February Progress Report
Welcome to February 2024's progress report! It's once again time to reflect on this month's progress and see what's changed.
I realize that last month's progress report came out super late (almost a week ago at this point...) and I've recommitted myself to pushing these out on a tight schedule going forward. No more missing self-imposed deadlines due to a lack of consequences. By disallowing myself to spend time with friends whilst posts are past their deadlines, I will encourage myself to release posts on schedule.
To begin with, I've successfully implemented a small fitness routine into my daily schedule. It's nothing major but definitely feels great to get me started. Beginning in the second week of February, I've consistently done three sets of triceps extensions and bicep curls using a fifteen pound dumbbell that happened to be lying around the house. I figured that I needed to work on some core muscles so began with three sets of crunches but am considering moving to something more comprehensive.
As I am completely inexperienced in the realm of fitness, I've just begun reading online and am finding myself feeling like I'm missing out greatly so I'm leaving lots of room to expand my routine and am quite interested in how it will evolve over time. I also am unable to do many push ups at the moment so I've begun by including 15-20 inclined push ups off the bed as well.
Lastly for my routine I began adding jumping jacks in the last week or so of February. The lack of cardio has been eating away at my health for a long time now but I've renewed my interest after seeing an old friend run a marathon just a week ago. I think it would be awesome to be able to say that I've run a marathon before so I'm seriously considering how possible that would be to accomplish.
Another small inroad that I'm proud of this month is in the realm of replacing video games with LeetCode. I've replaced at least three gaming sessions with friends this month with LeetCode sessions instead. I've forced my way through several problems at this month and am feeling motivated to continue. In a way, solving those problems is just like playing a game, going through a series of steps to solve problems and then optimizing the solutions.
The one area I've felt that I've seriously struggled throughout the month was in my sleep routine. I slept consistently horribly all throughout the month. Every few days I'm waking up as late as 3PM and sleeping anywhere from 4AM to 8AM. The variance is really messing with my energy levels throughout the day. One problem that I'm facing is that I already don't feel energetic enough during the day to accomplish work so it pushes me to finish work late at night which eats into my sleep time.
As for the whole reading routine, I made it as far as the first chapter in Atomic Habits thus far. I definitely plan on reading some more but I haven't found much motivation to pick up the tablet and start flipping through pages. Perhaps a routine will pop up but in the mean time I will continue to simply allow it to sit.
Additionally I spent time this month exploring different apps to track my time and allocate my time throughout the day but each one has different aspects that make them feel daunting or cumbersome to implement into my routine. For now I will continue searching and figuring things out from a more mental standpoint.
Finally, I've successfully set up a tiny workspace across my room from the desk where I play games. This space is next to the bed and has space for my laptop and another monitor to help with future coding projects. I haven't committed to anything beyond reading through some documentation yet but I'm optimistic that I'll find a project to motivate myself with in the near future.
Anyways, moving into March I plan on continuing with my exercise routine and expanding it as I continue to read more. I'm especially excited by the thought of one day running my own marathon but that will require a long journey from where I currently stand to achieve. Maybe one day...
On top of this, my main concern for the near term is figuring out a more manageable sleep schedule. I'm not quite sure how to approach the problem right now but I'm positive that I will figure it out slowly. It's super draining on the mind to feel so fatigued throughout the afternoon because I'm sleeping at odd hours and waking up at those same times a couple of days later.
One last project that I'm excited to begin in March is simply investing in my future. It's going to be a series focused on a new brokerage account and will showcase the power of long-term commitment to growth. I'm excited to begin this because I've always been interested in markets and money. My childhood was not one of luxury and I'm keen on being able to provide a healthy lifestyle for myself and loved ones in the future.
As of right now, the biggest drains on my time are school and friends. I've spent plenty of time at school sitting through classes but my lack of consistent focus means that I have to make up that work at home by studying and playing catchup. It's not a great system and I'm confident that improving my sleep schedule will go far in solving this issue.
To make more time for myself to work on my own projects or just sit back and watch videos, I'm going to have to be more efficient with schoolwork and also maximize my enjoyment during those periods of time when I do get to enjoy games with friends. These are the moments that I'll miss the most as I grow older and time becomes more scarce.
To finish, I am going to be investing some time in March to learning how to break text up into more readable chunks. I know nobody enjoys a wall of text, but here we are with yet another bland page of words. Next month's report will have real formatting to it!
And so by continuing to grow my routines and slowly replacing old habits with their reformed models, I am committed to growing into my full potential. Thank you for making it through yet another wall of text and please, let us strive for a better, brighter future together!