There was a disruption in my 90 Week Project, and I haven’t been updating the blog aspect of it since about week 53. BMT hit me out of the blue around Week 54, and I lost my notebook (which had all my data from week 45 onwards) somewhere in Pulau Tekong. My BMT ended around week 64, and two weeks later, I found myself thrown into Stagmont Camp for a Signal Operator course, which I am still in the midst of. It’s now about week 70. My date-tracking fucked up and I think I have a week more than I had originally thought- but that doesn’t matter, ultimately. (It’s just going to make my final presentation a little less elegant than I’d like.)
Anyway, the point is- I feel like I’m in a comfortable place right now, and with only 20 weeks (less than a hundred working days!) to go, I really need to start working on my Post-ORD plans. I do NOT want to find myself tapering off and sliding into some sort of inactive lurgy.
So here’s me describing some of my plans:
The Fitness Project:
Our bodies are incredibly important to us. Keeping fit has a profoundly positive effect on many other nodes in the larger complex system of our lives. Healthy body, healthy mind. I believe Richard Branson once answered the question “How to be more productive?” with “Work out more.” Haruki Murakami described at length how running taught him to be a more effective writer. I’ve always found my most effective, happy and generally productive periods to coincide with the periods of time where I’d been exercising the most.
Fitness Goals:
– Learn to Swim -> Swim 10 laps continously -> Complete Biathlon
– Run 5km without stopping -> Run 10km without stopping -> Complete Biathlon
– Bench Press 50kg -> Bench Press 60kg
– Complete 2.4km in under 11 minutes
– Reach 70kg bodyweight -> 75kg
The Music Project:
Music became a huge part of my life during my teenage years- it was a form of expression, communion, discovery, meditation, socialization, everything. It has huge value for me. Lately I feel like I’ve kind of stagnated, so I’ve decided to develop a more focused system to push myself to grow as a musician.
Music Goals:
– Start a music progress log
– Build repertoire of covers -> Record 50 YouTube covers
– Build and follow a schedule of YouTube music lessons
– Develop sufficient vocal control to use vibrato at will
– Finalize drafts of originals -> Record rough demos of originals -> Record Album
Small Big Changes Project:
This one isn’t really a proper stand-alone project- it’s a simple idea, to identify little things that would make a big difference in my life, in making progress in all the other projects.
– Get a new laptop battery that actually works, so I’m not bound to my charger
– Transfer my handphone bill from my parents’ account to my own
– Secure internet access, either through a dongle or wireless hotspot smartphone (will probably do the latter after I’m done with NS)
– Acquire a decent webcam (for recording YouTube covers)
– Acquire decent electric guitar, guitar amp, bass amp (Give music lessons!)
– Declutter my wardrobe
– Declutter my book collection
– Declutter my socks
The Routines Project:
Kinda similar to the small big-changes project, where the idea is to build simple and effective routines that replace my current lousy ones.
Goals:
– Daily meditation/visualization/reflection/tracking
– Daily exercise time
– Daily writing time
– Weekly readings
The Writing Project:
I think writing is pretty much the most highly developed skill I have, apart from stuff like thinking and daydreaming. I imagine that writing will play a huge role in my progress as an individual. So I figure, if it’s a good skill, I want it to be great.
Goals:
– Start a writing progress log
– Develop a consistent writing habit for the blog, improve the existing systems, make it sustainable
– Develop a consistent creative writing habit for my novel-writing project -> write and complete the novel. I plan to create a separate blog for it, where I’ll write in a very sporadic and broad, scattered manner and slowly develop an emergent pattern- taking reader input into consideration. So it’ll be a community-developed novel.
– Write and sell e-books (The first will be about hacking the 7 deadly sins!)
– Set aside specific practice sessions to criticize my own writing
– Sheer volume!!!
Project Statement:
Project Statement is an idea I have to sell T-shirts that function as conversation starters. Check out the early draft bits here:
The idea will be to use this as an experiment in hustling, entrepreneurship, marketing, trial and error. I have an idea of the worldview I’d like to convey, the sort of people I’d like to get involved with. From here I plan to build a sustainable business which I will expand into all sorts of other things- organizing gigs, for instance, maybe someday having a brick-and-mortar store (unlikely, though.) Someday I’d like to have a conversation cafe. That’s a little further down the road though, once I’ve leveled up a bit and have substantial financial resources.
Project (n_n)/:
I believe that every intelligent, quality person has several friends of similar calibre- but is usually somewhat alone. Good minds tend to be a little bit isolated and under-appreciated by their peers. I had the idea that I could build a community of such people- put them in one room, tell them to play nice, and have them figure out what they ought to do with one another without forcing their hands. It’s been wonderful so far. More on this later.
Alternative Degree Project:
I don’t really want to go to University, unless I can get a full scholarship to something incredible that’s going to be a wonderful opportunity. Otherwise, I think it’s not the most effective use of time and money. I believe that everything valuable about a degree can be outsourced, replaced, substituted with superior components. Most conventional degrees strike me as manifestations of the mass-manufacture mindset.
Gotta run now, will describe this in greater detail later.
20 Weeks Left: What I’m going to do when it’s over!
There was a disruption in my 90 Week Project, and I haven’t been updating the blog aspect of it since about week 53. BMT hit me out of the blue around Week 54, and I lost my notebook (which had all my data from week 45 onwards) somewhere in Pulau Tekong. My BMT ended around week 64, and two weeks later, I found myself thrown into Stagmont Camp for a Signal Operator course, which I am still in the midst of. It’s now about week 70. My date-tracking fucked up and I think I have a week more than I had originally thought- but that doesn’t matter, ultimately. (It’s just going to make my final presentation a little less elegant than I’d like.)
Anyway, the point is- I feel like I’m in a comfortable place right now, and with only 20 weeks (less than a hundred working days!) to go, I really need to start working on my Post-ORD plans. I do NOT want to find myself tapering off and sliding into some sort of inactive lurgy.
So here’s me describing some of my plans:
The Fitness Project:
Our bodies are incredibly important to us. Keeping fit has a profoundly positive effect on many other nodes in the larger complex system of our lives. Healthy body, healthy mind. I believe Richard Branson once answered the question “How to be more productive?” with “Work out more.” Haruki Murakami described at length how running taught him to be a more effective writer. I’ve always found my most effective, happy and generally productive periods to coincide with the periods of time where I’d been exercising the most.
Fitness Goals:
– Learn to Swim -> Swim 10 laps continously -> Complete Biathlon
– Run 5km without stopping -> Run 10km without stopping -> Complete Biathlon
– Bench Press 50kg -> Bench Press 60kg
– Complete 2.4km in under 11 minutes
– Reach 70kg bodyweight -> 75kg
The Music Project:
Music became a huge part of my life during my teenage years- it was a form of expression, communion, discovery, meditation, socialization, everything. It has huge value for me. Lately I feel like I’ve kind of stagnated, so I’ve decided to develop a more focused system to push myself to grow as a musician.
Music Goals:
– Start a music progress log
– Build repertoire of covers -> Record 50 YouTube covers
– Build and follow a schedule of YouTube music lessons
– Develop sufficient vocal control to use vibrato at will
– Finalize drafts of originals -> Record rough demos of originals -> Record Album
Small Big Changes Project:
This one isn’t really a proper stand-alone project- it’s a simple idea, to identify little things that would make a big difference in my life, in making progress in all the other projects.
– Get a new laptop battery that actually works, so I’m not bound to my charger
– Transfer my handphone bill from my parents’ account to my own
– Secure internet access, either through a dongle or wireless hotspot smartphone (will probably do the latter after I’m done with NS)
– Acquire a decent webcam (for recording YouTube covers)
– Acquire decent electric guitar, guitar amp, bass amp (Give music lessons!)
– Declutter my wardrobe
– Declutter my book collection
– Declutter my socks
The Routines Project:
Kinda similar to the small big-changes project, where the idea is to build simple and effective routines that replace my current lousy ones.
Goals:
– Daily meditation/visualization/reflection/tracking
– Daily exercise time
– Daily writing time
– Weekly readings
The Writing Project:
I think writing is pretty much the most highly developed skill I have, apart from stuff like thinking and daydreaming. I imagine that writing will play a huge role in my progress as an individual. So I figure, if it’s a good skill, I want it to be great.
Goals:
– Start a writing progress log
– Develop a consistent writing habit for the blog, improve the existing systems, make it sustainable
– Develop a consistent creative writing habit for my novel-writing project -> write and complete the novel. I plan to create a separate blog for it, where I’ll write in a very sporadic and broad, scattered manner and slowly develop an emergent pattern- taking reader input into consideration. So it’ll be a community-developed novel.
– Write and sell e-books (The first will be about hacking the 7 deadly sins!)
– Set aside specific practice sessions to criticize my own writing
– Sheer volume!!!
Project Statement:
Project Statement is an idea I have to sell T-shirts that function as conversation starters. Check out the early draft bits here:
The idea will be to use this as an experiment in hustling, entrepreneurship, marketing, trial and error. I have an idea of the worldview I’d like to convey, the sort of people I’d like to get involved with. From here I plan to build a sustainable business which I will expand into all sorts of other things- organizing gigs, for instance, maybe someday having a brick-and-mortar store (unlikely, though.) Someday I’d like to have a conversation cafe. That’s a little further down the road though, once I’ve leveled up a bit and have substantial financial resources.
Project (n_n)/:
I believe that every intelligent, quality person has several friends of similar calibre- but is usually somewhat alone. Good minds tend to be a little bit isolated and under-appreciated by their peers. I had the idea that I could build a community of such people- put them in one room, tell them to play nice, and have them figure out what they ought to do with one another without forcing their hands. It’s been wonderful so far. More on this later.
Alternative Degree Project:
I don’t really want to go to University, unless I can get a full scholarship to something incredible that’s going to be a wonderful opportunity. Otherwise, I think it’s not the most effective use of time and money. I believe that everything valuable about a degree can be outsourced, replaced, substituted with superior components. Most conventional degrees strike me as manifestations of the mass-manufacture mindset.
Gotta run now, will describe this in greater detail later.