From my own assestment I am still teetering on belonging as a hopeful or a member in younghands. I said that at the end of this week we should formalize me moving down to a “hopeful” if I came up short. It may be best for me to take that step down, I’ll explain why with this review:
I believe this week was an improvement from last week, although it’s hard to say given my subpar measuring for both weeks. I published three articles ((And made a draft of another)), I published this review on Saturday instead of Sunday, I was more active in channel, and I completed another 6 hours of saltmines. ((The hours are shortened in part because I am working down hours that I’ve already been paid for and am working on smaller maintance tasks.)) Overall, I felt ((I use the past tense of feel intentionally. I didn’t do the daily timelogs, and I just had the sensation of working harder for the hours. With that said, I am pretty sure I reduced the amount of time spent on “getting up for water” and the like.)) more focused during the time I was working at my desk.
Although there _might_ have been improvement from last week, I still fail to accomplish the goals laid out by my plan. I should have had 12 hours for saltmines instead of 6, I didn’t spend the 4 hours I said I would on Monday rereading Aristotle, and I believe I spent fewer than 8h working on TheFleet on Thursday although I’m not sure since I didn’t log my time anyways.
The main problem I have – and the reason I believe it may be best for me to step down to hopeful – is that the work I do for younghands is not the top priority in my mind. I’d like to say it is, it certainly is the top priority for when i’m “working”, but my actions show that I constantly prefer to enjoy social time in its various forms than to get done what I set out to do for the week.
If I am to be switched to a hopeful, my goal is immediately to regain my status as a member, but I am not sure if I’m ever going to be able to change my pattern of randomly dipping out of work to catch a beer for sunset with someone or the like. I am not sure whether this is a character flaw or what. Perhaps I can develop my ability to turn down last minute invitations and work on making sure that meeting with others fits in my schedule. In any case, I would rather be assigned as “hopeful” because I am someone for whom there is genuinely hope, than be assigned as “hopeful” because I am some hopeless impostor member.
I should mention that I understand the practical consequence of moving from member->hopeful is that the frequency of your comments/reviews on anything I do are reduced until I reach a higher level of productivity.
Enjoying social time is certainly not a problem in itself (nor was it ever banned or something, wtf). The trouble though starts when you set ~0 store by keeping your word, as simple as that. It might be perhaps that you don’t quite see the work (the fleet or even the reading or whatever) to matter much – in which case fine, pick something that you actually want to work on as in really want it more than chitchat. From my point of view, there’s no trouble in this case, just let me know – *what* is it you actually want to do?
Otherwise and overall, the question arising from the above though is quite a different one – why do you consider you want my feedback, comments & reviews? You don’t seem to store much value by them really or in any case way less than you store by whatever random invitation at any given time, by the sounds of it.
Comment by Diana Coman — April 5, 2020 @ 6:29 pm
I know social time is not a problem in itself, and that going back on my word is the larger issue. TheFleet interests me, or at least I think it does, and I don’t think switching projects would motivate me more or anything. I also don’t want to leave TheFleet unfinished.
I want your feedback, comments, and reviews since I find that your advice steers me in the right direction. There are small tips, such as ~ “proofread your work, then wait a couple of hours, and then proofread again. Don’t use a spellchecker since it promotes the bad behavior of not actually looking at the words you write during the proofread,” that aid me in whatever I’m doing. Also, I attribute a lot of the positive achievements I’ve had in the past six months to that advice: having put together a decent linux box, having greatly improved my writing output, and having short circuited my ego defense mechanism by writing weekly plans and reviews that expose my inability to accomplish goals I set for myself.
I value the advice, although I don’t have the character required to follow it in a timely fashion because I constantly put the hard work aside to enjoy wine, fruit, the beach, etc. I want my word to have meaning so at the moment I think it’s best if I reduce the goals laid out in my plans for the week and then try to work them back up.
Comment by Will Haack — April 8, 2020 @ 10:10 pm
The short of it really is short: *just do it*. Doesn’t this ~”I value it but won’t follow through” remind you of anything and anyone close to you?
Just publish an article on your blog every other day, for a full month, will you? And otherwise see about that otc network you wanted to build locally, since it’s the sort of thing that I gather you might even find more enjoyable than computer work anyway.
There’s also a slightly longer answer in chan today.
Comment by Diana Coman — April 13, 2020 @ 7:55 am
> The short of it really is short: *just do it*. Doesn’t this ~”I value it but won’t follow through” remind you of anything and anyone close to you?
Yes, it reminds me specifically of the shrysr fallout.
> Just publish an article on your blog every other day, for a full month, will you? And otherwise see about that otc network you wanted to build locally, since it’s the sort of thing that I gather you might even find more enjoyable than computer work anyway.
Okay, I’ll make the bidaily articles my primary goal. As for the OTC network, I’m happy to make that another focus but I am not sure whether going door to door is a good idea at the moment.
Comment by Will Haack — April 13, 2020 @ 7:11 pm
Re door to door, I suppose it depends on how closely observed the “don’t go” rules are where you are but at any rate, my point above was to focus on getting that moving – what the best approach & means might be are up to you at the end of the day anyway. Otoh I guess it’s an even better filter if you find people who are not too scared to actually talk -gasp!- to others in person atm.
Re reminder, I had in mind your live warning really and that “trying to X” for 2years+.
Comment by Diana Coman — April 13, 2020 @ 7:19 pm
That’s a good point re the natural filter created by the coronavirus situation. I’m sure the intersection of the ‘too scared to talk’ crowd with the interested-in-cash-deals-for-bitcoins crowd is ~nil.
And yes that live warning and X are relevant to my situation, thanks for pointing that out bluntly since my brain created a blind spot there.
Comment by Will Haack — April 13, 2020 @ 7:50 pm