff too. I too easily offer to do stuff for people. I like being helpful but then there is another thing to do. It is no wonder that in the time of Buddha he was advocating going forth from home into homelessness. No stuff to distract you.

Java programming

Throughout April even though I did no Java programming whatsoever my mind was focused on it having done so much in March. I want to do more now that I’ve got the ball rolling but with all that was going on in April it wasn’t really possible. The plan wasn’t to do an intensive followed by nothing but rather to see if I was able to be more intensive and then to drop back to a slower pace rather than stop. So I need to go back to haveing regular study periods when there is no intensive. At the end of June I will be gaining some more time due one of my yoga classes finishing so that day, Thursday will become a study day. But at the moment my current web projects are quite demanding so I do need to cut back on those. Especially where I need to learn stuff or do research. I don’t get paid for that research or study time and it only allows me to work on that particular project. What I mean is that the time spent is not really an investment for the future. So I know it’s a bit of a gamble but I’m going to do it. So from now until the date of the proposed vacation of the property it will be Java study as the main focus. Then hopefully a job.

The wheel log

This has been such an uphill struggle. I’ve even stopped entering completed wheels into my spreadsheet. I think that it’s mainly because I haven’t yet updated the look of the blog. But perhaps I just don’t care about keeping count. I did my first set of carbon wheels which were built and collected with no photos or records. I’m going to keep it on the list though till the end of June when I will review the whole year plan again.

Strength training

I stopped all my strength training activities during April. Mainly due to illness but then it just got put off and off. Now it’s May and I really would like to start again.

Reading a book a month

I didn’t have a reading day in April but I did read during my trip down to Brighton and have been reading throughout the month so this is all good. The level of enthusiasm has dropped a little since the beginning of the year as expected but not really low. Currently reading Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina.

Easy to grow vegetables

I have planted rocket and they have started sprouting but I haven’t done anything apart from that. My other seeds are on the shelf. I think this is part of me saying that I should do something with the garden just because I have one. For me just enjoying it is enough: I’m not a gardener. Perhaps the inner gardener will awaken when I’m older.

Raw food and meal planning

My diet has gone from bad to worse in April. Junk food, convenience food, snacks and generally a diet which I would frown upon if it was someone else’s. The main culprit is bread; toast in fact. If I can find an alternative to bread and toast then I think I will onto a winner. I told one of my clients about my bad diet and they reprimanded me severely. Wasn’t expecting that.

Tech free periods

I have been rather focused on my gadgets this month, especially the computer but then I have been out in the garden and out having picnics. So even though it hasn’t been a conscious decision to get away from the computer that is what happened. Very nice actually, especially with this great weather. In fact I didn’t take a laptop with me during my trip to Brighton and I didn’t miss it at all.

Proper holidays

A weekend in Brighton during April as a break of course but also to see friends as mentioned above. It was also a sort of treat at the end of my Java intensive. One thing I am missing though is a regular day off but then I sort of have that when Maya comes to visit. Did miss the lack of a reading day though.

This month I have been thinking a lot about my future. Getting old, changing career, where to live, what to do and I’m noticing that new ideas have replaced my current sketches over the past few years. It shows that I’m settling into my new life and in fact my vision of the future is fairly close to where I am now. It’s just a bit more free time, slightly more more money and cutting back on the extraneous bumf. I think that is totally achievable.

It is now the end of the first quarter and as well as a review of the month, which is almost 2 weeks late, it is a review of the first three months. Spring has sprung and the long cold winter is finally over. Christmas and New Year when the year plan was made seem to be a long time ago in the distant past and it appears that I’m starting to get a clearer idea of what I thought I wanted and what I really want.

As you will have seen from previous reports this year and in this report there are long standing goals which continue simply by tradition and not due to the fact that there is a strong urge to pursue them. But why then did they go onto the year plan in the first place? Was it just to flesh it out? Give it some bulk? I seem to remember that there was an overarching feeling of just taking care of myself rather than any major development in my life. But some of the old goals have started to become chores so they will need some review and reconsideration. The goal of goal less ness has already been dropped from the plan as it could not be clearly defined and there are others that cover that same area.

But other than becoming more aware of what I want a little bit and what I want a lot, what else has changed? For one thing my new found interest in Java programming. It was on the plan and I put no pressure on myself to pursue it. In fact I thought it was pretty much demoted to hobby level rather than a candidate for a future career. But since a chat with a friend that has all changed and the idea of the Java intensive arose. The other thing that has changed, during March especially is my childcare arrangements. This has had a significant impact on my life and my week. I used to have my daughter for one and a half days from Sunday afternoon through to Monday evening. This eventually increased to Saturday evening too. But now it’s all day Friday and Saturday through to Sunday morning until 10 AM. It is a welcome change in that I get to see her for a longer period which is also a block of time. But it’s also a big chunk out of my week and it means that I don’t cycle on those days. Previously I cycled on both Sunday and Monday. I also need to think of ways to incorporate some of my goals with time spent with my daughter. Things like raw food, tech free periods and gardening would be easy to implement as long as there is still an urge to do them I suppose.

As I’m writing this it’s making me clearer about the changes that have occurred but also to the fact that it will take some time to absorb them and to adapt to them. Some goals will be dropped to make way for others. Far better to pursue fewer goals wholeheartedly rather than try to pursue a bigger array of goals begrudgingly. The other thing that I have realised over the past month is that I’m trying to do it all very quickly and this is a plan for the whole year and I seem intent on achieving it all in a month or two.

120 miles

I was averaging around 90 miles a week when my speedo died. Well, the battery run out. One of the clips was already broken so it had been strapped to the stem with cable ties. I couldn’t deal with the embarrassment of seeing my low mileage any longer and took the opportunity to discard the old beast. So now I will have to keep track in order measure my overall weekly mileage as I know most of the distances of my routes. But I’m unlikely to do this. I’m going to have a little break then before I get a new speedo.

Meditation

Going strong and a very natural sense of progress. I don’t need to force this or even encourage it as it just seems to happen. I knew it would come back one day.

Yoga

This is a real uphill struggle. I think that my goal is at odds with my natural urge. I seem to have a very high expectation of myself and want to reach a level of practice that I had when I first started. But on the other hand the reality is that even though now my yoga room is ready I don’t really feel like teaching any classes there. In fact I wish I could stop teaching classes altogether and have a break from the whole yoga teaching life. I suppose I feel that I ought to practice if I’m a teacher but at the moment I really don’t want to devote any time to it. I did do one or two short sessions of practice which is a step in the right direction but there is a real conflict here between what I want to do and what I think I ought to do and perhaps what I think might be good for me.

Friends

I had a plan of grouping my friends according to geographical region but that still remains a plan. I have been staying connected to some of my international friends through Skype. What I used to do was to only put it on when I was in the mood to chat. But then you never see anyone on. So what I’ve started doing is to leave it on more often and for longer. That way I do get distracted but it does help me to connect with people. I’m also making some new London friends and it is encouraging to know that I still have the capacity to make friends and that people do want to be friends with me.

De-clutter

I did think about getting rid of my xbox, but as soon as I did I began to play again. So perhaps it should stay. A bit like the BBQ coming out in the summer. The musical equipment was going to be borrowed by a friend but that never really happened. As I’ve said before, it’s a big flat and stuff can be easily put away and forgotten.

Java programming

March was the month of my Java intensive. A short burst of focused study to test a few ideas. To see if I would still enjoy it at a more intensive level, if I would retain what I was studying and if I could maintain the pace. The result was positive on all fronts but looking back now a month does seem very short. Even though I did study 2-3 hours most days it still seems that I didn’t cover a lot of ground. But I definitely do want to continue so I think that the next step would be to undertake a two month intensive. Some website work has come in so I do need to focus on that but I do need to resume studies very soon in order to maintain the enthusiasm that I have gained. I will of course keep up a minimal amount of study but I also wonder that even at this intensive pace if I can reach a level of expertise that would be suitable for employment.

The wheel log

The reluctance and mental blocks continue. I have been keeping records in a spreadsheet and have uploaded one or two wheels. This is one of those things that I would like to have done but don’t actually want to do myself.

Strength training

Still going strong (pun intended) but starting to see some signs of reluctance especially due to little aches and pains developing. I have also missed a couple of sessions, even though they occur only twice a week for 15 mins due to Maya being here. Mainly an excuse but the reluctance is building. So I need to investigate the aches and pains. My strength is improving and I’m enjoying it and I don’t want aches and pains to put me off. Perhaps I just need to warm up properly or change the exercises that I’m doing.

Reading a book a month

Just finished the Trial by Franz Kafka on the kindle. A fascinating but surreal story. The urge to read as with other goals has diminished somewhat and the holiday has dwindled away but still chugging along at a healthy pace. Certainly no reluctance here but perhaps I should alternate between high brow and low brow.

Had another reading day too which also covers taking proper holidays and having tech free periods as I’m not counting the kindle as technology.

Easy to grow vegetable

Yet another goal that was a good idea at the time of writing. When I have free time I reflect on ideas and set goals but then I don’t seem to want to do them when the time comes around. The plan was to make it as easy as possible to do this as I had an inkling that I might suffer a great bout of reluctance. I have planted some rocket seeds but nothing more.

Raw food and meal planning

Hmm. What happened here? Junk food has been creeping back into my life. I do love junk food so it’s hard to resist. Some raw food is still making its way into my diet but nowhere near the 50% that I have set as my goal. Perhaps I should treat this as a year long process rather than zero to fifty in one month.

Tech free periods

Part of the allure of having tech free periods is that it allows one to be away from the noise and light generated by these devices. I guess even using a dustpan and brush as opposed to a hoover would count in this respect.

Proper holidays

In March I didn’t go away anywhere for a proper break but did take a day off as a Reading Day. Also now that I have two full days with Maya I have been spending time out by the river Pool while she goes off on her scooter with her friend and we have a picnic. Visiting her friend to play and hang out also feels like time out.

Writing this report has shown me that I do need to define my goals more clearly and recognise that I need to put less effort into some goals and more effort into others. I also need to create a new version of year plan, a quarterly revision if you like. Not that the plan should keep changing but that it should evolve or become more refined as the year goes on. This isn’t a new year’s resolution should not be seen in that way but as a complete plan for the whole year.