keep on plodding

• If a couple whose income is $100,000, which increases by 4% a year, saves 5% of their income every year, with 8% interest, they'll have $523,000 after 25 years.
• If they increase it by 1% every year, to 30% in year 25, they'll have $1.6 million.
• If they go the other way, starting at 30%, decreasing by 1% every year, they'll hit $2.1 million in 25 years. In addition, they'll have contributed $133,000 less than if they had used the former method.
  

It's been a while since I posted, and the main reason I'm posting now, is that it seems someone is still viewing this blog! So to whoever that is, this post goes to you.

I've posted a lot of little ideas and thoughts here and there, but I think by far the most important thing in life is simple happiness. I've thought that I would be happy, or happier, upon having perfect skin, perfect teeth, a bigger room, and so on. And I probably would be happier, for a little while at least. But I realise now, I've been happy in the past with things I can have again with almost no trouble.

You're probably old enough to have some idea of what makes you happy, but I find it rather relaxing to try writing these things down. Defining them so I now value them just that much more, and strive more to have and treasure them, makes me happier still. :]

1. A best friend - Things like your first kiss, first win, first everything, you have to tell these things to someone. Ideally, one person who you love to bits, and desperately want to hear the news. Someone to hang out with, give and get presents from, doze on each other's shoulders, life is bliss both when I'm just thinking about being with this person and actually being with this person. :]
   
2. A best skill - The one thing that keeps me up at night AND gets me up early. The thing I do better than anyone else in the world. The thing I read about, and whose champions I idolise and aspire to beat. A skill that doesn't need any "point", its point is to keep me happy and feeling alive. Fun to do, and also gives me kudos from being good at it, that is, a circle of fans and people who come to me to benefit from my knowledge.
3. A favourite food - People sometimes say that it's best not to play favourites, but I completely disagree. Having a food that you would cross oceans for because everything about it makes you feel wonderful, is real happiness.
4. Being with people - Strangers or friends, I do love the company of people in the right setting! Laughing in the arcade, laughing in the restaurant, laughing in a club, laughing is always best and right with other people.
   
5. Being alone - The only time I can realise what it is I value most and treasure it, what I need most and attend to it, is when I am alone. Spending minutes, hours, even days, just attending to my own every need and want, reflecting on the things and people I love, is refreshing and liberating.
   
6. Good hair - If I walk out of my house with bad hair, I can't feel confident, and will feel self conscious all day long completely irrespective of what anyone says. I won't dress as well, I won't prepare properly, because no amount of work elsewhere can overcome a bad hairdo. If I walk out with what I think is good hair, I go all out and prep everything else to go with it. I feel the eyes of other people on me, good and sexy :] Which leads very easily to being happy!
7. Realisation that what I have is the envy of many - I once kept pining for what others had, but there are so many people I've met who tell me how much they envy what I have and ask me how to have them. Not only am I happy to know this, I'm happy to teach them how to obtain it for themselves. Happiness around for all.
   

I quite like the sound of a one syllable word, a connecting word, and a two syllable word.

Cloak and Dagger. Ike and Tina. Gin and tonic. Pen and paper. Talk on Corners. Jen and Brandy. Life of Brian.

And I have absolutely no idea why. If you do, please post! =)

Random link: Cellar Door on Wikipedia

Everybody hurts themselves sometimes, whether we realise it or not. Possibly the most common way, is how we can destroy ourselves with how we perceive our flaws. And the most unfortunate part of finding and identifying our weaknesses, is that it gives a small illusion of power. That we're taking control, finding out what's wrong, then fixing the chinks. Just like smoothing over the nicks in a car's paint job, once started, there's no stopping until it's perfect.

When we look for our weaknesses…we may feel somewhere between somewhat satisfed to utterly self destructed. If that is all we feel, why bother doing it? Why don't we do the reverse - that is, find strengths and make them stronger instead?

I grabbed a bit of paper and wrote down everything positive I could remember people have ever said about me. I chose not to write down anything I thought of myself personally; only the words of other people were written down. So even though I thought myself to be ugly, people have only ever said that I was cute, so down that went. It was quite addictive. I stopped myself from going into my email archives to find random nice things my friends had said about me, which would surely have taken all week.

And I felt great. I've been tempted to keep the paper on me for others to see and write on, but for now I've kept it only as another personal motivator in my wallet.

There is an individual, who I will not name in any way, that I despise. This person has caused great pain and anguish to a number of people very close to me, and the thought that I am somehow connected to this fool is disheartening.

For a time, it was one of my greatest fears, that in spite of all my efforts, I would somehow turn into a copy of this person.

But today, I realised that this was completely impossible. Simply because this individual had little ability to blame his problems on himself, thereby hurting others with his fury, while I had a "problem" of almost always blaming myself for my problems. This "problem" of mine, is in fact, my greatest weapon in preventing myself from ever turning into that abomination, and is something I now consider to be one of my most precious character traits.

I found myself wondering one day...is uni life for me more like a computer game, or a race?

As someone who once was on the road to becoming a hardcore, even professional gamer, I saw many similarities between uni life and computer games. Most people simply dive into computer games without thinking a whole lot, and just have fun while performing at a mediocre level, and the same can be said for uni. Uni is great fun, you meet lots of young, gorgeous and intelligent people who like the same things you do, and come out with a degree to boot.

But for hardcore gamers, a game is a discipline. They learn to understand the game, the rules, the mechanics, and practice them diligently so that they come out ahead of other people playing the same game. For me, uni has many similarities. Plenty of high scoring uni students do well because they've learned how to learn.

And I then compared it to a race. Cars, running, horseriding, whatever. How it was important in a race to find a perfect line, or a perfect pace, to make the absolute most of the muscle or horsepower you had to bear to get ahead of the other racers.

Instead of arguing with myself which of the two uni was more like, I decided to simply combine the two. Uni for me right now, is like a Racing Game. (More on that in future posts ;) )



How is this useful? For some decision making, this has proven to be very valuable to me. I recently pondered what career I would most love to do in the future. I laid out the things that I could never get bored doing, the things I would stay up late for, get up early for and risk ACT public transport for. This came down to: learning how to use computers to do everything, and teaching. Up until now, I thought that I would be in a career in IT, writing or designing software for some big firm making big money. And this idea is still compelling. But I also love teaching. Kids and adults alike, I love to be loved for my skills in teaching people to be their best in anything.

So instead of deciding between a career in IT or teaching, I decided to mash them together. I'd like to teach IT. And I feel really really good.



Let it be stressed that mashing is not the same as doing both things individually! I would most definitely not advocate deciding between a new TV or a new sound system, and just buying both. I simply advise that when an argument comes along or a decision needs to be made, think about how both sides can be mashed together in addition to thinking about each exclusively.

"And yet," says the Tortoise, "I'll run with you for a wager."

"Done," says the Hare, and then they asked the Fox to be the judge.

They started together, and the Tortoise kept jogging on still, till he came to the end of the course.

The Hare laid himself down midway and took a nap; "for," says he, "I can catch up with the Tortoise when I please."

But it seems he overslept himself, for when he came to wake, though he scudded away as fast as possible, the Tortoise had got to the post before him and won the wager.

Slow and Steady wins the race.

• When setting out to do something, like an assignment, do so at the easiest pace possible such that you're not really exerting myself. Just as changing gears often while driving isn't fuel economic or even good for the gearbox, you should also avoid studying in bursts when you can't afford to waste the energy. Finding this pace takes practice, so if you have a spare hour, take the opportunity to get familiar with it.
  
• Take a break every hour or so for about 10 minutes. This doesn't mean browsing to a new page with the latest goss or firing up Counter Strike. This means things like having a stretch, grabbing a cookie, anything that puts you back in the real world. We don't want to be tightly focused, we want to be absorbing the fruits of our labour. Again, it's up to you to find out how long you can work before you lose efficiency, and have to rest.
  
• Don't let yourself be interrupted. Yes, you probably do have time for the interruption. But no, you can't afford to lose rhythm once you've got it going.
  

• Work diligently and comfortably without interruption.
• Every hour, break away from work and get a grip of reality.
• When you start up again, look over what you were doing before.