Good afternoon & Happy New Year Friends and Family!

In the vein of most of these blog posts, I mention something about renewing my commitment to regularly posting, adhere for 1 maybe 2 (tops!) posts and promptly fall off the wagon (or get back on the band wagon, this cliché has always eluded me a bit).  So rather than making huge promises to post a bunch, I’ll just skip to the fascinating and all around interesting life updates.

 

New Year’s Resolutions

I love New Year’s Resolutions/Goals!  They are this amazing opportunity to reflect on life and dig into some serious self-improvement/life-maximization.  While not every resolution has worked out perfectly (eg, 2012 when I tried to reduce my net possessions by 365, resulting in an accidental purging of all my shorts in February and frustrating repurchasing of them in June) – they have all been well intentioned.

This year, I pursuing a strategy focused on 3-4 resolutions that change each month, rather than one MEGA resolution.  For those of you thinking, “this sounds familiar”… yes, I stole the idea from The Happiness Project.

The theme for January and this blog entry are one in the same, “Do the Right Things First.”  For the keen observer in the crowd, you’ll notice two things – 1) I think that a “crowd” of people read this and 2) obviously, writing a blog entry is a little bit down on the “right thing” category.  This resolution has been a helpful guidepost throughout the month and helped ensure I get more sleep, eat right, respond to texts timely, and focus on applying for full time jobs (more on this later).

As February starts to rear its little head, I have already crafted my theme “Embrace the Creativity,” which is basically giving myself free licenses to pick up any and all arts and crafts projects I want!  Ideally, in my dream-February, I will try the “write a book in a month” challenge – essentially, the “author” commits to writing for 1 hour a day, every day, without reviewing or editing.  The math works out such that you should have a 202 page novel done.

Novel Math

 

For the doubters in crowd who think this may not be the next literary master piece, the Great Gatsby was only 180 pages. (Also, note the continued suggestion there is a crowd reading, I hope you have gathered some friends and family around to read out loud together.)

Oh… last note on the resolution front.  I have committed myself a series watching at least 31 romantic comedies from the 80s, 90s, & 2000s – which is maybe the greatest resolution ever.  While my roommates have protested a few of the films, I would say they have been pretty heartily embraced.  In some moments of self-reflection, I have discovered a lifelong love of celebrity redheads (a la Debra Messing, Amy Adams [in Enchanted], Isla Fisher) and Hugh Grant.

Movies

Job Search

For discerning LinkedIn eye or folks I happened to tell, I started a 3 month contract role at Autodesk in November.  Specifically, I work on helping craft a strategy for parts of their 3D printing ecosystem and the corresponding marketing tactics.  Before you ask, I don’t even know what I mean in that sentence.  Sadly, it is coming to a conclusion in February so I am firing up the job search again to see if I can find my dream job.  I’ll pass along more details as they come!

Also, for those of you who were curious – I am still lecturing at Berkeley.  I am helping with another class this March – it is a 2-day leadership course for Evening Weekend MBA students and I am excited to keep stretching those muscles.

 

Alright homies – hopefully more to come soon!   Much love and good luck with resolutions!