A fellow reader asked a great question the other day. "How do you teach your kids to be bored? Mine hate boredom." It's a great question because it's a timeless complaint parents have heard, magnified in the age of instant gratification and digital entertainment.
The foundation for this answer comes first in communication and cooperation between all child caretakers, be it parents, grandparents, or whoever is watching the child for a reasonable amount of time. Boredom is an itch that everyone wants to scratch. Adults can scratch the itch of boredom for themselves, but kids typically rely on adults to help them scratch it. So if a single adult in the room caters to the child's complaint of boredom and immediately scratches their itch, that adult becomes the path of least resistance, and the child will always go to them in the future. A unified approach is critical to implement good habits.
Once all primary adults are aligned, then the real work begins. The first is to limit how many cheap distractions a kid has. Today's toys are frequently gimmicky and designed to give instant novelty dopamine hits while lacking depth in experimentation. Play with it for 15 minutes, then throw it away and buy something new. It's impossible to avoid all the cheap, gimmicky toys, but my wife and I try to prevent first acquiring and then quietly throwing away any that do make it into the household. With the marketing put out convincing our kids of the imperative nature of owning the latest fad, it's a struggle, and I'm not sure how successful we are, but we at least both acknowledge we should minimize these toys and make an attempt at it.
The best solution to avoiding the gimmick is implementing a chore-based allowance system that puts money into their pockets daily, assuming they complete their chores. Then, they must purchase all the toys they want themselves. They can still buy the gimmicky, but sometimes, explaining how they spent weeks saving up to buy a toy they'll play with for only a single day hits home. It doesn't happen every time, and sometimes they still buy the gimmick, especially our youngest, but over time, it's been sinking in. We are equipping them today with the mental mapping they need to make good purchasing decisions in the future. Prepare them today with insignificant low-cost toys so they are ready in the future when they make large-dollar purchasing decisions.
Instead of those cheap-thrills toys, we try to get longer-lasting toys. Legos do the trick, especially free-forming collections of loose pieces, so the kids have to build from their imagination. Colors (crayons, colored pencils, markers, etc.) and creative supplies are great too. Even the furniture can be creative. We got our kids The Nugget (https://nuggetcomfort.com/), which they use to build forts, go indoor camping, build reading dens, use as a coach, etc. We also like science-based or learning-based toys too. Although those tend to be a single-use experience, they are learning in the process, so it is forgivable. Books are the same way, and the library is a cheap way to get those single-use items, so we take the kids about once a month to renew their literary collections.
In general, we tend to find reasons to purchase these toys ourselves: birthdays and Christmas, treats for doing something well, or any excuse to maintain the system of them buying their toys while bending it to encourage them to get toys we feel are better for them.
Once you've minimized your collection of gadgets and tried to gear it around more complex or creative toys, the next thing is to limit the most dominant must-have instant gratification items. For us, it's screen time, specifically an iPad and Nintendo Switch.
To counter these two, we have a few systems in place. First is that they have to earn their screen time. They must do two screens and two year-round educational activities each day: DuoLingo and Kumon. Both are only 15-30 minutes, so they are manageable daily. The rule is that after they do one of their educational activities, they can use one of their screens. If they've been highly unruly recently, they must do both educational activities before either screen time. Depending on the teacher, homework is a third educational activity they must complete during the school year. They can watch me play the Switch if they complete this third activity.
There are a few reasons why this last way is essential. It's beneficial because although I stopped playing games long ago, it helps me destress to pick up a controller. It's an excellent motivator for me to put down work on days I'm especially swamped. We also play games outside, board games, and do other things, but screen time especially motivates our youngest, so he's guaranteed to be insistent on unlocking this bonding time. But here's another crucial reason why I like them watching me. It teaches them social watching. Exposing them to games they might not usually be interested in is a benefit. Watching someone else click all the buttons while they sit back and observe teaches them patience. My favorite type of game is the story-based RPG game, which typically has a world to explore, so it teaches them good co-piloting skills. I put a world map or dungeon map in front of them, and they direct me to where I need to go. Overall, it is a great bonding exercise.
We now have established a reward system for screen time. Next up is limiting screen time per session. Parental controls make setting up the screen restrictions easy. The iPad and Switch have built-in screen limits, so we set both to 30 minutes. That way, no one has to keep a manual timer. It's all built-in, and when it's over, it's over.
All the prep work is now complete. We've minimized the cheap-thrill gimmicky toys. Instead, we've focused on creative, mind-utilizing, and longer-lasting toys. We've implemented a reward system while putting automated timer limits on their screens. We have to funnel everything into this system, which is the hardest part.
When they come up to us complaining about the itch of boredom, we do not want to scratch it for them. That's the easy solution to appease them and make the complaining disappear. Still, it only teaches them to rely on external toys for entertainment and external people to facilitate them to play with those toys. Instead, we point out and provide suggestions for their creative toys to help spark something to do. If they say no to that, we point out that with a room full of toys and items, if they can't figure out anything to do, we suggest we go through what they have and get rid of things. Fear of losing their gimmicky toys can sometimes motivate them, which, ironically, they never play with but have difficulty getting rid of. If they still need to do their educational activities, we suggest they do those to get the screen times. Sometimes, we only tell them to go into their rooms to figure it out independently. And leave it at that. It sometimes feels like lousy parenting because we ignore their complaints. But it's forcing them to scratch their itch and exercise their creative muscles. After we've told them this, we've often seen our youngest sitting on the bed, staring into nothing. It could be better, but hopefully, something is brewing. At this point, they usually figure something out: reading, napping, colors, or Legos being the current trend.
It's not perfect, nor do we flawlessly execute. But it is gradually working, and over time, it hopefully continues giving the kids the versatility to avoid the easy instant gratification way out of boredom and instead embrace it and channel that energy into something more beneficial.
7.15.2024
7.08.2024
#43 | Empty Promises
I was talking to a leader in a tech startup recently, and they mentioned the levels of uncertainty and insecurity that have recently started popping up in their colleagues. After years of developing and pivoting its product, the startup recently launched its MVP, or minimum viable product.
They are now receiving a lot of interest, seeing sales growth, and a lot of promise in expanding the product beyond the MVP. All are very positive. The predicament they are facing is that after years of developing the product, too many within the company have become somewhat complacent and have lost their fire. They became comfortable with the tinkering and needed to remember the intensity of a do-or-die startup where things are advancing quickly, and the customer is fickle. The product launched, the real work kicked up, and the team is still determining if they can deliver according to the hype and turn things into an enduring company.
Welcome to the startup world!
To solve this uncertainty, I mentioned that the CEO and the other leaders needed to step up their motivational game. The startup was at a possible "go big or go home" moment, so people needed to provide their best energy and execution. There was no time for anything else. But what motivates an average individual employee to do that?
One way is to offer increased compensation. At established companies with large budgets, it can be base salary and bonus increases. At public companies, it can be some form of stock compensation, which has the extended effect of retaining employees until their stocks vest. At newer private companies, especially startups, equity provides upside on a potential exit.
Unfortunately, although everyone might have equity, not everyone will have top-tier equity—maybe not even the top 20% of the company. And if they don't, increasing their equity requires board approval, which would be challenging and potentially unlikely to happen. Any significant or off-cycle base or bonus increase would go through the board if the burn rate and budget even allowed it.
So, I suggested that the CEO and the company's leaders start making empty promises. I do this at work, too, although it is better than it sounds.
Career growth and compensation are naturally frequent topics of discussion within my department. The foundation of my response is similar for everyone. For example, I tell them it's a partnership. I have to make sure they have the right opportunities. They have to execute those opportunities in a way I can sell, and then I have to sell it. I can only do so much if my employees don't reciprocate my efforts.
I also tell them that once we've done the work, I'll do what I can to get them more compensation, a higher rating, or a promotion. But there are a lot of hurdles between them getting their rewards. My peers may back it or contend against it. My boss may accept or reject it. Then, countless other people from HR to finance to others in the direct chain of command might stop it. Perhaps the hurdle is not a person, but the company's performance is lackluster, and that particular performance cycle mirrors it. The company has done well, but the macro-level economics are trending downward. All these things are out of my control and my employee's control.
So what do we do? Give up before we even start?
And this is where the empty promise, or a highly focused promise, comes in. I tell my employees I can't guarantee things I don't control. However, I guarantee that I will work towards giving people the opportunities to grow as an individual and professionally. If they follow my lead and work the process with me, I'll ensure they have exposure to challenging problems, higher-level responsibilities, and growth-expanding experiences. No matter what happens outside our control, I can provide that as long as I still have a job and any form of authority.
From there, I also tell them that if the company or I cannot give them the career growth to match their personal or professional development on the timeline they want, I hold no hard feelings if they find another department or company that will. They must do what they must and shouldn't let anything stop them from their goals. During their growth, they have already paid back the company and myself for whatever value they provided and owe nothing more. Although I hope the company can retain people, sometimes it doesn't happen. I've had plenty of people who have moved on because of this, some of which I still connect and collaborate with.
The situation is the same for personal projects. Instead of setting goals and aspirations that revolve around outcomes out of your control, focus on only things in your control.
The startup's leadership can also address the uncertainty using the same logic. No one can predict whether a startup will succeed or fail. And even if the startup is a success, there are different types of success. Continuously growing so that the individuals can develop their careers is a success for the startup. Everyone being laid off immediately after selling to another company is also a success for the startup. Since career or compensation growth is out of everyone's control, the CEO and leaders of the startup can start giving some empty but focused promises that although career and compensation growth is not guaranteed, if their employees dig in during this crucial moment, they can guarantee to have tremendous growth from a personal and professional perspective.
The experience they gain will help them in their professions and lives, regardless of the outcome.
They are now receiving a lot of interest, seeing sales growth, and a lot of promise in expanding the product beyond the MVP. All are very positive. The predicament they are facing is that after years of developing the product, too many within the company have become somewhat complacent and have lost their fire. They became comfortable with the tinkering and needed to remember the intensity of a do-or-die startup where things are advancing quickly, and the customer is fickle. The product launched, the real work kicked up, and the team is still determining if they can deliver according to the hype and turn things into an enduring company.
Welcome to the startup world!
To solve this uncertainty, I mentioned that the CEO and the other leaders needed to step up their motivational game. The startup was at a possible "go big or go home" moment, so people needed to provide their best energy and execution. There was no time for anything else. But what motivates an average individual employee to do that?
One way is to offer increased compensation. At established companies with large budgets, it can be base salary and bonus increases. At public companies, it can be some form of stock compensation, which has the extended effect of retaining employees until their stocks vest. At newer private companies, especially startups, equity provides upside on a potential exit.
Unfortunately, although everyone might have equity, not everyone will have top-tier equity—maybe not even the top 20% of the company. And if they don't, increasing their equity requires board approval, which would be challenging and potentially unlikely to happen. Any significant or off-cycle base or bonus increase would go through the board if the burn rate and budget even allowed it.
So, I suggested that the CEO and the company's leaders start making empty promises. I do this at work, too, although it is better than it sounds.
Career growth and compensation are naturally frequent topics of discussion within my department. The foundation of my response is similar for everyone. For example, I tell them it's a partnership. I have to make sure they have the right opportunities. They have to execute those opportunities in a way I can sell, and then I have to sell it. I can only do so much if my employees don't reciprocate my efforts.
I also tell them that once we've done the work, I'll do what I can to get them more compensation, a higher rating, or a promotion. But there are a lot of hurdles between them getting their rewards. My peers may back it or contend against it. My boss may accept or reject it. Then, countless other people from HR to finance to others in the direct chain of command might stop it. Perhaps the hurdle is not a person, but the company's performance is lackluster, and that particular performance cycle mirrors it. The company has done well, but the macro-level economics are trending downward. All these things are out of my control and my employee's control.
So what do we do? Give up before we even start?
And this is where the empty promise, or a highly focused promise, comes in. I tell my employees I can't guarantee things I don't control. However, I guarantee that I will work towards giving people the opportunities to grow as an individual and professionally. If they follow my lead and work the process with me, I'll ensure they have exposure to challenging problems, higher-level responsibilities, and growth-expanding experiences. No matter what happens outside our control, I can provide that as long as I still have a job and any form of authority.
From there, I also tell them that if the company or I cannot give them the career growth to match their personal or professional development on the timeline they want, I hold no hard feelings if they find another department or company that will. They must do what they must and shouldn't let anything stop them from their goals. During their growth, they have already paid back the company and myself for whatever value they provided and owe nothing more. Although I hope the company can retain people, sometimes it doesn't happen. I've had plenty of people who have moved on because of this, some of which I still connect and collaborate with.
The situation is the same for personal projects. Instead of setting goals and aspirations that revolve around outcomes out of your control, focus on only things in your control.
The startup's leadership can also address the uncertainty using the same logic. No one can predict whether a startup will succeed or fail. And even if the startup is a success, there are different types of success. Continuously growing so that the individuals can develop their careers is a success for the startup. Everyone being laid off immediately after selling to another company is also a success for the startup. Since career or compensation growth is out of everyone's control, the CEO and leaders of the startup can start giving some empty but focused promises that although career and compensation growth is not guaranteed, if their employees dig in during this crucial moment, they can guarantee to have tremendous growth from a personal and professional perspective.
The experience they gain will help them in their professions and lives, regardless of the outcome.
7.01.2024
#42 | Bring You
Recently, a reader was binge-reading the Boredom blog from start to finish. Then they came to my 3-ish month hiatus from the end of June 2019 to mid-October 2019. They messaged with the following comment: I love how you took the gap in 2019 from June to October. Really shows your human. We all run into life."
My response was: wait until you see my 4+ year sabbatical coming up at the beginning of 2020.
All kidding aside, they touched on a principle I've strived to be a core tenant of my leadership style for the past two years. Around two years ago, I shifted organizations within my company and almost tripled the number of people I managed overnight. Not only did I see that large of an increase in people, but I had helped build up my previous area from nothing, so I knew everyone exceptionally well, and vice versa.
In my new organization, I started working with people who might have superficial knowledge of me with meaningful interactions. That means I had to dig deep into figuring out what type of leader I wanted to be and could practically reinvent myself as needed.
I knew I didn't want to be an unapproachable leader. I entered this company as a senior software engineer, earned promotions, and worked my way up. I was once in their shoes and walked the same path as them. I knew a lot of their pains and frustrations. I wanted them to know that and to sense that by how I presented myself and interacted with them. Saying it wasn't enough, I had to live it. An unapproachable leadership style frequently leads to a tone-deaf and ivory-tower dynamic. Maintaining chain of command and leadership hierarchies is possible without sacrificing approachability.
I also didn't want to be overly stoic. That is a common trait I see with older or higher-up leadership styles. Emotions don't exist, and neither do faults or mistakes. I am perfect, and you should be too. No thanks. It's exhausting to maintain that front at all times, and it is also a great morale killer. As the head of any team, the team's culture will likely mimic your own. Showing emotions; disappointment and frustration, excitement and hope, and everything else in between; doesn't weaken the team. Showing weaknesses and mistakes doesn't magnify our faults. Showing our emotions, flaws, and errors allows us to be stronger as individuals or as a team as we address them.
I wanted to be inclusive. Obnoxious and toxic "tech bros" fill the tech industry. However, the tech industry is common; any large community can tend to homogenize. That's not how I want to surround myself. I grew up in a very diverse neighborhood. I have enjoyed having friends from all walks of life. One of the most appealing parts of traveling is to immerse myself as much as possible in local customs, activities, and people. Diversity strengthens us by bringing in all these unique perspectives to ensure we miss nothing.
There were many other traits that I did or didn't want to exhibit, but they all sum up into a single word: authentic.
Robots and AI have yet to take over. We still run things. We all make mistakes, burn out, and have unconscious biases. We are all human. We should embrace this part of ourselves, strengthening us as we acknowledge, analyze, and address our humanity—not just in leadership but in our everyday lives and in all of our social interactions with our colleagues, family, and friends.
If the leader is authentic, those around them will also feel more comfortable dropping the mask and being authentic.
My response was: wait until you see my 4+ year sabbatical coming up at the beginning of 2020.
All kidding aside, they touched on a principle I've strived to be a core tenant of my leadership style for the past two years. Around two years ago, I shifted organizations within my company and almost tripled the number of people I managed overnight. Not only did I see that large of an increase in people, but I had helped build up my previous area from nothing, so I knew everyone exceptionally well, and vice versa.
In my new organization, I started working with people who might have superficial knowledge of me with meaningful interactions. That means I had to dig deep into figuring out what type of leader I wanted to be and could practically reinvent myself as needed.
I knew I didn't want to be an unapproachable leader. I entered this company as a senior software engineer, earned promotions, and worked my way up. I was once in their shoes and walked the same path as them. I knew a lot of their pains and frustrations. I wanted them to know that and to sense that by how I presented myself and interacted with them. Saying it wasn't enough, I had to live it. An unapproachable leadership style frequently leads to a tone-deaf and ivory-tower dynamic. Maintaining chain of command and leadership hierarchies is possible without sacrificing approachability.
I also didn't want to be overly stoic. That is a common trait I see with older or higher-up leadership styles. Emotions don't exist, and neither do faults or mistakes. I am perfect, and you should be too. No thanks. It's exhausting to maintain that front at all times, and it is also a great morale killer. As the head of any team, the team's culture will likely mimic your own. Showing emotions; disappointment and frustration, excitement and hope, and everything else in between; doesn't weaken the team. Showing weaknesses and mistakes doesn't magnify our faults. Showing our emotions, flaws, and errors allows us to be stronger as individuals or as a team as we address them.
I wanted to be inclusive. Obnoxious and toxic "tech bros" fill the tech industry. However, the tech industry is common; any large community can tend to homogenize. That's not how I want to surround myself. I grew up in a very diverse neighborhood. I have enjoyed having friends from all walks of life. One of the most appealing parts of traveling is to immerse myself as much as possible in local customs, activities, and people. Diversity strengthens us by bringing in all these unique perspectives to ensure we miss nothing.
There were many other traits that I did or didn't want to exhibit, but they all sum up into a single word: authentic.
Robots and AI have yet to take over. We still run things. We all make mistakes, burn out, and have unconscious biases. We are all human. We should embrace this part of ourselves, strengthening us as we acknowledge, analyze, and address our humanity—not just in leadership but in our everyday lives and in all of our social interactions with our colleagues, family, and friends.
If the leader is authentic, those around them will also feel more comfortable dropping the mask and being authentic.
6.24.2024
#41 | Partnerships & Collaborations
My childhood was interesting. I felt like a middle-class family living in a low-income neighborhood. I believe this is mainly because my parents were on-again, off-again separated. Both worked and made decent money, but they were both separate single-income households due to not being together and living single through most of my childhood. They could not combine finances as is typically required for modern family households.
Because of this, the neighborhood I grew up in was not ideal. Gang violence and murders around my elementary school in my early years there. Teen relationship drama and more murders on my street in my late elementary school years. Watching fights constantly during and after school in middle school, where the loser ended up in the hospital. Entering high school and realized a lot of my best friends from elementary school were gone due to early-teen pregnancies, juvie, or being dead. Then, I experienced race wars and walkouts and guns and knives on the high school campus. Going to college and finding out other schools were so afraid to go to your hood for sporting events that they would prefer to forfeit games. Talking to my new colleague peers about how I wasn't sure I would make it through high school in a literal sense and being told they completely understood because high school was so embarrassing and anxiety-inducing that they figuratively didn't think they would survive. Then, going home during every college break to find out yet another old classmate was no longer with us, sometimes due to "stepping on the wrong shoes" at a house party or sometimes being part of a deal gone wrong. While texting my new friends from the porch at night, hearing gunshots pop off. To top it all off, going back a decade after high school graduation and seeing the cartels take over the old stomping grounds with open carry and public-space domestic abuse.
My saving grace was that my parents made decent money and provided stable households despite shifting ones, allowing me to be level-headed enough to pick my friends carefully and to stay off the radar while still succeeding.
I made it out. But nothing happens in a vacuum, and there were a lot of people throughout that helped. Many I wouldn't even remember anymore, some I remember vividly. I aim to pay it forward as often as I can.
This background has been a guiding force in my philanthropic desires. Immediately after graduating from college and having a steady income, I started donating to the local family shelter monthly for a decade. Immediately before the pandemic, I started volunteering at Junior Achievement. Helping other kids make it out has always been a big passion of mine.
However, that changed a few years ago when I was tired of my corporate job's endless meetings and political infighting. I was inches from quitting and using what I had learned and gained leadership skills to try to land a high-level position at a nonprofit. I was a weekend away from turning in my notice when my wife sat me down to talk through this significant life decision.
She brought reality to the decision. Nonprofits are bogged down with bureaucracy and sometimes have low effectiveness at translating donated dollars into truly effective altruism. While at work, the number of people within the domain I managed had nearly tripled to around 80 people. So my wife said if I wanted to pay it forward and help people, I had a large audience between my org and all of our counterparts and collaborators that I could help, especially in the technology industry where tech bro culture runs rampant and many people become overlooked.
That convo changed my course. I stayed at work and focused exclusively on helping my people. The funny side effect is that the more energy I put into empowering my people, the better they did. The better they did, the better I looked as a leader. The better I looked, the more influence I gained across areas outside my domain. The more influence I gained, the more I could focus on empowering a larger group of people. And the cycle continued.
I want to use that same energy and apply it to non-work endeavors, dusting off the PCB and rebuilding it in Confluence. I'm also figuring out how to increase my outreach with Discord, Patreon, and Substack. Helping kids make it out has stayed on the radar, but the radar just expanded to helping anyone achieve their goals, regardless of their age or background.
During this new era, I started talking with an artist friend who works in the entertainment industry. He has a budding YouTube channel and is trying to figure out how to expand it. He discussed his hectic life involving career, family, and personal projects. It seemed like burnout was real, and being overwhelmed was an understatement. He sounded like all of us, and I recalled the first few posts of this blog. I started giving him some insights I've discovered throughout the years and pointed him towards the blog, hoping it would hit close to him and help him. I also told him I was working with people at work to grow their careers. At one point, he asked me when I had decided I wanted to be a mentor.
That triggered some thoughts; something didn't sit quite right.
So I started to think about it. Why didn't it sit right?
Then it hit me. Some people I mentored at work started at the same level and at the same time as I did. And they are today at the same level as me. Some of the people I have mentored outside of work have been my seniors and accomplished more in life, but I happened to be more of a master at a specific aspect of their lives. Others were my juniors in the traditional sense, but while helping them grow as individuals, they gave me as much back as I gave them. They helped me refine my message. Through careful thought, I had to articulate my thoughts in a way that others could receive. It forced me to be introspective enough to pull out what worked and didn't work for me. Then forced me to be observant and empathetic enough to realize what worked for me won't work for everyone and to listen and understand other's perspectives to ensure what I was putting out was not tone deaf, was not from a position of privilege or lack of understanding, and would be heard.
I haven't been a mentor to anyone.
Instead, I have been a partner and collaborator with all these great people, young and old. They have given me as much as I have given them. Paying it forward, helping others out, and my philanthropic desires come full circle. Again, nothing happens in a vacuum, and we are all interconnected.
Because of this, the neighborhood I grew up in was not ideal. Gang violence and murders around my elementary school in my early years there. Teen relationship drama and more murders on my street in my late elementary school years. Watching fights constantly during and after school in middle school, where the loser ended up in the hospital. Entering high school and realized a lot of my best friends from elementary school were gone due to early-teen pregnancies, juvie, or being dead. Then, I experienced race wars and walkouts and guns and knives on the high school campus. Going to college and finding out other schools were so afraid to go to your hood for sporting events that they would prefer to forfeit games. Talking to my new colleague peers about how I wasn't sure I would make it through high school in a literal sense and being told they completely understood because high school was so embarrassing and anxiety-inducing that they figuratively didn't think they would survive. Then, going home during every college break to find out yet another old classmate was no longer with us, sometimes due to "stepping on the wrong shoes" at a house party or sometimes being part of a deal gone wrong. While texting my new friends from the porch at night, hearing gunshots pop off. To top it all off, going back a decade after high school graduation and seeing the cartels take over the old stomping grounds with open carry and public-space domestic abuse.
My saving grace was that my parents made decent money and provided stable households despite shifting ones, allowing me to be level-headed enough to pick my friends carefully and to stay off the radar while still succeeding.
I made it out. But nothing happens in a vacuum, and there were a lot of people throughout that helped. Many I wouldn't even remember anymore, some I remember vividly. I aim to pay it forward as often as I can.
This background has been a guiding force in my philanthropic desires. Immediately after graduating from college and having a steady income, I started donating to the local family shelter monthly for a decade. Immediately before the pandemic, I started volunteering at Junior Achievement. Helping other kids make it out has always been a big passion of mine.
However, that changed a few years ago when I was tired of my corporate job's endless meetings and political infighting. I was inches from quitting and using what I had learned and gained leadership skills to try to land a high-level position at a nonprofit. I was a weekend away from turning in my notice when my wife sat me down to talk through this significant life decision.
She brought reality to the decision. Nonprofits are bogged down with bureaucracy and sometimes have low effectiveness at translating donated dollars into truly effective altruism. While at work, the number of people within the domain I managed had nearly tripled to around 80 people. So my wife said if I wanted to pay it forward and help people, I had a large audience between my org and all of our counterparts and collaborators that I could help, especially in the technology industry where tech bro culture runs rampant and many people become overlooked.
That convo changed my course. I stayed at work and focused exclusively on helping my people. The funny side effect is that the more energy I put into empowering my people, the better they did. The better they did, the better I looked as a leader. The better I looked, the more influence I gained across areas outside my domain. The more influence I gained, the more I could focus on empowering a larger group of people. And the cycle continued.
I want to use that same energy and apply it to non-work endeavors, dusting off the PCB and rebuilding it in Confluence. I'm also figuring out how to increase my outreach with Discord, Patreon, and Substack. Helping kids make it out has stayed on the radar, but the radar just expanded to helping anyone achieve their goals, regardless of their age or background.
During this new era, I started talking with an artist friend who works in the entertainment industry. He has a budding YouTube channel and is trying to figure out how to expand it. He discussed his hectic life involving career, family, and personal projects. It seemed like burnout was real, and being overwhelmed was an understatement. He sounded like all of us, and I recalled the first few posts of this blog. I started giving him some insights I've discovered throughout the years and pointed him towards the blog, hoping it would hit close to him and help him. I also told him I was working with people at work to grow their careers. At one point, he asked me when I had decided I wanted to be a mentor.
That triggered some thoughts; something didn't sit quite right.
So I started to think about it. Why didn't it sit right?
Then it hit me. Some people I mentored at work started at the same level and at the same time as I did. And they are today at the same level as me. Some of the people I have mentored outside of work have been my seniors and accomplished more in life, but I happened to be more of a master at a specific aspect of their lives. Others were my juniors in the traditional sense, but while helping them grow as individuals, they gave me as much back as I gave them. They helped me refine my message. Through careful thought, I had to articulate my thoughts in a way that others could receive. It forced me to be introspective enough to pull out what worked and didn't work for me. Then forced me to be observant and empathetic enough to realize what worked for me won't work for everyone and to listen and understand other's perspectives to ensure what I was putting out was not tone deaf, was not from a position of privilege or lack of understanding, and would be heard.
I haven't been a mentor to anyone.
Instead, I have been a partner and collaborator with all these great people, young and old. They have given me as much as I have given them. Paying it forward, helping others out, and my philanthropic desires come full circle. Again, nothing happens in a vacuum, and we are all interconnected.
6.16.2024
#40 | The Return
It's been a while since I last published a blog post, but I'm excited to announce that I'm back and ready to start writing again.
When I started this blog, I aimed to experiment with what it would take to maintain a regular publishing schedule. I set a goal of publishing a new blog entry every week for a year. I wanted to build a routine that would allow me to generate high-quality content regularly. Whether or not the content remained high-quality is up for debate, but I was able to establish a system that kept me on track for the most part, with only a minor break during that first year.
After a year of publishing weekly blog posts, I ran out of topics to discuss. Or, more accurately, I had put all my focus on generating the content and zero focus on promoting the blog, so the organic traffic needed more. Without any interaction from an audience, I was speaking into the void with no feedback cycle. Then the pandemic hit, and with it came a lot of craziness.
Life hit hard, shattering my routine and my motivation.
My personal life has changed since I last wrote a blog post. My role at my day job has continued to expand, and I've had more and more opportunities to take on leadership positions. My last entry was January 2020 at which point I was a Senior Manager managing around 20 or so Engineers. Four years later, my employer has stayed the same, but I've received two promotions to Executive Director and manage anywhere from 60-80 people depending on the re-org of the week. The growth rate has forced a high level of increase in professional maturity, leadership techniques and skills, and even personal maturity.
In my personal life, things have also been in flux, with a mix of successes and failures. My wife's oldest has both gone to university and graduated. My oldest has moved with her mother a state away. Our youngest is now eight years old but has been diagnosed with being on the autism spectrum along with having ADHD (highly functional, but it explains all of his quirks). We obtained passports for our kids (which are about to expire as underaged passports only last five years!) and have made three international trips as a family, two being to my wife's home country in Latin America.
To round things out, I have become more proactive in this blog and the PCB. I have rebuilt the old Trello tracking system into a Confluence system. I have worked with a few others to establish their unique system based on the PCB concepts and then watched them achieve amazing results.
As a result, I have a new set of topics to discuss. So here we go.
I'm excited to see where this blog can go in the future. I want to continue to share my knowledge with others, but I'd also like to find ways to incorporate more community and critical thinking into the blog.
Stay tuned for future updates and new blog posts. I look forward to reconnecting with my audience and continuing this experimental journey.
When I started this blog, I aimed to experiment with what it would take to maintain a regular publishing schedule. I set a goal of publishing a new blog entry every week for a year. I wanted to build a routine that would allow me to generate high-quality content regularly. Whether or not the content remained high-quality is up for debate, but I was able to establish a system that kept me on track for the most part, with only a minor break during that first year.
After a year of publishing weekly blog posts, I ran out of topics to discuss. Or, more accurately, I had put all my focus on generating the content and zero focus on promoting the blog, so the organic traffic needed more. Without any interaction from an audience, I was speaking into the void with no feedback cycle. Then the pandemic hit, and with it came a lot of craziness.
Life hit hard, shattering my routine and my motivation.
My personal life has changed since I last wrote a blog post. My role at my day job has continued to expand, and I've had more and more opportunities to take on leadership positions. My last entry was January 2020 at which point I was a Senior Manager managing around 20 or so Engineers. Four years later, my employer has stayed the same, but I've received two promotions to Executive Director and manage anywhere from 60-80 people depending on the re-org of the week. The growth rate has forced a high level of increase in professional maturity, leadership techniques and skills, and even personal maturity.
In my personal life, things have also been in flux, with a mix of successes and failures. My wife's oldest has both gone to university and graduated. My oldest has moved with her mother a state away. Our youngest is now eight years old but has been diagnosed with being on the autism spectrum along with having ADHD (highly functional, but it explains all of his quirks). We obtained passports for our kids (which are about to expire as underaged passports only last five years!) and have made three international trips as a family, two being to my wife's home country in Latin America.
To round things out, I have become more proactive in this blog and the PCB. I have rebuilt the old Trello tracking system into a Confluence system. I have worked with a few others to establish their unique system based on the PCB concepts and then watched them achieve amazing results.
As a result, I have a new set of topics to discuss. So here we go.
I'm excited to see where this blog can go in the future. I want to continue to share my knowledge with others, but I'd also like to find ways to incorporate more community and critical thinking into the blog.
Stay tuned for future updates and new blog posts. I look forward to reconnecting with my audience and continuing this experimental journey.
1.09.2020
#39 | 2020 Goals
This week I want to lay out some goals for 2020. I mulled it over all week. My original intention was to follow the same format as my 2019 recap from last week. I would discuss the goals for the blog and the Personal Control Book, then consider the 3 Life Focuses: Financial Independence, Health, and Philanthropy.
The more I thought about this approach, the worse it felt. I couldn't quite place why, but I finally realized I was over-emphasizing Financial Independence. If I boil down the blog and PCB, potential monetizing goals relate to improving my financial independence. These goals would overload Financial Independence and place greater importance on that Life Focus than the other two. Therefore, I stripped them out.
That leaves my original 3 Life Focuses:
So here they are:
Financial Independence
From reviewing my On-The-Horizon Beacons, this Life Focus has two aspects. The first is the FI portion of FIRE; the second is having livecations. My 2020 goals will continue traveling towards these Beacons since I'm not looking to reverse direction.
In terms of being FI, my goal is to improve my non-9-5 income stream to expense ratio. This year my wife and I put an increased focus on generating new income streams. I feel we currently have four legit non-9-5 in various forms of reliability and size. These income streams come close to covering our core expenses; mortgage, car expenses, etc. My goal is to have our alternative income fully cover our core expenses in addition to also covering our monthly lifestyle, ex: going out, recurring entertainment. To achieve this, I plan on applying pressure to increase our alternative incomes while also aggressively tackling expenses, especially monthly recurring bills.
To advance our livecations, we're already tentatively planning a month-long summer trip to Bolivia. Unfortunately, there are a lot of hurdles to overcome, with some of them being out of our control. My reach goal is to complete that trip, but my attainable goal would be to get all of our ducks in a row this year so that even if we are unable to have a livecation this year, the road will be ready for next year. This goal involves obtaining passports, ensuring there would be no snags with not only my 9-5 but also in maintaining any of our alternative income streams, determining who will house-sit, and allocating enough capital to fund an extended trip.
Health
For health, I want to stop the yo-yo-ing cycle. I've found that I can typically maintain a particular habit for a couple of months, but then I fall off the wagon. I'll manage a healthy and (supposedly) sustainable eating plan and, in the process, lose a dozen pounds. But then the stress hits and the junk food tempts, and the pounds come back. Or I'll start running again and will get into a nice rhythm, and then the unpredictability of life happens, and I lose my routine and can't start again.
So for this Life Focus, I want to focus on sustainable habits around eating, exercising, and overall weight. To achieve this goal, I'm planning on pacing myself. For example, I've done Weight Watchers in the past and find it a convenient way to track eating. The problem I've had in the past is once I start to get closer to my target weight, my weight loss naturally slows down, which mentally feels like I'm failing even though this is an expected outcome and weight loss wasn't my goal. However, weight is an easily tracked metric, and it's tough to switch from a weight-loss mentality to a weight-maintain mindset. Therefore this time, I'm not going to track my weight at all. Instead, I'll configure Weight Watchers to aim to maintain my weight, put in a guesstimate for how much I weigh today, and then use my Shapa scale to track progress. At that point, my success criteria will be to step on my Shapa daily receiving a green-to-blue Shapa color, and to record my food intake consistently.
That's just an example of a starting point. I intend to add in an exercise element to the goal too, and then once I have an all-encompassing system built around my current level of health, I can execute minor tweaks to the system to achieve any small gains I might have.
Philanthropy
I feel like I struggled the most with this Life Focus, which has lead to struggling to lay out a solid goal for 2020. This Life Focus also has probably the longest and most ambitious On-The-Horizon Beacon. Therefore, I will keep my 2020 focus simple and easy to help jump-start progress.
In 2020, I want to find one or more non-profit organizations that I can volunteer at semi-regularly throughout the year. The organization and its mission and who or what it serves will not matter. How frequently I volunteer does not matter. My only goal is to find an organization that I feel I could volunteer at for years to come.
(Written 2019.01.05)
The more I thought about this approach, the worse it felt. I couldn't quite place why, but I finally realized I was over-emphasizing Financial Independence. If I boil down the blog and PCB, potential monetizing goals relate to improving my financial independence. These goals would overload Financial Independence and place greater importance on that Life Focus than the other two. Therefore, I stripped them out.
That leaves my original 3 Life Focuses:
- Financial Independence
- Health
- Philanthropy
So here they are:
Financial Independence
From reviewing my On-The-Horizon Beacons, this Life Focus has two aspects. The first is the FI portion of FIRE; the second is having livecations. My 2020 goals will continue traveling towards these Beacons since I'm not looking to reverse direction.
In terms of being FI, my goal is to improve my non-9-5 income stream to expense ratio. This year my wife and I put an increased focus on generating new income streams. I feel we currently have four legit non-9-5 in various forms of reliability and size. These income streams come close to covering our core expenses; mortgage, car expenses, etc. My goal is to have our alternative income fully cover our core expenses in addition to also covering our monthly lifestyle, ex: going out, recurring entertainment. To achieve this, I plan on applying pressure to increase our alternative incomes while also aggressively tackling expenses, especially monthly recurring bills.
To advance our livecations, we're already tentatively planning a month-long summer trip to Bolivia. Unfortunately, there are a lot of hurdles to overcome, with some of them being out of our control. My reach goal is to complete that trip, but my attainable goal would be to get all of our ducks in a row this year so that even if we are unable to have a livecation this year, the road will be ready for next year. This goal involves obtaining passports, ensuring there would be no snags with not only my 9-5 but also in maintaining any of our alternative income streams, determining who will house-sit, and allocating enough capital to fund an extended trip.
Health
For health, I want to stop the yo-yo-ing cycle. I've found that I can typically maintain a particular habit for a couple of months, but then I fall off the wagon. I'll manage a healthy and (supposedly) sustainable eating plan and, in the process, lose a dozen pounds. But then the stress hits and the junk food tempts, and the pounds come back. Or I'll start running again and will get into a nice rhythm, and then the unpredictability of life happens, and I lose my routine and can't start again.
So for this Life Focus, I want to focus on sustainable habits around eating, exercising, and overall weight. To achieve this goal, I'm planning on pacing myself. For example, I've done Weight Watchers in the past and find it a convenient way to track eating. The problem I've had in the past is once I start to get closer to my target weight, my weight loss naturally slows down, which mentally feels like I'm failing even though this is an expected outcome and weight loss wasn't my goal. However, weight is an easily tracked metric, and it's tough to switch from a weight-loss mentality to a weight-maintain mindset. Therefore this time, I'm not going to track my weight at all. Instead, I'll configure Weight Watchers to aim to maintain my weight, put in a guesstimate for how much I weigh today, and then use my Shapa scale to track progress. At that point, my success criteria will be to step on my Shapa daily receiving a green-to-blue Shapa color, and to record my food intake consistently.
That's just an example of a starting point. I intend to add in an exercise element to the goal too, and then once I have an all-encompassing system built around my current level of health, I can execute minor tweaks to the system to achieve any small gains I might have.
Philanthropy
I feel like I struggled the most with this Life Focus, which has lead to struggling to lay out a solid goal for 2020. This Life Focus also has probably the longest and most ambitious On-The-Horizon Beacon. Therefore, I will keep my 2020 focus simple and easy to help jump-start progress.
In 2020, I want to find one or more non-profit organizations that I can volunteer at semi-regularly throughout the year. The organization and its mission and who or what it serves will not matter. How frequently I volunteer does not matter. My only goal is to find an organization that I feel I could volunteer at for years to come.
(Written 2019.01.05)
1.02.2020
#38 | 2019 Recap
On January 3rd, 2019, I posted my first Boredom is my Goal blog entry. This post will go out on January 2nd, 2020. I felt it was a good time to do a recap of how far things have come. In terms of the blog growth, the Personal Control Book progression, and the progress of my three core Life Focuses on Financial Independence, Health, and Philanthropy.
First up, there is my Boredom is my Goal blog. My content creation was strong. I was able to post a new entry every Thursday of the year, minus a 3-month hiatus when life got too busy. I would have preferred not to have that break, but I'm happy with that outcome nonetheless. In terms of readership, that had some highlights but has been somewhat lackluster. One entry received several hundred views; a few reached a couple of dozen views. One thing I find interesting is that before the hiatus, I had consistent views on each post. After the pause, it's been crickets. That's a bit discouraging, but it feels like it's indicating that content and consistency are kings, even though my takeaway from when I stopped writing is that I should be more comfortable on myself when it came to expectations of having a release schedule. The conflict!
Next up is the development of the Personal Control Book. The progress of the PCB is my surprise story of the year. Creating a PCB wasn't on my radar at all. Still, I ended up completely revamping a system I developed to manage the projects of dozens of engineers and technology professionals and tweaked things for personal use. After many iterations and experimenting on tools, layouts, and structures, I feel like I have boiled things down to something that works, at least for me. I've found that it's provided a lot of focus in my life and has helped me to channel my energies. I also worked with three individuals in setting up their PCBs, two of which finished the exercise, with one of them providing semi-frequent updates on how their progression.
For my life focuses, this is where I felt like I had the most significant wins but also the biggest let downs. Let's start with the least positive and move towards the most exciting.
First up is Philanthropy. By the end of the year, I was hoping to have a quarterly-recurring self-organized donation drive started. I made the first donation but never initiated the second. I felt like the initial round had a ton of lessons learned on how I could have done things better. I was somewhat excited to improve on things, but I tied the donations to having enough cashflow from side projects. Unfortunately, cashflow became tight, so the motivation to donate became minimal. I wasn't interested in external fundraising sources, so that fizzled out. In addition to the donation drive, I also started the year out volunteering monthly at a local food drive. That was going well, but I noticed a disenchanting trend with the other volunteers, so I felt it was best to move on and haven't found an alternative yet.
Overall, I was able to apply more focus on Philanthropy in 2019 than in other recent years, but it felt like excuses were abundant, let downs were frequent, and I didn't achieve as much as I wanted. But it's a good foundation for me to build on in 2020.
Health had a bit more consistent success. I put a lot of attention to diet and healthy lifestyle changes. As a result, my typical consumption averages more on the healthy side with a more substantial assortment of fruits, vegetables, and overall diversity of color on my plate. This lifestyle focus laid the groundwork for managing my weight. I followed some meal plans and purchased a Shapa scale. Exercising was a bit under-performing, but there were hints of launching a consistent workout plan. These things take time, and I'm confident I'll build in a good routine. In terms of relationships, I put a heavy focus on building stability and closeness with each member of the family, and I'm continually re-evaluating where I can do better to see continuous improvements. There have been speedbumps throughout the year. I've found this to be the hardest thing to maintain. Relationships are incredibly dynamic and have to adjust based on the growth of all sides.
A healthy lifestyle seems like it should always be the very top priority, but I love to eat, and laziness always strikes hard, so at the first sign of increased stress and decreased time, a healthy lifestyle tends to suffer first. I was going strong this year until the holiday season started, and a lot of my good habits began to crumble. The good news is that every holiday season is always a struggle to maintain a healthy lifestyle, and the New Year is still a very motivating time to jump back on that bandwagon.
The last focus, Financial Independence, has seen the most progress. I started the year out with a focus on organizing and streamlining my stock market investments. Dealing with financial institutes is a massive pain in the ass. Notaries, mailing in forms, waiting months for some activity, then repeat. But together, my wife and I were able to consolidate and automate this portion of our portfolio. For non-market investments, this year's most substantial investment was a commercial real estate project that we had been discussing for years. This investment adds nicely to our real estate portfolio. We've also started a standalone side hustle of online selling, We're about four months in, but the growth in sales has been very encouraging.
But Financial Independence is not all work and no fun. My main goal for being FI is not to retire early but to be able to have the financial security to spend as much time with my family as possible, especially in the summers when everyone is off from school. During the school year, I've been able to make myself extremely available, attending as many events, and picking up any responsibilities around all three of the kids' schedules. For the summer, I've started the family on the path of getting passports, and I've started all the discussions and planning required to make our (hopefully) first month-long family trip to South America.
At the end of the year, I've done the groundwork for full investing automation. I've run the numbers, and I could consider myself Barista FIREd. I'm ready to start embarking on some extended livecations.
At the end of 2019, I feel like I can look back and feel a sense of accomplishment. My renewed focus is working, and the majority of my life indicators are trending in the desired direction. I'm excited to see what 2020 has in store for myself and my family.
(Written 2019.12.28)
First up, there is my Boredom is my Goal blog. My content creation was strong. I was able to post a new entry every Thursday of the year, minus a 3-month hiatus when life got too busy. I would have preferred not to have that break, but I'm happy with that outcome nonetheless. In terms of readership, that had some highlights but has been somewhat lackluster. One entry received several hundred views; a few reached a couple of dozen views. One thing I find interesting is that before the hiatus, I had consistent views on each post. After the pause, it's been crickets. That's a bit discouraging, but it feels like it's indicating that content and consistency are kings, even though my takeaway from when I stopped writing is that I should be more comfortable on myself when it came to expectations of having a release schedule. The conflict!
Next up is the development of the Personal Control Book. The progress of the PCB is my surprise story of the year. Creating a PCB wasn't on my radar at all. Still, I ended up completely revamping a system I developed to manage the projects of dozens of engineers and technology professionals and tweaked things for personal use. After many iterations and experimenting on tools, layouts, and structures, I feel like I have boiled things down to something that works, at least for me. I've found that it's provided a lot of focus in my life and has helped me to channel my energies. I also worked with three individuals in setting up their PCBs, two of which finished the exercise, with one of them providing semi-frequent updates on how their progression.
For my life focuses, this is where I felt like I had the most significant wins but also the biggest let downs. Let's start with the least positive and move towards the most exciting.
First up is Philanthropy. By the end of the year, I was hoping to have a quarterly-recurring self-organized donation drive started. I made the first donation but never initiated the second. I felt like the initial round had a ton of lessons learned on how I could have done things better. I was somewhat excited to improve on things, but I tied the donations to having enough cashflow from side projects. Unfortunately, cashflow became tight, so the motivation to donate became minimal. I wasn't interested in external fundraising sources, so that fizzled out. In addition to the donation drive, I also started the year out volunteering monthly at a local food drive. That was going well, but I noticed a disenchanting trend with the other volunteers, so I felt it was best to move on and haven't found an alternative yet.
Overall, I was able to apply more focus on Philanthropy in 2019 than in other recent years, but it felt like excuses were abundant, let downs were frequent, and I didn't achieve as much as I wanted. But it's a good foundation for me to build on in 2020.
Health had a bit more consistent success. I put a lot of attention to diet and healthy lifestyle changes. As a result, my typical consumption averages more on the healthy side with a more substantial assortment of fruits, vegetables, and overall diversity of color on my plate. This lifestyle focus laid the groundwork for managing my weight. I followed some meal plans and purchased a Shapa scale. Exercising was a bit under-performing, but there were hints of launching a consistent workout plan. These things take time, and I'm confident I'll build in a good routine. In terms of relationships, I put a heavy focus on building stability and closeness with each member of the family, and I'm continually re-evaluating where I can do better to see continuous improvements. There have been speedbumps throughout the year. I've found this to be the hardest thing to maintain. Relationships are incredibly dynamic and have to adjust based on the growth of all sides.
A healthy lifestyle seems like it should always be the very top priority, but I love to eat, and laziness always strikes hard, so at the first sign of increased stress and decreased time, a healthy lifestyle tends to suffer first. I was going strong this year until the holiday season started, and a lot of my good habits began to crumble. The good news is that every holiday season is always a struggle to maintain a healthy lifestyle, and the New Year is still a very motivating time to jump back on that bandwagon.
The last focus, Financial Independence, has seen the most progress. I started the year out with a focus on organizing and streamlining my stock market investments. Dealing with financial institutes is a massive pain in the ass. Notaries, mailing in forms, waiting months for some activity, then repeat. But together, my wife and I were able to consolidate and automate this portion of our portfolio. For non-market investments, this year's most substantial investment was a commercial real estate project that we had been discussing for years. This investment adds nicely to our real estate portfolio. We've also started a standalone side hustle of online selling, We're about four months in, but the growth in sales has been very encouraging.
But Financial Independence is not all work and no fun. My main goal for being FI is not to retire early but to be able to have the financial security to spend as much time with my family as possible, especially in the summers when everyone is off from school. During the school year, I've been able to make myself extremely available, attending as many events, and picking up any responsibilities around all three of the kids' schedules. For the summer, I've started the family on the path of getting passports, and I've started all the discussions and planning required to make our (hopefully) first month-long family trip to South America.
At the end of the year, I've done the groundwork for full investing automation. I've run the numbers, and I could consider myself Barista FIREd. I'm ready to start embarking on some extended livecations.
At the end of 2019, I feel like I can look back and feel a sense of accomplishment. My renewed focus is working, and the majority of my life indicators are trending in the desired direction. I'm excited to see what 2020 has in store for myself and my family.
(Written 2019.12.28)
12.26.2019
#37 | Minimalism For High Performers
As I continue writing for this blog, I am continually nailing down precisely what the theme of my writing is and the purpose of my philosophy of Boredom. I recently found greater clarity in what it's all about.
I used to tell people it was a combination of minimalizing your life while focusing on productivity, mixed in with some leadership insights. That's a mouthful and is saying everything without being anything. After mentally replaying this mouthful multiple times, I realized the philosophy of Boredom is about minimalism for high performers. Short and simple.
Before creating the blog, I remember talking to a coworker about how overloaded we were with projects and that my focus in life was to be Bored so that I could do more. He laughed, saying that's not how being bored works. My response was, "it is for me." I couldn't vocalize what I meant, but after exploring this blog, I understand what I was saying is that for high performers, that's precisely how it works.
A lot of people might be frequently bored. When they get this way, they might end up doing nothing, thus increasing their boredom. Or worse, they get into trouble or focus on time-wasters. Idle hands are the devil's playground. However, that's not what happens when high performers get bored.
When bored, we go out seeking a new project to do, which is why we get ourselves into burnout trouble so quickly. We're always eager to say yes to a new project. Which is why aiming for Boredom works. It helps us say no to some of these less ideal projects because seeking Boredom is more important than saying yes to one more random project.
But a philosophy of Boredom isn't enough. Once we free up our time from distractions, we must assert project discipline. That's where the Personal Control Book comes into play. The PCB helps channel our focus into what will make the most significant impact on our lives. It's the guard rails that ensure we don't get back into the trap of randomly accepting new projects with no rhyme or reason.
Boredom is my Goal is the philosophy to apply minimalism for high performers. The Personal Control Book is then the system that funnels this newly created available energy into the best possible applications.
(Written 2019.12.07)
I used to tell people it was a combination of minimalizing your life while focusing on productivity, mixed in with some leadership insights. That's a mouthful and is saying everything without being anything. After mentally replaying this mouthful multiple times, I realized the philosophy of Boredom is about minimalism for high performers. Short and simple.
Before creating the blog, I remember talking to a coworker about how overloaded we were with projects and that my focus in life was to be Bored so that I could do more. He laughed, saying that's not how being bored works. My response was, "it is for me." I couldn't vocalize what I meant, but after exploring this blog, I understand what I was saying is that for high performers, that's precisely how it works.
A lot of people might be frequently bored. When they get this way, they might end up doing nothing, thus increasing their boredom. Or worse, they get into trouble or focus on time-wasters. Idle hands are the devil's playground. However, that's not what happens when high performers get bored.
When bored, we go out seeking a new project to do, which is why we get ourselves into burnout trouble so quickly. We're always eager to say yes to a new project. Which is why aiming for Boredom works. It helps us say no to some of these less ideal projects because seeking Boredom is more important than saying yes to one more random project.
But a philosophy of Boredom isn't enough. Once we free up our time from distractions, we must assert project discipline. That's where the Personal Control Book comes into play. The PCB helps channel our focus into what will make the most significant impact on our lives. It's the guard rails that ensure we don't get back into the trap of randomly accepting new projects with no rhyme or reason.
Boredom is my Goal is the philosophy to apply minimalism for high performers. The Personal Control Book is then the system that funnels this newly created available energy into the best possible applications.
(Written 2019.12.07)
12.19.2019
#36 | FU Income
Life had become crazy busy for a while, but it's starting to calm down again. As things calm down, I've been able to evaluate the past few months. One of the insights I've discovered is a deeper understanding of FU Money.
JL Collins didn't coin the term, but he's where I first heard it. Just like his article, linked above, I hadn't known what FU Money was, but once he described it, it made perfect sense. It was something I was aiming for too. Or at least I thought I was.
The more I think about it though, the more I think FU Money itself is kind of bulls--t. Although I thought FU Money was my goal, I've never been able to incorporate it into my financial strategy appropriately. The first issue I have is that retirements accounts have typically been my first avenue of investing. But as the balance of my retirement accounts increased, I never felt like that would be considered part of my FU Money bucket.
If I wanted to say FU to my job and go on a self-funded sabbatical adventure to discover myself, what I want to live off of my would my retirement accounts? Not really. I wouldn't want to cash them out and take the penalty hit for withdrawing from them before retirement. Instead of funding retirement accounts, let's say I funded a non-retirement brokerage account. Would that make a difference? Doubtful. I wouldn't want to sell my wealth-generating assets to cover my monthly expenses. I wouldn't be comfortable missing out on the opportunity cost of not benefiting from compounding interest or returns. The milestone I would have to reach to feel secure is the 4% rule threshold.
But if I waited until I reached the 4% rule threshold, then I would call that retirement money, not FU Money. I imagine FU Money is when you have enough in assets and cash that for any reason, you can quit your job without worrying about the scramble of immediately finding a new income stream. Retirement could be a side effect of this short-notice quitting, but retirement is an all-or-nothing scenario. When you retire, you retire for good. If you come back out of retirement, then that means you drained your investment accounts before you were ready to retire.
Plus, retiring early is extremely hard. There are quite a few people in the FIRE community who have retired early, but to retire in your 20s or 30s usually seems to be a direct result of penny-pinching to the point of depression. Or at least a significantly decreased life satisfaction.
What's the answer then if FU Money seems like a reasonable goal but doesn't' actually fit my model? Figuring that out has inadvertently become my current focus.
Over the past three months, I've been focusing on several different side projects. The first was a commercial real estate project that I had been watching for years, but the time had finally come to execute. This particular project will kick off a healthy but not retirement-worthy monthly cashflow. The second project was starting a side business doing online selling with my wife. This project doesn't produce passive income, yet, but creates an alternative revenue stream. And the goal is to grow the revenue stream enough that we can hire employees and helpers and start working on converting it to either a leveraged income or a completely passive income. The last project(s) was a few individuals in my technology network who reached out to me for freelancing. Freelancing is something that I've always done since college graduation, but I had a year-long drought in projects. The income generated from these projects tends to be very short-lived but usually significant in size than other side-gigs. At this point in my career, I also manage other resources with these gigs and charge a markup for my resources time instead of direct billing for my time. So I consider this leveraged income.
For the past year or so, my focus was on adding to my investment account balances. However, for these projects, the entire focus has been on created alternative income streams. Income streams that pull the monthly burden away from the 9-5 income stream. These income streams started making me think about FU Income. They didn't increase my investment account balances one bit; there has been no impact on my net worth. But yet I still feel more secure now than I did just a few months ago.
So I dug deeper. My net worth is already large enough that I feel like I have preliminary FU Money. But even with that net worth, I'm not interested in cashing out any of my existing portfolios to cover my monthly expenses. So it's FU Money that is untouchable if I want to say FU.
I was trying to sort out all of this, and it finally hit me. I had discovered FU Income. Between these three new income streams, I can cover the majority of our monthly expenses. That means if I quit my job overnight, to be entirely income-to-expense neutral, I could get a minimum wage job and still maintain my current lifestyle without decreasing my assets.
Another angle I started thinking about was the golden egg-laying goose. The moral of that story was to have patience in receiving a golden egg every day. The protagonist loses patience and kills the goose hoping to extract all of the golden eggs hiding inside, only to discover there are no golden eggs inside, thus destroying their future golden egg income. In my opinion, prematurely tapping into your FU Money is equivalent to killing your goose. Except instead of impatience being the motivation, needing to eat the goose for daily sustenance is the motivation. Although it's not a selfish motivation, the outcome is the same. With the purpose of FU Income instead of FU Money, I equate that to pursuing more geese instead of pursuing more golden eggs.
So now, I know what my focus moving forward should be. I have surpassed having FU Money. I must now focus on creating FU Income so that I can genuinely gain the financial independence that I seek.
(Written 2019.12.07)
JL Collins didn't coin the term, but he's where I first heard it. Just like his article, linked above, I hadn't known what FU Money was, but once he described it, it made perfect sense. It was something I was aiming for too. Or at least I thought I was.
The more I think about it though, the more I think FU Money itself is kind of bulls--t. Although I thought FU Money was my goal, I've never been able to incorporate it into my financial strategy appropriately. The first issue I have is that retirements accounts have typically been my first avenue of investing. But as the balance of my retirement accounts increased, I never felt like that would be considered part of my FU Money bucket.
If I wanted to say FU to my job and go on a self-funded sabbatical adventure to discover myself, what I want to live off of my would my retirement accounts? Not really. I wouldn't want to cash them out and take the penalty hit for withdrawing from them before retirement. Instead of funding retirement accounts, let's say I funded a non-retirement brokerage account. Would that make a difference? Doubtful. I wouldn't want to sell my wealth-generating assets to cover my monthly expenses. I wouldn't be comfortable missing out on the opportunity cost of not benefiting from compounding interest or returns. The milestone I would have to reach to feel secure is the 4% rule threshold.
But if I waited until I reached the 4% rule threshold, then I would call that retirement money, not FU Money. I imagine FU Money is when you have enough in assets and cash that for any reason, you can quit your job without worrying about the scramble of immediately finding a new income stream. Retirement could be a side effect of this short-notice quitting, but retirement is an all-or-nothing scenario. When you retire, you retire for good. If you come back out of retirement, then that means you drained your investment accounts before you were ready to retire.
Plus, retiring early is extremely hard. There are quite a few people in the FIRE community who have retired early, but to retire in your 20s or 30s usually seems to be a direct result of penny-pinching to the point of depression. Or at least a significantly decreased life satisfaction.
What's the answer then if FU Money seems like a reasonable goal but doesn't' actually fit my model? Figuring that out has inadvertently become my current focus.
Over the past three months, I've been focusing on several different side projects. The first was a commercial real estate project that I had been watching for years, but the time had finally come to execute. This particular project will kick off a healthy but not retirement-worthy monthly cashflow. The second project was starting a side business doing online selling with my wife. This project doesn't produce passive income, yet, but creates an alternative revenue stream. And the goal is to grow the revenue stream enough that we can hire employees and helpers and start working on converting it to either a leveraged income or a completely passive income. The last project(s) was a few individuals in my technology network who reached out to me for freelancing. Freelancing is something that I've always done since college graduation, but I had a year-long drought in projects. The income generated from these projects tends to be very short-lived but usually significant in size than other side-gigs. At this point in my career, I also manage other resources with these gigs and charge a markup for my resources time instead of direct billing for my time. So I consider this leveraged income.
For the past year or so, my focus was on adding to my investment account balances. However, for these projects, the entire focus has been on created alternative income streams. Income streams that pull the monthly burden away from the 9-5 income stream. These income streams started making me think about FU Income. They didn't increase my investment account balances one bit; there has been no impact on my net worth. But yet I still feel more secure now than I did just a few months ago.
So I dug deeper. My net worth is already large enough that I feel like I have preliminary FU Money. But even with that net worth, I'm not interested in cashing out any of my existing portfolios to cover my monthly expenses. So it's FU Money that is untouchable if I want to say FU.
I was trying to sort out all of this, and it finally hit me. I had discovered FU Income. Between these three new income streams, I can cover the majority of our monthly expenses. That means if I quit my job overnight, to be entirely income-to-expense neutral, I could get a minimum wage job and still maintain my current lifestyle without decreasing my assets.
Another angle I started thinking about was the golden egg-laying goose. The moral of that story was to have patience in receiving a golden egg every day. The protagonist loses patience and kills the goose hoping to extract all of the golden eggs hiding inside, only to discover there are no golden eggs inside, thus destroying their future golden egg income. In my opinion, prematurely tapping into your FU Money is equivalent to killing your goose. Except instead of impatience being the motivation, needing to eat the goose for daily sustenance is the motivation. Although it's not a selfish motivation, the outcome is the same. With the purpose of FU Income instead of FU Money, I equate that to pursuing more geese instead of pursuing more golden eggs.
So now, I know what my focus moving forward should be. I have surpassed having FU Money. I must now focus on creating FU Income so that I can genuinely gain the financial independence that I seek.
(Written 2019.12.07)
12.12.2019
#35 | Heroes & Soldiers
Recently I was talking to someone at work, and we started discussing the topic of heroes and soldiers in regards to performance reviews and who gets recognized. I hadn't heard this metaphor before, but it made perfect sense. I wanted to explore the concept a bit more.
The breakdown is that at work, you have heroes, and you have soldiers. Your heroes are the ones who come in to save the day. If your production system is down, they figure out how to bring it back up. If a customer is angry and demands immediate attention and resolution, the hero calms them down and satisfy their expectations. Whenever things are in trouble, the hero enters. The problem is solved, congratulations emails are sent out, and praise showers start. The celebrations begin.
Soldiers, on the other hand, are the ones in the trenches every day. They keep the world going round. They handle hundreds of customers without letting things escalate to the point of needing a hero. They create feature after feature, with constant in-depth analysis, and deliver every time. Frequently, these folks might not enjoy the spotlight of being a hero. They might even crumble when the spotlight finds them. But they don't need the spotlight to become essential members of the team.
Which then gets around to our conversation topic. How to recognize and reward everyone appropriately? Before my work conversation, I would frequently think about people in terms of being top performers, medium performers, and the occasional short-lived bottom performer. Everybody fit comfortably into these three buckets. But over time, I've noticed that some top performers struggle to get proper rewards. Their stats and KPIs would be consistently at the top of the charts. They always worked on essential tasks and were goto people for their areas. They had all of the indicators that should make them easy to reward, but the best rewards always seem to bypass them.
On the other hand, other top performers seemed to walk into their rewards. Their managers would make little effort and bam -- instant-reward. There always seemed like a disparity in contributions and ease of awards.
That's where the heroes versus soldiers metaphor clicked for me. Being a top performer helped to secure a promotion, but it wasn't the primary factor. The more critical trait is to be a visible hero. Even if you were a hero/soldier shining in the spotlight while digging into the daily trenches, the hero aspect of your output is what justifies the promotion.
Then I started thinking back at my previous jobs and evaluating myself. At my first job out of college, I was a complete soldier. I was the guy who sat in my office toiling away, avoiding any visible spotlight while carrying the burden of workload for the team. Everyone who knew the intricacies of the group realized I was a top performer for the team. No one outside of the group knew what contributions I was making. Because of that, I gained a lot of valuable experience, and it launched me as a professional engineer, but my career growth was very stagnant.
In comparison, I've now come to embrace the spotlight. I still bear down and toil away in the trenches when needed, but I'm also known to be the person who steps into the foreground to save the day when a crisis occurs. I've learned how to play both roles. I'm confident that the hero part of my deliverables has made the difference from my first job. My career growth has reflected this difference in approach.
I find it somewhat discouraging. If I would have known at my first job, maybe I could have done things differently. Even now, as a manager, I might be reaping the benefits, but that's not enough. I tend to hold my team to high expectations leading a lot of them to be top performers, but some are heroes, and some are soldiers, but all, in my opinion, are deserving of recognition.
But at least I've made this realization. With realization comes the ability to plan a countermeasure to this anti-pattern. Once I figure out that countermeasure, I'll be able to be an even better leader and make sure I keep all top performers engaged and happy so that everyone can keep us marching forward towards victory.
Project success isn't won by only the heroes performing great feats of strength, but also by the soldiers putting in the grind and showing up strong every day.
(Written 2019.12.06)
The breakdown is that at work, you have heroes, and you have soldiers. Your heroes are the ones who come in to save the day. If your production system is down, they figure out how to bring it back up. If a customer is angry and demands immediate attention and resolution, the hero calms them down and satisfy their expectations. Whenever things are in trouble, the hero enters. The problem is solved, congratulations emails are sent out, and praise showers start. The celebrations begin.
Soldiers, on the other hand, are the ones in the trenches every day. They keep the world going round. They handle hundreds of customers without letting things escalate to the point of needing a hero. They create feature after feature, with constant in-depth analysis, and deliver every time. Frequently, these folks might not enjoy the spotlight of being a hero. They might even crumble when the spotlight finds them. But they don't need the spotlight to become essential members of the team.
Which then gets around to our conversation topic. How to recognize and reward everyone appropriately? Before my work conversation, I would frequently think about people in terms of being top performers, medium performers, and the occasional short-lived bottom performer. Everybody fit comfortably into these three buckets. But over time, I've noticed that some top performers struggle to get proper rewards. Their stats and KPIs would be consistently at the top of the charts. They always worked on essential tasks and were goto people for their areas. They had all of the indicators that should make them easy to reward, but the best rewards always seem to bypass them.
On the other hand, other top performers seemed to walk into their rewards. Their managers would make little effort and bam -- instant-reward. There always seemed like a disparity in contributions and ease of awards.
That's where the heroes versus soldiers metaphor clicked for me. Being a top performer helped to secure a promotion, but it wasn't the primary factor. The more critical trait is to be a visible hero. Even if you were a hero/soldier shining in the spotlight while digging into the daily trenches, the hero aspect of your output is what justifies the promotion.
Then I started thinking back at my previous jobs and evaluating myself. At my first job out of college, I was a complete soldier. I was the guy who sat in my office toiling away, avoiding any visible spotlight while carrying the burden of workload for the team. Everyone who knew the intricacies of the group realized I was a top performer for the team. No one outside of the group knew what contributions I was making. Because of that, I gained a lot of valuable experience, and it launched me as a professional engineer, but my career growth was very stagnant.
In comparison, I've now come to embrace the spotlight. I still bear down and toil away in the trenches when needed, but I'm also known to be the person who steps into the foreground to save the day when a crisis occurs. I've learned how to play both roles. I'm confident that the hero part of my deliverables has made the difference from my first job. My career growth has reflected this difference in approach.
I find it somewhat discouraging. If I would have known at my first job, maybe I could have done things differently. Even now, as a manager, I might be reaping the benefits, but that's not enough. I tend to hold my team to high expectations leading a lot of them to be top performers, but some are heroes, and some are soldiers, but all, in my opinion, are deserving of recognition.
But at least I've made this realization. With realization comes the ability to plan a countermeasure to this anti-pattern. Once I figure out that countermeasure, I'll be able to be an even better leader and make sure I keep all top performers engaged and happy so that everyone can keep us marching forward towards victory.
Project success isn't won by only the heroes performing great feats of strength, but also by the soldiers putting in the grind and showing up strong every day.
(Written 2019.12.06)
12.05.2019
#34 | Why I Side Hustle
I started talking about this in a different article but then realized that the content was diverging from the article's intended topic. So here we are, a followup post.
Ever since I graduated from college, I've been a hustler. There has never been a time when I did not have a stable and well-paying job, and I jump around companies very infrequently. I've worked at three companies over 16 years in the tech industry, which is almost unheard of these days. A lot of my tech peers jump to a new company every two to three years.
Why do I side hustle? I've had a lot of friends, coworkers, and acquaintances make comments or give me looks asking this very question. Like most things in life, there is no single response.
Probably the most significant impact my side hustles have done is to expand my skill set. At every job, there is a lane we are expected to stay in — some list of responsibilities and tasks we are supposed to perform for our given role. If someone wants a promotion, they might look at the position above theirs and start executing against that list of responsibilities and tasks. But everything is very narrow. Seldom have I seen an environment where you are encouraged to do everything and anything possible. Engineers should engineer; support should handle customer interactions; sales should sell the product, etc. Expanding it further, people working in technology don't have any reason to deal in real estate, to perform market analysis for the food industry, or any number of non-technology related situations.
When I freelance in technology, I'm able to perform every job task, wear every hat. For example, I've learned quite a few skills that now make me better than a lot of product managers, even though I've never held a product manager title. The same goes for support, customer relations, or project management. When I resell online, I'm able to branch out of my industry and start thinking about things like small scale supply chain, procurement, inventory management, distribution, popular trends, and marketing.
Instead of becoming narrowly-focused on my one role within my day job, I'm able to become a well-rounded individual.
Another benefit of the side-hustle is the network that you create. Some people go to meetups, some to conferences and conventions. Some people try to work with every outside vendor or client. Those are all fine, but to me are a bit shallow from a professional sense. When I network professionally, I want to know how well someone can perform in completing their assignment, and I want to showcase my ability to execute. What better way to do that then to have real projects working with real deadlines. Even if it's an internal project like my online reselling where I don't have a client or a contract, it's still applicable. If I meet someone who sells on the same platform as I do, I can pitch a collaboration to test their abilities and follow through. If I need some help with SEO, I can reach out to professionals for advice.
By having real projects to work on, my networking is more accurate to life and all-encompassing to any facet of a professional need.
And the last benefit is financial, which is also the least important to me. Typically side hustle income goes into one of two categories. The first category is fun-money. This category is usually the case if I earn only a few hundred dollars. That can pay for a few nice dinners or a couple of months of Starbucks. Or maybe a treat for my wife or kids. It can even be something bigger like a laptop or iPad that will dual-purpose in both professional and personal or combined to help pay for a vacation. The second category is investment money. This category comes into play when the income generated reaches thousands of dollars. I love it when I can max out my IRA contributions from side-hustle pay; it feels like my "after 5" work is going towards my long term goals. It's even more exciting if I can generate enough side-hustle money to fund a more substantial investment.
When I can funnel my side-hustle money into an investment, I'm directly converting my limited time into cash, then into passive income. When the passive income is large enough, it allows me to buy back my freedom. I'm not just trading time for consumer goods or experiences but instead trading time today for freedom tomorrow. This exchange is a balancing act because tomorrow may never come, so you don't want to exchange too much time. But the entire purpose is to Financial Independence is to gain freedom, so being able to act directly against that goal is motivating.
Some people may think I'm crazy, or I juggle too many projects when I don't need to because of my day job. But I see these side hustles as a way to expand my skill set, expand my network, and to help buy my freedom.
(Written 2019.10.23)
Ever since I graduated from college, I've been a hustler. There has never been a time when I did not have a stable and well-paying job, and I jump around companies very infrequently. I've worked at three companies over 16 years in the tech industry, which is almost unheard of these days. A lot of my tech peers jump to a new company every two to three years.
Why do I side hustle? I've had a lot of friends, coworkers, and acquaintances make comments or give me looks asking this very question. Like most things in life, there is no single response.
Probably the most significant impact my side hustles have done is to expand my skill set. At every job, there is a lane we are expected to stay in — some list of responsibilities and tasks we are supposed to perform for our given role. If someone wants a promotion, they might look at the position above theirs and start executing against that list of responsibilities and tasks. But everything is very narrow. Seldom have I seen an environment where you are encouraged to do everything and anything possible. Engineers should engineer; support should handle customer interactions; sales should sell the product, etc. Expanding it further, people working in technology don't have any reason to deal in real estate, to perform market analysis for the food industry, or any number of non-technology related situations.
When I freelance in technology, I'm able to perform every job task, wear every hat. For example, I've learned quite a few skills that now make me better than a lot of product managers, even though I've never held a product manager title. The same goes for support, customer relations, or project management. When I resell online, I'm able to branch out of my industry and start thinking about things like small scale supply chain, procurement, inventory management, distribution, popular trends, and marketing.
Instead of becoming narrowly-focused on my one role within my day job, I'm able to become a well-rounded individual.
Another benefit of the side-hustle is the network that you create. Some people go to meetups, some to conferences and conventions. Some people try to work with every outside vendor or client. Those are all fine, but to me are a bit shallow from a professional sense. When I network professionally, I want to know how well someone can perform in completing their assignment, and I want to showcase my ability to execute. What better way to do that then to have real projects working with real deadlines. Even if it's an internal project like my online reselling where I don't have a client or a contract, it's still applicable. If I meet someone who sells on the same platform as I do, I can pitch a collaboration to test their abilities and follow through. If I need some help with SEO, I can reach out to professionals for advice.
By having real projects to work on, my networking is more accurate to life and all-encompassing to any facet of a professional need.
And the last benefit is financial, which is also the least important to me. Typically side hustle income goes into one of two categories. The first category is fun-money. This category is usually the case if I earn only a few hundred dollars. That can pay for a few nice dinners or a couple of months of Starbucks. Or maybe a treat for my wife or kids. It can even be something bigger like a laptop or iPad that will dual-purpose in both professional and personal or combined to help pay for a vacation. The second category is investment money. This category comes into play when the income generated reaches thousands of dollars. I love it when I can max out my IRA contributions from side-hustle pay; it feels like my "after 5" work is going towards my long term goals. It's even more exciting if I can generate enough side-hustle money to fund a more substantial investment.
When I can funnel my side-hustle money into an investment, I'm directly converting my limited time into cash, then into passive income. When the passive income is large enough, it allows me to buy back my freedom. I'm not just trading time for consumer goods or experiences but instead trading time today for freedom tomorrow. This exchange is a balancing act because tomorrow may never come, so you don't want to exchange too much time. But the entire purpose is to Financial Independence is to gain freedom, so being able to act directly against that goal is motivating.
Some people may think I'm crazy, or I juggle too many projects when I don't need to because of my day job. But I see these side hustles as a way to expand my skill set, expand my network, and to help buy my freedom.
(Written 2019.10.23)
11.28.2019
#33 | Go With The Flow
I've been obsessing about my release schedule recently.
I spent six months pre-writing my blog posts, sometimes having up to a month worth of posts written and scheduled. I had a rigid schedule of releasing a new post every Thursday. I like this schedule because it is a way to give the reader something on a relaxing Friday before starting their weekend.
I always had the intention that if I missed a Thursday, that would be fine. But I knew that wasn't true. I'm the kind of person that once I miss once, the drive will fade enough that I'll lose my momentum. Next thing I know, three months go by and nothing. I need the schedule to stay motivated; any will do.
When I picked up writing again, I considered a weekly release rate was burnt-out levels of output. I thought once a month would be better. That seems very doable. If I write a single post once a month, that would be easy. Sounds good!
Then I started thinking about the yearly article count. When releasing weekly, I would have 52 posts. That's a good number. When releasing monthly, that's only 12 posts. Sometimes I can write a dozen articles in a couple of weeks, so spreading the release of those out over a full year didn't fit.
My thoughts next went to a variable schedule. Something where if I have one or two posts queued up, I post monthly. If I have three to six posts queued up, I release every other week. And then if I have over six posts queued up, I would go back to weekly. That way, if I became inspired, I could release weekly and fade to monthly over time. It sounded genius.
Or not. I was getting my headache. This internal debate is how my brain works. I started spending more thought on HOW I would release my posts than WHAT would be in them (hence me taking an entire post on this topic). I'm going to try my hardest to let the obsession go and adhere to my original schedule: release on Thursday anytime I have something written AND to not fall off the wagon again for three months if I miss a week.
Forget the schedule. Just let the thoughts flow! Sometimes you just must let it go and see where things take you.
(Written 2019.10.19)
I spent six months pre-writing my blog posts, sometimes having up to a month worth of posts written and scheduled. I had a rigid schedule of releasing a new post every Thursday. I like this schedule because it is a way to give the reader something on a relaxing Friday before starting their weekend.
I always had the intention that if I missed a Thursday, that would be fine. But I knew that wasn't true. I'm the kind of person that once I miss once, the drive will fade enough that I'll lose my momentum. Next thing I know, three months go by and nothing. I need the schedule to stay motivated; any will do.
When I picked up writing again, I considered a weekly release rate was burnt-out levels of output. I thought once a month would be better. That seems very doable. If I write a single post once a month, that would be easy. Sounds good!
Then I started thinking about the yearly article count. When releasing weekly, I would have 52 posts. That's a good number. When releasing monthly, that's only 12 posts. Sometimes I can write a dozen articles in a couple of weeks, so spreading the release of those out over a full year didn't fit.
My thoughts next went to a variable schedule. Something where if I have one or two posts queued up, I post monthly. If I have three to six posts queued up, I release every other week. And then if I have over six posts queued up, I would go back to weekly. That way, if I became inspired, I could release weekly and fade to monthly over time. It sounded genius.
Or not. I was getting my headache. This internal debate is how my brain works. I started spending more thought on HOW I would release my posts than WHAT would be in them (hence me taking an entire post on this topic). I'm going to try my hardest to let the obsession go and adhere to my original schedule: release on Thursday anytime I have something written AND to not fall off the wagon again for three months if I miss a week.
Forget the schedule. Just let the thoughts flow! Sometimes you just must let it go and see where things take you.
(Written 2019.10.19)
11.21.2019
#32 | The Loss Of Focus
In the last post, I talked about my busy period and how it related to the philosophy of Boredom. This time I wanted to talk about how it impacted my Personal Control Book.
I've talked about how I organize my PCB. The guts of the PCB are within Trello. Life Focuses, Beacons, Areas of Focuses, and Projects are all kept within the Trello boards and cards. Then for my weekly updates, I keep them on a private Confluence page.
It's all very well set up, organized, and executed; until it's not.
I can admit that for a few months, I didn't touch Trello. I neglected all of those Projects with nicely laid out tasks. As new projects came in, I didn't consult Trello to see how they fit into my Life Focuses. I stopped all activity within Trello and stopped logging in. I still kept up my weekly updates, but Trello didn't exist to me.
This lapse is okay. I didn't abandon Trello or the PCB, and I still recommend them. I'm again using them today.
Overhead explains the lapse. Any system is overhead, even useful ones. Maintaining the system is energy that seldom is spent directly on whatever project you're trying to complete. So it needs to be viewed this way.
Let's imagine that your system is your car. To keep things running smoothly, you must maintain it. It needs oil changes, tuneups, and washes. Changing your oil does not get you to your destination faster. But not giving your car a tuneup will eventually cause you to be stranded away from your destination.
But life is not perfect, and we only have so many hours in the day. When we hit our most intense time crunches, that overhead involved in maintaining the system becomes a hindrance. If you need to get to your destination in an hour and it's an hour's drive away, you don't have time to take the car in for a tuneup. The tuneup can wait.
What I did was I kept the focus on the weekly updates, only because they helped me navigate my tasks and help prevent any from falling between the cracks. I shelved the rest of the PCB until I could breathe again.
As I'm writing this, I'm in the recovery phase. I've managed to include all new projects into my Weekly Update. Only about half of those have a Trello board, but any new projects will get one. I updated the boards that already existed. I even enhanced my Weekly Update now that I got to see how it performed under high stress.
I think it's critical that even when we get buried with life and start to feel like we're losing focus, we are prepared. It might seem chaotic, but we have the system. If we properly maintain our system before hitting chaos, it'll provide its value and serve its purpose during that chaos. It might start to break down, but a sound system will hold through until the turmoil dies down, and you can start maintaining it again.
(Written 2019.10.19)
I've talked about how I organize my PCB. The guts of the PCB are within Trello. Life Focuses, Beacons, Areas of Focuses, and Projects are all kept within the Trello boards and cards. Then for my weekly updates, I keep them on a private Confluence page.
It's all very well set up, organized, and executed; until it's not.
I can admit that for a few months, I didn't touch Trello. I neglected all of those Projects with nicely laid out tasks. As new projects came in, I didn't consult Trello to see how they fit into my Life Focuses. I stopped all activity within Trello and stopped logging in. I still kept up my weekly updates, but Trello didn't exist to me.
This lapse is okay. I didn't abandon Trello or the PCB, and I still recommend them. I'm again using them today.
Overhead explains the lapse. Any system is overhead, even useful ones. Maintaining the system is energy that seldom is spent directly on whatever project you're trying to complete. So it needs to be viewed this way.
Let's imagine that your system is your car. To keep things running smoothly, you must maintain it. It needs oil changes, tuneups, and washes. Changing your oil does not get you to your destination faster. But not giving your car a tuneup will eventually cause you to be stranded away from your destination.
But life is not perfect, and we only have so many hours in the day. When we hit our most intense time crunches, that overhead involved in maintaining the system becomes a hindrance. If you need to get to your destination in an hour and it's an hour's drive away, you don't have time to take the car in for a tuneup. The tuneup can wait.
What I did was I kept the focus on the weekly updates, only because they helped me navigate my tasks and help prevent any from falling between the cracks. I shelved the rest of the PCB until I could breathe again.
As I'm writing this, I'm in the recovery phase. I've managed to include all new projects into my Weekly Update. Only about half of those have a Trello board, but any new projects will get one. I updated the boards that already existed. I even enhanced my Weekly Update now that I got to see how it performed under high stress.
I think it's critical that even when we get buried with life and start to feel like we're losing focus, we are prepared. It might seem chaotic, but we have the system. If we properly maintain our system before hitting chaos, it'll provide its value and serve its purpose during that chaos. It might start to break down, but a sound system will hold through until the turmoil dies down, and you can start maintaining it again.
(Written 2019.10.19)
11.14.2019
#31 | When Life Happens
Recently my life has been seeing a flurry of projects. My life has been anything but Boring. I wanted to address that in direct correlation with my Boredom is my Goal philosophy.
Before this current explosion of activity, my life was getting pretty Boring. I had three ongoing projects according to my Personal Control Book, but making progress against those goals was not all-consuming. I was spending a significant amount of time every night reading graphic novels. I was staying on top of all household chores, and the house was impeccably clean and tidy. I was going to bed early every night and naturally early every morning.
It was amazing.
And then an opportunity blitz hit. I haven't touched a graphic novel in a long time, and a couple of new ones are piling up waiting for their turn to be consumed. I'm going to bed late, waking by my alarm, and sometimes slogging through my morning routine to get the day rolling. The house feels cluttered and chaotic and frequently doesn't get the much-needed attention it deserves until the weekend.
"But I thought your goal was to be Bored! Why would you take on these projects instead of saying 'NO'!"
That is a direct paraphrased quote.
It might appear that I lost my way, but I don't see it that way. Instead, I see things as life happening. Each opportunity that I said "yes" to somehow fit into my Life Focuses as defined by my PCB. They might have been all different, with different actions required, and different outcomes. But, with the help of my PCB, I could quickly evaluate each opportunity and figure out if they fit or not. If it didn't, I could reject it. And some things I did decline. If it did match my PCB, and that opportunity needed immediate action, I could accept it with confidence.
So I was prepared for the chaos. It was an organized and managed chaos.
It goes beyond that, though. Throughout the entire experience, my focus was always on figuring out how to make things Boring again. I keep my graphic novels in eyesight, teasing me to get back to them. I have held my morning alarm at the same time, to prevent myself from falling too far out of my routine. These actions, among others, have helped to make sure I defined a realistic scope for each project and pushed hard to close the project out as soon as possible. It helped motivate me to reevaluate a plan so that once immediate action was no longer needed, I could shelf it. It kept me sane, knowing that this wasn't my new norm and that every week, my goal was to close out more tasks than open new ones. I knew that as long as I kept my Boredom is my Goal philosophy close to my heart, this insanity was just temporary.
We can't control life, nor can we control what is presented to us: opportunities or otherwise. We can't control other people or the unfolding of events. We can't control time and magically create more. But we can control ourselves and how we react to the world. So when life happens, if you've mentally and philosophically prepared yourself, you can roll with it, embrace it, and thrive with it.
When life happens, go with the flow!
(Written 2019.10.19)
Before this current explosion of activity, my life was getting pretty Boring. I had three ongoing projects according to my Personal Control Book, but making progress against those goals was not all-consuming. I was spending a significant amount of time every night reading graphic novels. I was staying on top of all household chores, and the house was impeccably clean and tidy. I was going to bed early every night and naturally early every morning.
It was amazing.
And then an opportunity blitz hit. I haven't touched a graphic novel in a long time, and a couple of new ones are piling up waiting for their turn to be consumed. I'm going to bed late, waking by my alarm, and sometimes slogging through my morning routine to get the day rolling. The house feels cluttered and chaotic and frequently doesn't get the much-needed attention it deserves until the weekend.
"But I thought your goal was to be Bored! Why would you take on these projects instead of saying 'NO'!"
That is a direct paraphrased quote.
It might appear that I lost my way, but I don't see it that way. Instead, I see things as life happening. Each opportunity that I said "yes" to somehow fit into my Life Focuses as defined by my PCB. They might have been all different, with different actions required, and different outcomes. But, with the help of my PCB, I could quickly evaluate each opportunity and figure out if they fit or not. If it didn't, I could reject it. And some things I did decline. If it did match my PCB, and that opportunity needed immediate action, I could accept it with confidence.
So I was prepared for the chaos. It was an organized and managed chaos.
It goes beyond that, though. Throughout the entire experience, my focus was always on figuring out how to make things Boring again. I keep my graphic novels in eyesight, teasing me to get back to them. I have held my morning alarm at the same time, to prevent myself from falling too far out of my routine. These actions, among others, have helped to make sure I defined a realistic scope for each project and pushed hard to close the project out as soon as possible. It helped motivate me to reevaluate a plan so that once immediate action was no longer needed, I could shelf it. It kept me sane, knowing that this wasn't my new norm and that every week, my goal was to close out more tasks than open new ones. I knew that as long as I kept my Boredom is my Goal philosophy close to my heart, this insanity was just temporary.
We can't control life, nor can we control what is presented to us: opportunities or otherwise. We can't control other people or the unfolding of events. We can't control time and magically create more. But we can control ourselves and how we react to the world. So when life happens, if you've mentally and philosophically prepared yourself, you can roll with it, embrace it, and thrive with it.
When life happens, go with the flow!
(Written 2019.10.19)
11.07.2019
#30 | The Company We Keep
This topic isn't very original, but it's something that I started thinking about recently. It's essential to think about the people surrounding you.
The reason why I've started thinking about this is a trifecta of scenarios.
The first is one of the reasons why I ended up taking a 3-month hiatus from the blog. Some real estate opportunities presented themselves, and it was a chance to put some foundational components into my Financial Independence life goal. The opportunity involved engaging in a part of real estate investing I hadn't done before, so the process was very new and intensive. I can't recall how many times I was talking to someone more experienced would say: "When you did due diligence on XYZ, what did you find out?". And I would scramble to not sound like a complete newbie with a stalling response like "That's a good question, let me check with my wife to see what she's found out." Even though we were scouring the internet for advice, there was still much more to know, and we were consistently a few steps behind.
In our defense, most of our contacts knew we hadn't done a project like this before. We were typically upfront with it on the first introductions. But it was still not the most flattering place to find ourselves time and time again. Sometimes my wife or I would start to get self-conscious, but I would remind us that everyone starts at the beginning. Everyone knows that, and so it was vital for us to always present the most professional and capable versions of ourselves in these situations. Every person we talked to was a future long-term contact. I wanted them to view us as new but reliable up-comers, someone they would want to know for our potential. On the flip side, we wanted to recognize them for their experience and guidance. Within this particular investment and throughout the entire process, we wanted to surround ourselves with competent people, while proving that we were worthy of joining that network. Having that network will be invaluable for future endeavors.
The second scenario is the FI meetups I had mentioned a few posts back. At the time of writing this post, we have only gone to two of their monthly meetups, but I already feel good about the company we can keep there. Everyone is at a different stage in their FI journey. Some just heard about financial independence and are working on converting the management of their finances. Some have already retired early. And then the majority seem like they are like us, somewhere in the middle.
While going to these meetups, I've found a good portion of the conversation does not revolve around finances, investing, or anything directly related to FI. But that does not matter as I don't feel that's the purpose of the meetups. Instead, we can surround ourselves once a month with people who understand this niche mentality. They understand the financial motivation of skipping the fries and drink to save a few bucks. They appreciate finding free or cheap entertainment instead of looking for pay-to-entertain activities. Even when talking about our side hustles, they understand the motivation. I've hinted at some of my other friends about our side hustles, and I get the impression they feel we are crazy. The people at the FI meetups understand the potential in a side hustle. Those are the people I want to surround myself with, people who encourage me to achieve my highest potential instead of feeling crazy for trying to maximize my accomplishments.
And the last scenario is my Personal Control Book "coaching" (if it can be called that just yet). Essentially, helping people to perform their own PCB Setup.
Besides the motivation to continue developing this PCB concept, I'm finding a new group of people worthy of knowing. People who, although they may be at different phases, just like the FI-folks, have a desire to be more focused and productive in their lives. People who want to set goals and accomplish them. People that feel there is a lot to do in life and want to make something worthwhile. This coaching concept is very new, but it's exhilarating to start embarking on this journey. The real estate network is solely an investment group. The FI meetups involve joining an existing community. PCB coaching is a chance for me to help build a community of like-minded individuals. The honor of helping to bring together what I hope will be a fantastic group of people is very humbling.
Although I love meeting new people and I'm friends with individuals from at all different points in their lives and different cultures, ideologies, and mentalities, making sure we keep close the right company is an invaluable action.
(Written 2019.10.19)
The reason why I've started thinking about this is a trifecta of scenarios.
The first is one of the reasons why I ended up taking a 3-month hiatus from the blog. Some real estate opportunities presented themselves, and it was a chance to put some foundational components into my Financial Independence life goal. The opportunity involved engaging in a part of real estate investing I hadn't done before, so the process was very new and intensive. I can't recall how many times I was talking to someone more experienced would say: "When you did due diligence on XYZ, what did you find out?". And I would scramble to not sound like a complete newbie with a stalling response like "That's a good question, let me check with my wife to see what she's found out." Even though we were scouring the internet for advice, there was still much more to know, and we were consistently a few steps behind.
In our defense, most of our contacts knew we hadn't done a project like this before. We were typically upfront with it on the first introductions. But it was still not the most flattering place to find ourselves time and time again. Sometimes my wife or I would start to get self-conscious, but I would remind us that everyone starts at the beginning. Everyone knows that, and so it was vital for us to always present the most professional and capable versions of ourselves in these situations. Every person we talked to was a future long-term contact. I wanted them to view us as new but reliable up-comers, someone they would want to know for our potential. On the flip side, we wanted to recognize them for their experience and guidance. Within this particular investment and throughout the entire process, we wanted to surround ourselves with competent people, while proving that we were worthy of joining that network. Having that network will be invaluable for future endeavors.
The second scenario is the FI meetups I had mentioned a few posts back. At the time of writing this post, we have only gone to two of their monthly meetups, but I already feel good about the company we can keep there. Everyone is at a different stage in their FI journey. Some just heard about financial independence and are working on converting the management of their finances. Some have already retired early. And then the majority seem like they are like us, somewhere in the middle.
While going to these meetups, I've found a good portion of the conversation does not revolve around finances, investing, or anything directly related to FI. But that does not matter as I don't feel that's the purpose of the meetups. Instead, we can surround ourselves once a month with people who understand this niche mentality. They understand the financial motivation of skipping the fries and drink to save a few bucks. They appreciate finding free or cheap entertainment instead of looking for pay-to-entertain activities. Even when talking about our side hustles, they understand the motivation. I've hinted at some of my other friends about our side hustles, and I get the impression they feel we are crazy. The people at the FI meetups understand the potential in a side hustle. Those are the people I want to surround myself with, people who encourage me to achieve my highest potential instead of feeling crazy for trying to maximize my accomplishments.
And the last scenario is my Personal Control Book "coaching" (if it can be called that just yet). Essentially, helping people to perform their own PCB Setup.
Besides the motivation to continue developing this PCB concept, I'm finding a new group of people worthy of knowing. People who, although they may be at different phases, just like the FI-folks, have a desire to be more focused and productive in their lives. People who want to set goals and accomplish them. People that feel there is a lot to do in life and want to make something worthwhile. This coaching concept is very new, but it's exhilarating to start embarking on this journey. The real estate network is solely an investment group. The FI meetups involve joining an existing community. PCB coaching is a chance for me to help build a community of like-minded individuals. The honor of helping to bring together what I hope will be a fantastic group of people is very humbling.
Although I love meeting new people and I'm friends with individuals from at all different points in their lives and different cultures, ideologies, and mentalities, making sure we keep close the right company is an invaluable action.
(Written 2019.10.19)
10.31.2019
#29 | Why 3 Life Focuses?
I wanted to talk today about why I pick three life focuses. I feel this is especially important because when I started this journey, one of my original inspirations had seven focuses.
That inspiration was a Merril Lynch life planner. My wife and I went through this life planner, and although it tries to be great, it's a bit overwhelming. It took us forever to go through all seven categories. Especially because each of the seven categories then wants you to have two goals. That means you end up with 14 life goals. To me, that's just insane. How can you apply focus when there are 14 things on your plate?
My wife and I pushed through the process and started prioritizing these 14 goals. We could only prioritize five goals before we started having arguments between what the next priorities would be. It was ridiculous. From my years of dealing with product managers trying to prioritize feature development, it's obvious anything above a certain threshold is pointless. If it's not something you can start working on immediately, it's priority will change by the time you get to it.
As a couple, if we can only work on a few priorities at once and trying to prioritize everything beyond that top group becomes pointless, why even try to prioritize everything? So the first thing I wanted to do when I was developing my Personal Control Book was to define better these life goals (called Life Focuses within the PCB) and goals (called Beacons within the PCB). During this redefining is when I determined three was the ideal number.
One might ask, why not just have one? Then you could focus entirely on something. This concentrated focus is what I feel a lot of the FIRE community does. The subreddit is bursting with people who put FI as their top and only priority and end up negatively impacting other parts of their lives. There is no life balance.
It makes sense if you think about it. If you become a workaholic, you will never see your family. You will eat unhealthy because it's convenient, and you will never make time for exercise. Eventually, your family life will fall apart, and your health will diminish. If you become an obsessed gym rat, you won't give your career the energy it needs to flourish, and again your home life will become heavily neglected. And if you spend all of your energy building relationships with your family, then unless they are part of your fitness and career, your performance at work will suffer, and you'll never take time to take care of yourself.
Three Life Focuses don't have the downside of either having a single Life Focus or seven Life Focuses. It keeps you well rounded, yet not so well rounded that you can't make progress on anything. It's in the Goldie Locks zone.
And just because some things are not part of my three Life Focuses doesn't mean I neglect them entirely. For example, if my three Life Focuses are family, career, and health. Friendships are not directly part of that trio, but healthy friendships might be necessary to health and so are indirectly included. That's why I don't have the family as part of my Life Focuses within my PCB, because to me, having a strong relationship with everyone in my family is a critical part of health. When I focus on health, typically, things related to building stronger familial relationships is top and center.
By having three Life Focuses leading to three On-The-Horizon Beacons, it lets you focus on what you feel is most critical while ensuring you still become a well-rounded individual.
(Written 2019.06.27)
That inspiration was a Merril Lynch life planner. My wife and I went through this life planner, and although it tries to be great, it's a bit overwhelming. It took us forever to go through all seven categories. Especially because each of the seven categories then wants you to have two goals. That means you end up with 14 life goals. To me, that's just insane. How can you apply focus when there are 14 things on your plate?
My wife and I pushed through the process and started prioritizing these 14 goals. We could only prioritize five goals before we started having arguments between what the next priorities would be. It was ridiculous. From my years of dealing with product managers trying to prioritize feature development, it's obvious anything above a certain threshold is pointless. If it's not something you can start working on immediately, it's priority will change by the time you get to it.
As a couple, if we can only work on a few priorities at once and trying to prioritize everything beyond that top group becomes pointless, why even try to prioritize everything? So the first thing I wanted to do when I was developing my Personal Control Book was to define better these life goals (called Life Focuses within the PCB) and goals (called Beacons within the PCB). During this redefining is when I determined three was the ideal number.
One might ask, why not just have one? Then you could focus entirely on something. This concentrated focus is what I feel a lot of the FIRE community does. The subreddit is bursting with people who put FI as their top and only priority and end up negatively impacting other parts of their lives. There is no life balance.
It makes sense if you think about it. If you become a workaholic, you will never see your family. You will eat unhealthy because it's convenient, and you will never make time for exercise. Eventually, your family life will fall apart, and your health will diminish. If you become an obsessed gym rat, you won't give your career the energy it needs to flourish, and again your home life will become heavily neglected. And if you spend all of your energy building relationships with your family, then unless they are part of your fitness and career, your performance at work will suffer, and you'll never take time to take care of yourself.
Three Life Focuses don't have the downside of either having a single Life Focus or seven Life Focuses. It keeps you well rounded, yet not so well rounded that you can't make progress on anything. It's in the Goldie Locks zone.
And just because some things are not part of my three Life Focuses doesn't mean I neglect them entirely. For example, if my three Life Focuses are family, career, and health. Friendships are not directly part of that trio, but healthy friendships might be necessary to health and so are indirectly included. That's why I don't have the family as part of my Life Focuses within my PCB, because to me, having a strong relationship with everyone in my family is a critical part of health. When I focus on health, typically, things related to building stronger familial relationships is top and center.
By having three Life Focuses leading to three On-The-Horizon Beacons, it lets you focus on what you feel is most critical while ensuring you still become a well-rounded individual.
(Written 2019.06.27)
10.24.2019
#28 | Career vs Job
I frequently tell my colleagues that their career is not their job. My intended purpose of voicing this opinion is to bring focus on the bigger picture of their career instead of the smaller front-and-center "distraction" that is their job. Recently I repeated this to someone but with a tweak.
I realized the concept was more profound and pointed out how some people risk their careers for the sake of their job, while others risk their job for the sake of their careers. As soon as I said that phrase, I wanted to delve deeper into that meaning. It felt like a light went off. So here we are.
This talking point stemmed from discussing how drawn out it was to get anything done in our environment. The politics, bureaucracy, stay-in-your-lane mentality, and non-productive anti-pattern roadblocks cause every task to take substantially longer than it should. Minute-long tasks could take days. Day-long tasks could take a month. Every step required making requests from other people, then you wait. You finally really receive a response, but find out your request was wrong. So you must make a new one, and then you wait. You finally receive approval to proceed, but you are required to talk to someone else to execute the task. So you create a new request, but that request is low on their priority list, and then you wait.
This cycle goes on, and then suddenly, you're 20 years into your career but feel like you only have a few years of experience. No matter how much you try to make that wait time more productive, you really can't. If you follow the rules, you're gated waiting. The sad part is, you might not even realize that two decades into your career has only produced two years of real experience because all of your peers have done the same thing. It feels normal. The reality is that everyone's years of experience has been watered down to be almost meaningless.
This situation is where I feel people risk their careers for the sake of their job. They played it safe. They followed the rules. They didn't step on any toes, crossed all their "t"s, and dotted all of their "i"s. They asked before acting and never did anything which would get them, their team, or their project in trouble. They never failed, but they also never really succeeded. Their job stayed happy, but their career stalled.
And then one day their company gets tired of them. That's a given in today's corporate landscape. What happens then? Panic is what happens. Because even though they might have two decades of being a warm body in a field, when they interview at another job, their experience level seems junior in comparison to what it should be. It's hard to find another job who will see value in them at the same level as their old job.
I saw this frequently happen at my first job out of college. It terrified me and even depressed me watching that happen to some of my more "experienced" peers. I see it happening to some of my coworkers now, and I fear for them. Their careers are at risk because they put their job first.
I try to do the opposite and put my career first. Straight out of college, I would freelance and do side projects even though most day jobs discourage extracurricular activities. Even within my day job, I'm respectful of job roles and responsibilities, but I center my focus around getting the project done regardless of whose lane I have to enter. One of my mottos is to let someone do their job first, but if they don't do it, then don't be afraid to step on their toes and get it done.
I've spent a lot of time risking my job to make sure my career was good. And that has given me confidence.
If I ever push boundaries too far, what's the worst that would happen? I would get fired. I've been in the field for a decade and a half, but between my mentality, my constant pushing, and my side projects, I have the equivalent of several decades worth of experience. I'm not worried about finding a replacement job.
But would my job fire me? It's possible; I might eventually cross a line. Sometimes I push too hard, and the anxiety hits me. But I have confidence that line is farther away than I'm willing to go. Plus, I provide value to my company. If I can get a "30-day" task done in a few days, that's invaluable. And Because I promote an influential positive culture among my peers and employees, and because I'm very respectful and compliment those around me that are skilled, I've built a social buffer. My teammates speak well of me. My managers praise me. And my (competent) colleagues support me. There is always a line, and there is still an ending, but I've built the proper offenses and defenses to help ensure that I'm secure.
By putting my career first at the risk of jeopardizing my job, I've created a win/win/win/win situation. My company wins by receiving more value; My coworkers win by having a champion to promote a competitive but collaborative culture. My job wins by creating a list of accomplishments and building a social buffer; My career wins in case my job ever gets tired of me, and I need to scramble to replace it.
It's not enough to say that your career is not your job. It is also essential to understand that those individuals who risk their careers to secure their jobs end up at a disadvantage in the long run, while those who risk their jobs to secure their careers tend to benefit all parties involved in the long term.
(Written 2019.10.05)
I realized the concept was more profound and pointed out how some people risk their careers for the sake of their job, while others risk their job for the sake of their careers. As soon as I said that phrase, I wanted to delve deeper into that meaning. It felt like a light went off. So here we are.
This talking point stemmed from discussing how drawn out it was to get anything done in our environment. The politics, bureaucracy, stay-in-your-lane mentality, and non-productive anti-pattern roadblocks cause every task to take substantially longer than it should. Minute-long tasks could take days. Day-long tasks could take a month. Every step required making requests from other people, then you wait. You finally really receive a response, but find out your request was wrong. So you must make a new one, and then you wait. You finally receive approval to proceed, but you are required to talk to someone else to execute the task. So you create a new request, but that request is low on their priority list, and then you wait.
This cycle goes on, and then suddenly, you're 20 years into your career but feel like you only have a few years of experience. No matter how much you try to make that wait time more productive, you really can't. If you follow the rules, you're gated waiting. The sad part is, you might not even realize that two decades into your career has only produced two years of real experience because all of your peers have done the same thing. It feels normal. The reality is that everyone's years of experience has been watered down to be almost meaningless.
This situation is where I feel people risk their careers for the sake of their job. They played it safe. They followed the rules. They didn't step on any toes, crossed all their "t"s, and dotted all of their "i"s. They asked before acting and never did anything which would get them, their team, or their project in trouble. They never failed, but they also never really succeeded. Their job stayed happy, but their career stalled.
And then one day their company gets tired of them. That's a given in today's corporate landscape. What happens then? Panic is what happens. Because even though they might have two decades of being a warm body in a field, when they interview at another job, their experience level seems junior in comparison to what it should be. It's hard to find another job who will see value in them at the same level as their old job.
I saw this frequently happen at my first job out of college. It terrified me and even depressed me watching that happen to some of my more "experienced" peers. I see it happening to some of my coworkers now, and I fear for them. Their careers are at risk because they put their job first.
I try to do the opposite and put my career first. Straight out of college, I would freelance and do side projects even though most day jobs discourage extracurricular activities. Even within my day job, I'm respectful of job roles and responsibilities, but I center my focus around getting the project done regardless of whose lane I have to enter. One of my mottos is to let someone do their job first, but if they don't do it, then don't be afraid to step on their toes and get it done.
I've spent a lot of time risking my job to make sure my career was good. And that has given me confidence.
If I ever push boundaries too far, what's the worst that would happen? I would get fired. I've been in the field for a decade and a half, but between my mentality, my constant pushing, and my side projects, I have the equivalent of several decades worth of experience. I'm not worried about finding a replacement job.
But would my job fire me? It's possible; I might eventually cross a line. Sometimes I push too hard, and the anxiety hits me. But I have confidence that line is farther away than I'm willing to go. Plus, I provide value to my company. If I can get a "30-day" task done in a few days, that's invaluable. And Because I promote an influential positive culture among my peers and employees, and because I'm very respectful and compliment those around me that are skilled, I've built a social buffer. My teammates speak well of me. My managers praise me. And my (competent) colleagues support me. There is always a line, and there is still an ending, but I've built the proper offenses and defenses to help ensure that I'm secure.
By putting my career first at the risk of jeopardizing my job, I've created a win/win/win/win situation. My company wins by receiving more value; My coworkers win by having a champion to promote a competitive but collaborative culture. My job wins by creating a list of accomplishments and building a social buffer; My career wins in case my job ever gets tired of me, and I need to scramble to replace it.
It's not enough to say that your career is not your job. It is also essential to understand that those individuals who risk their careers to secure their jobs end up at a disadvantage in the long run, while those who risk their jobs to secure their careers tend to benefit all parties involved in the long term.
(Written 2019.10.05)
10.17.2019
#27 | The Perks Of Having Kids
I hit my blog's half-birthday and lost steam. A lot of opportunities popped into my life, taking all of my time. Mix that with being dominated by writer's block. I haven't posted in three months, and I've been debating the future of the site.
Then my wife and I went to a Financial Independence (FI) Meetup, and the other attendees inspired me to continue. As they put it, I had already put six months into exploring this concept, creating content, and developing the site. But what sparked me was a question that someone asked me.
In this particular FI group, having kids is rare. So someone asked my wife and me: "What are the perks of having three kids?"
It's a great question, and my wife answered it well. However, we discussed it more on the way home and realized there were so many more layers to explore. So I decided to revive the blog and address this question.
The answer is multi-faceted, but I can summarize it with one word: mindfulness.
To begin explaining, we will address the aspect of time. When you have kids, especially three kids, every free minute of your life will be sucked up. To be able to get anything done, you have to learn to be very efficient and effective with your time. My wife and I are both ambitious, so we have become calculating where our time goes. When the kids are off at school, we have to maximize our time to work on our day jobs. We're human and still have idle times, but we don't have the freedom to dawdle around frequently.
This time is bookended by dropping the kids off in the morning and picking them up in the afternoon. There are exactly 8 hours between those two bookends. That means we need to pack a full 8 hours of work, including lunch, errands, or other distractions, into precisely 8 hours. This statement might sound obvious, but you would be surprised how many of your peers do 8 hours of work during their 8-hour workday. Although our day jobs frequently bleed into our evenings, we strive to keep it contained within those two bookends.
Then the evenings come. We have about three to four hours of family time. We feel family dinner is important, so most nights, we put a focus on a home-cooked meal and eating together as a family. We tag-team to get this done, but also get all dishes and household cleanup done. Let's not forget about the kids' homework. And then the real joys of just spending some quality relax time with the kids. Almost every night, there is a struggle to push past fatigue from a long day. But because we feel it's essential to have healthy meals and spend time together as a family, we make it happen.
And finally, the kids go to bed, and we get our final chunk of time. We have about two hours before we go to bed. Some nights we put our feet up and watch a show. Most nights, we look at our side projects, investments, or interests and push on those. These two hours are our only "us" time, so we have no choice to use this time as effectively as possible, even if that activity is to cuddle up and watch something together.
Our weekends are only a slight variation of our weekdays. Some weekends we relax and are idle all weekend. But those are very rare. We have to go to the grocery store to feed five, along with doing laundry for five. We want to do activities so that the kids can have an eventful weekend. But we also have things like Meetups, date nights, and other social events. And don't forget about the side projects. The weekend is the perfect time to knock out a chunk of tasks for those.
Especially with the theme of this blog, we want to maximize our time by minimizing our wasteful activities. Looking over our days, pretty much 24/7/365, we are mindful of our time and how we use it.
We can now get to the second layer of the answer. Having kids forces us to live in the NOW. Several of the leading FI voices who have reached early retirement have talked about the downside of obsessing over their FI number. They say they wished they enjoyed life more during the wealth-building years. Hoped that they had taken better of their health or cared a little less about every single dollar saved. But with kids, we don't feel we have that option.
As hypothetical kid-free adults, maybe we would be comfortable with making a decision where we give up five or ten years of life experiences so that we could retire early and have 50+ years of early retirement. But that's not fair to our kids. Those five to ten years might be an instrumental part of their childhoods. When each kid is only at home for approximately 20 years, even though that feels like an incredibly long time, it passes in a heartbeat. What's 50+ years of retirement worth if you lose half of your kids' childhood to FI obsession.
Although we have an FI-mindset combined with our ambitious personalities, we won't sacrifice our kids' childhood or their early life experiences. It can be exhausting, but our kids give us the energy and motivation to do exactly that.
And finally, the last layer. Motivation. After the birth of every kid, my productivity and drive in my career shot up. Once the chaos of having a newborn dies down, the thoughts of providing for the kids and ensuring they have excellent future opportunities shoots up. Not only do I want to be able to provide for them, but I also want to be a good role model for them. So I strive to achieve a career they could be proud of and possibly be influenced into also working hard and reaching their dreams when they get older. But life is much more about career. So we push hard towards living a healthy lifestyle for them to mirror. We push harder in experiencing life so that they can see what's possible. It's hard to be complacent in life when you want to provide the best life for your kids.
In the end, having kids increases the stress, chaos, and sheer amount of overhead in your life. But, besides the obvious of being a bundle of joy and happiness, the mindfulness they give you in just about everything in life is a fantastic perk to having any amount of kids, especially three. You don't have the luxury of letting life pass you by.
(Written 2019.10.05)
Then my wife and I went to a Financial Independence (FI) Meetup, and the other attendees inspired me to continue. As they put it, I had already put six months into exploring this concept, creating content, and developing the site. But what sparked me was a question that someone asked me.
In this particular FI group, having kids is rare. So someone asked my wife and me: "What are the perks of having three kids?"
It's a great question, and my wife answered it well. However, we discussed it more on the way home and realized there were so many more layers to explore. So I decided to revive the blog and address this question.
The answer is multi-faceted, but I can summarize it with one word: mindfulness.
To begin explaining, we will address the aspect of time. When you have kids, especially three kids, every free minute of your life will be sucked up. To be able to get anything done, you have to learn to be very efficient and effective with your time. My wife and I are both ambitious, so we have become calculating where our time goes. When the kids are off at school, we have to maximize our time to work on our day jobs. We're human and still have idle times, but we don't have the freedom to dawdle around frequently.
This time is bookended by dropping the kids off in the morning and picking them up in the afternoon. There are exactly 8 hours between those two bookends. That means we need to pack a full 8 hours of work, including lunch, errands, or other distractions, into precisely 8 hours. This statement might sound obvious, but you would be surprised how many of your peers do 8 hours of work during their 8-hour workday. Although our day jobs frequently bleed into our evenings, we strive to keep it contained within those two bookends.
Then the evenings come. We have about three to four hours of family time. We feel family dinner is important, so most nights, we put a focus on a home-cooked meal and eating together as a family. We tag-team to get this done, but also get all dishes and household cleanup done. Let's not forget about the kids' homework. And then the real joys of just spending some quality relax time with the kids. Almost every night, there is a struggle to push past fatigue from a long day. But because we feel it's essential to have healthy meals and spend time together as a family, we make it happen.
And finally, the kids go to bed, and we get our final chunk of time. We have about two hours before we go to bed. Some nights we put our feet up and watch a show. Most nights, we look at our side projects, investments, or interests and push on those. These two hours are our only "us" time, so we have no choice to use this time as effectively as possible, even if that activity is to cuddle up and watch something together.
Our weekends are only a slight variation of our weekdays. Some weekends we relax and are idle all weekend. But those are very rare. We have to go to the grocery store to feed five, along with doing laundry for five. We want to do activities so that the kids can have an eventful weekend. But we also have things like Meetups, date nights, and other social events. And don't forget about the side projects. The weekend is the perfect time to knock out a chunk of tasks for those.
Especially with the theme of this blog, we want to maximize our time by minimizing our wasteful activities. Looking over our days, pretty much 24/7/365, we are mindful of our time and how we use it.
We can now get to the second layer of the answer. Having kids forces us to live in the NOW. Several of the leading FI voices who have reached early retirement have talked about the downside of obsessing over their FI number. They say they wished they enjoyed life more during the wealth-building years. Hoped that they had taken better of their health or cared a little less about every single dollar saved. But with kids, we don't feel we have that option.
As hypothetical kid-free adults, maybe we would be comfortable with making a decision where we give up five or ten years of life experiences so that we could retire early and have 50+ years of early retirement. But that's not fair to our kids. Those five to ten years might be an instrumental part of their childhoods. When each kid is only at home for approximately 20 years, even though that feels like an incredibly long time, it passes in a heartbeat. What's 50+ years of retirement worth if you lose half of your kids' childhood to FI obsession.
Although we have an FI-mindset combined with our ambitious personalities, we won't sacrifice our kids' childhood or their early life experiences. It can be exhausting, but our kids give us the energy and motivation to do exactly that.
And finally, the last layer. Motivation. After the birth of every kid, my productivity and drive in my career shot up. Once the chaos of having a newborn dies down, the thoughts of providing for the kids and ensuring they have excellent future opportunities shoots up. Not only do I want to be able to provide for them, but I also want to be a good role model for them. So I strive to achieve a career they could be proud of and possibly be influenced into also working hard and reaching their dreams when they get older. But life is much more about career. So we push hard towards living a healthy lifestyle for them to mirror. We push harder in experiencing life so that they can see what's possible. It's hard to be complacent in life when you want to provide the best life for your kids.
In the end, having kids increases the stress, chaos, and sheer amount of overhead in your life. But, besides the obvious of being a bundle of joy and happiness, the mindfulness they give you in just about everything in life is a fantastic perk to having any amount of kids, especially three. You don't have the luxury of letting life pass you by.
(Written 2019.10.05)
6.27.2019
#26 | Half Birthday
Post 26. Wow.
With a new post every week, that means I've been working on this blog for half a year. Six months. I wanted to take the chance to make evaluate where things started and where we've ended up.
A year ago, I was feeling a bit overwhelmed. Although I've always had a focus on NOT being in the rat race of life, I was feeling the wheel pulling me in and locking me down. Life was progressing, but was it progressing how I wanted? I couldn't tell you, all I knew is that I was busy getting things done. I can also tell you that my stress levels were high while my energy levels were low.
That's when the philosophy of Boredom started to form. Initially, it was a struggle. Cutting activities and distractions out of your life is a hard task. Do the same thing for a blended family of 5 is near impossible. But we slowly persevered.
Six months in and I was starting to see dividends from our efforts. I decided to share my knowledge with a broader audience. The blog was born. I had no clue what I wanted to do with it. I still don't know, but I do know I should continue writing and see where it lead.
Creating the blog led to becoming semi-active in Reddit as both a topic contributor and comment contributor. I was a long time lurker but had never had a desire to post. It led to reaching out to a few of my favorite content creators, asking for feedback, and receiving some interesting and useful advice. It led to reaching out to some newly discovered content creators who were writing about the same subject matter, and starting some exciting dialogues while gaining some recommendations on some interesting books and articles to read.
As time passed on, I realized writing posts for the blog wasn't enough. It was an outlet for my voice, allowing me to tell my story, but it felt like the site needed to be more. The blog broke into three sections. In addition to telling my story, it became the home of my permanent Personal Control Book along with the transient accountability Weekly Update.
The Personal Control Book has become the containing force, ensuring I maximize my time and energy to it's fullest. The Weekly Update has become the driving force to make sure a week doesn't go by where I'm not in some form advancing one of my goals.
After executing against the PCB for a few months, my train of life was chugging along at full steam ahead. From a random conversation with a business associate, I found my first guinea pig to try out the PCB for herself. It was a success, so I reached out to strangers. That's currently a work in progress, but I'm determined to make it a success regardless if it takes one, two, or ten groups. I've even built a Business Control Book for a different business associate and started helping them progress through that.
As of this writing, I've created or helped create 26 posts, 5 PCBs, 1 BCB, 3 permanent pages describing my PCB, and 15 transient Weekly Updates. I feel blessed to be able to create this content and have the opportunity to continue writing. I can't wait for what the next six months will hold.
(Written 2019.05.28)
With a new post every week, that means I've been working on this blog for half a year. Six months. I wanted to take the chance to make evaluate where things started and where we've ended up.
A year ago, I was feeling a bit overwhelmed. Although I've always had a focus on NOT being in the rat race of life, I was feeling the wheel pulling me in and locking me down. Life was progressing, but was it progressing how I wanted? I couldn't tell you, all I knew is that I was busy getting things done. I can also tell you that my stress levels were high while my energy levels were low.
That's when the philosophy of Boredom started to form. Initially, it was a struggle. Cutting activities and distractions out of your life is a hard task. Do the same thing for a blended family of 5 is near impossible. But we slowly persevered.
Six months in and I was starting to see dividends from our efforts. I decided to share my knowledge with a broader audience. The blog was born. I had no clue what I wanted to do with it. I still don't know, but I do know I should continue writing and see where it lead.
Creating the blog led to becoming semi-active in Reddit as both a topic contributor and comment contributor. I was a long time lurker but had never had a desire to post. It led to reaching out to a few of my favorite content creators, asking for feedback, and receiving some interesting and useful advice. It led to reaching out to some newly discovered content creators who were writing about the same subject matter, and starting some exciting dialogues while gaining some recommendations on some interesting books and articles to read.
As time passed on, I realized writing posts for the blog wasn't enough. It was an outlet for my voice, allowing me to tell my story, but it felt like the site needed to be more. The blog broke into three sections. In addition to telling my story, it became the home of my permanent Personal Control Book along with the transient accountability Weekly Update.
The Personal Control Book has become the containing force, ensuring I maximize my time and energy to it's fullest. The Weekly Update has become the driving force to make sure a week doesn't go by where I'm not in some form advancing one of my goals.
After executing against the PCB for a few months, my train of life was chugging along at full steam ahead. From a random conversation with a business associate, I found my first guinea pig to try out the PCB for herself. It was a success, so I reached out to strangers. That's currently a work in progress, but I'm determined to make it a success regardless if it takes one, two, or ten groups. I've even built a Business Control Book for a different business associate and started helping them progress through that.
As of this writing, I've created or helped create 26 posts, 5 PCBs, 1 BCB, 3 permanent pages describing my PCB, and 15 transient Weekly Updates. I feel blessed to be able to create this content and have the opportunity to continue writing. I can't wait for what the next six months will hold.
(Written 2019.05.28)
6.20.2019
#25 | PCBs and Boredom
I wanted to write today about the Personal Control Book and how it relates to my philosophy of Boredom is my Goal.
I’ve recently put a more substantial focus on running my PCB and have been exploring the idea of coaching other people on how to run their own. While doing this, the nagging voice in my head has been telling me this doesn’t make sense. The PCB is a productivity tool that on its surface is made to help you accomplish more. The philosophy of Boredom is my Goal is to minimize what you’re doing in life so that you can have more moments of Boredom. They seem like they are in direct conflict with each other.
This apparent conflict is what I would like to clear up.
To recap what the philosophy of Boredom is my Goal tries to promote, it’s not actually about sitting around and doing nothing ALL day long. It’s about trying to make pockets of time to do nothing by decluttering your life of all of the pointless tasks and distracts that we have every day. It’s about being mindful regarding where we put our time. It’s about minimizing the activities we have in our lives.
During this cleansing process, we get to do nothing and achieve Boredom. Once we have removed all of the unnecessary, that’s where the real benefits come in. We have a clear mind and spirit. With rested bodies and minds, we become more capable. When we add new projects to our lives, they can be projects which are most critical to us.
The question then turns towards what projects to add. And this is where the PCB shines. The reason why I developed my PCB was that I had gone through all of my long-running random projects. The sense of accomplishment of tackling another nice-to-have project was wearing thin. There was no ultimate goal. There was just busy-ness.
Being mindful about the random projects you pick up is just slightly more advantageous to flittering your life away with distractions. If I spend my days browsing the latest Game of the Day app, or if I spend my days conquering a specific game, the result is the same. Mindless entertainment. There is little difference between YouTube surfing for an entire week watching YouTube’s recommendation list versus binge-watching the latest Netflix intriguing series. Even if I was productive with my random projects, like doing odd-job projects around the house, it’s still just tinkering. There is no value added to my life, besides just causal distractions.
The PCB became a tool to focus these random projects. It helped paint a picture of where I wanted to head in my life. I already had a vision, but the PCB helped make that vision concrete. It also helped with motivation. Even today, when I start to get distracted by the latest fad activity, I remind myself how it helps me to reach one of my three Beacons. If it can’t, I question if I should start it.
Boredom is my Goal is a philosophy of life to live by, while a Personal Control Book ensures you spend your time and energy to maximum benefit.
(Written 2019.05.28)
I’ve recently put a more substantial focus on running my PCB and have been exploring the idea of coaching other people on how to run their own. While doing this, the nagging voice in my head has been telling me this doesn’t make sense. The PCB is a productivity tool that on its surface is made to help you accomplish more. The philosophy of Boredom is my Goal is to minimize what you’re doing in life so that you can have more moments of Boredom. They seem like they are in direct conflict with each other.
This apparent conflict is what I would like to clear up.
To recap what the philosophy of Boredom is my Goal tries to promote, it’s not actually about sitting around and doing nothing ALL day long. It’s about trying to make pockets of time to do nothing by decluttering your life of all of the pointless tasks and distracts that we have every day. It’s about being mindful regarding where we put our time. It’s about minimizing the activities we have in our lives.
During this cleansing process, we get to do nothing and achieve Boredom. Once we have removed all of the unnecessary, that’s where the real benefits come in. We have a clear mind and spirit. With rested bodies and minds, we become more capable. When we add new projects to our lives, they can be projects which are most critical to us.
The question then turns towards what projects to add. And this is where the PCB shines. The reason why I developed my PCB was that I had gone through all of my long-running random projects. The sense of accomplishment of tackling another nice-to-have project was wearing thin. There was no ultimate goal. There was just busy-ness.
Being mindful about the random projects you pick up is just slightly more advantageous to flittering your life away with distractions. If I spend my days browsing the latest Game of the Day app, or if I spend my days conquering a specific game, the result is the same. Mindless entertainment. There is little difference between YouTube surfing for an entire week watching YouTube’s recommendation list versus binge-watching the latest Netflix intriguing series. Even if I was productive with my random projects, like doing odd-job projects around the house, it’s still just tinkering. There is no value added to my life, besides just causal distractions.
The PCB became a tool to focus these random projects. It helped paint a picture of where I wanted to head in my life. I already had a vision, but the PCB helped make that vision concrete. It also helped with motivation. Even today, when I start to get distracted by the latest fad activity, I remind myself how it helps me to reach one of my three Beacons. If it can’t, I question if I should start it.
Boredom is my Goal is a philosophy of life to live by, while a Personal Control Book ensures you spend your time and energy to maximum benefit.
(Written 2019.05.28)
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