Existential Crisis

I had quite the existential realization last week. Wednesday to be exact. It was brought on by a culmination of failures and disappointments. I had chosen to skip my classes that day, and was considering skipping work as well. How was the time being spent? Not well. This had been happening more and more.

Skip class.
Play video games.
Go to work.
Play more games.
Sleep.

Notice the absence of eating...

I had given myself goals this semester. I was tired of not knowing anything about programming, even though I had a year and a half of "experience" under my belt by that time. I also wanted to re-learn how to learn, because the techniques I had been presented with as a child weren't working at all.

I was taking steps toward those goals. I was reading "Pragmatic Thinking and Learning," by Andy Hunt, a book suggested to me by a professor. It was going well, but not great. Basically, I wasn't moving as quickly as I would like. I was self sabotaging. The thing about being totally aware of your problems and not doing anything about them is the guilt. It's crushing. Sadly, I'm not capable of being blissfully unawares.

So anyway...Wednesday.

While reading more "Pragmatic Thinking" I had a realization. Since I was a child, I've been searching for the easiest method for comfort in my life. A silver bullet for my world. An easy solution that would just solve everything. My marriage was one. I've taken pills in an attempt to "improve my brain power," and worked out three days a week thinking that I would magically transform into some muscle ridden beefcake.

Nothing (of course) worked, so to deal with all that disappointment, I've always drowned myself in entertainment. This doesn't get you very far in the world.

Well, I'm tired of it. So I'm doing something.

This last week has been very exciting. I've picked up my old programming books and am starting from the beginning. Maybe that's a bit of an overreaction to my programming woes, but I feel as though its exactly what I need. I've begun to take notes on everything that I read. I do the thought exercises suggested in the "Pragmatic" book, where in the past I wouldn't have given them a moments thought. I would have expected the book to just cure me.

It's odd to admit that I never knew that the only way to get better at tasks was to work on them, but I didn't. Well, now I'm working.

There are two things that I'm doing now that have been the most game changing and exciting right now.

Firstly, I'm writing every little idea I have down. I always have my phone with me, so this is relatively easy to do. It's also exciting to realize that there are ideas in my brain that may be worth something, whereas in the past I would just subconsciously dismiss any thought that would run through my brain. It's hard to describe the self worth that I have gleaned from this process.

Secondly, "Pragmatic" suggests an exercise where every morning when you wake up, you immediately write three pages of...well, whatever. The notion is that this stream of consciousness writing coupled with the absence of those barriers the "Lizard Brain" puts up can really produce some very introspective thoughts, as well as some excellent ideas. While I haven't hit the ideas stage yet, I find the process very liberating.

So what exactly does all of this mean. Well, I'm finding a motivation in me that I never really knew that I had. I've never been motivated to do anything even remotely difficult or time consuming, and yet here I am, giving myself goals and projects and then working on them. How exciting.

Why did this take so long?