This is post #4 in Where’s Jeremy (2013)
May.
For three weeks I took an hiatus from programming on the casting database.
Around this time my friends Joe, Alee, Hannah, Richard, and a few others, started frequenting Merlin's Rest, a pub very near my house. I'm not sure what this says about us, but by the time of this writing, the wait staff doesn't even card us anymore, because they all know us. Our frequent waitress Jess also takes great joy in picking out fun new drinks for me (she knows my standing order is "something pink, fruity, and alcoholic; the pink is optional"). Kinda cool to be a "regular."
Later in May I served food to the poor and homeless with my friend Darrell and his group of people he calls "Salt Shakers". This was my first experience serving in a food line and, while I don't want to belittle my problems as unimportant, the experience certainly gave me some perspective.
As a fun little programming side project, I was hired by Street Factory Media, a local advertising firm, to create a computer animation for some food trucks they were helping launch. I used the little-known Quartz Composer to create an animation, pulling data from a web API to display titles of upcoming music/sporting events for each of the three cities where the food trucks would be. It was fun... but also stressful - the end-client (not SFM - they were great) was not very cooperative when I asked for information, and I ended up having to figure out a lot of extra details that should not have been my responsibility. Like so often happens: live and learn.
Wednesday, November 06, 2013
Monday, November 04, 2013
Where's Jeremy (2013) - Part 1: A logistical summary - April
This is post #3 in Where’s Jeremy (2013)
April.
I started ComedySportz's level II improv class, with lots of the same faces from level I, as well as my good friend Allie - she'd already gone through Level III and was going to repeat it, but they didn't have enough students sign up, so she joined my level II class instead!
In a different friend group, I started hosting Star Wars movie nights for two friends who'd never ever seen the movies. I was unaware such people even existed. Now Hannah and Alee finally understand the references we make, like "It's a trap!" and "these are not the <fill in the blank> you're looking for."
My coworker Wendy (who trained me in at Cray a year ago) invited me along in her friend-group of musical-goers to see Aida at Minnetonka High School. Let me take a step back and say on record: standing ovations are given far too easily these days - it's rare to see a production that truly deserves one. But Minnetonka's Aida, wow. Just, wow. It took until intermission before I realized there was a live orchestra - the music was so flawless, I thought they were playing back a recording! The singers - high schoolers - had amazing voices, absolutely blew me away. Without question, they earned their standing applause.
April.
I started ComedySportz's level II improv class, with lots of the same faces from level I, as well as my good friend Allie - she'd already gone through Level III and was going to repeat it, but they didn't have enough students sign up, so she joined my level II class instead!
In a different friend group, I started hosting Star Wars movie nights for two friends who'd never ever seen the movies. I was unaware such people even existed. Now Hannah and Alee finally understand the references we make, like "It's a trap!" and "these are not the <fill in the blank> you're looking for."
My coworker Wendy (who trained me in at Cray a year ago) invited me along in her friend-group of musical-goers to see Aida at Minnetonka High School. Let me take a step back and say on record: standing ovations are given far too easily these days - it's rare to see a production that truly deserves one. But Minnetonka's Aida, wow. Just, wow. It took until intermission before I realized there was a live orchestra - the music was so flawless, I thought they were playing back a recording! The singers - high schoolers - had amazing voices, absolutely blew me away. Without question, they earned their standing applause.
Sunday, November 03, 2013
Where's Jeremy (2013) - Part 1: A logistical summary - March
This is post #2 in Where’s Jeremy (2013)
March.
Kicking off what quickly turned my conversations into a broken record, I began work on March 1 on an online extras casting database for the company I run, Samaritan Casting.
After years of suffering year-round allergies, and seeing dwindling results from prescription meds, I started allergy shots - once a week, shot in each arm. As of this writing (August) I've worked up to what they call a "maintenance" dose, so now only need to go for shots bi-weekly. (Update: as of the actual publishing date, I'm back to once a week, because my allergies this summer have been that miserable).
You might dread taxes, but mine were exciting! Between leaving full-time employment at Minnehaha to become a contractor at Cray, starting on COBRA, dealing with HSA reimbursements, and taking over a small business, my money was well-spent to let someone else deal with all my 2012 tax details. Conveniently, it happens that one of my movie-making friends' wife is a CPA; Cheryl and I met early in 2012, she gave me guidance throughout the year, and then when it came to tax time, she made the whole experience as painless as it possibly could be. If you ever need a tax person, ping me and I'll put you in touch with her.
Mid-month, I wrapped up taking the level I improv class at ComedySportz in Uptown. I have no ambition to be an on-stage performer there (they call them "actletes": a combination actor + athlete), the class was just for fun, for personal growth, and to push myself out of my comfort zone. Missions accomplished.
Also mid-month, I road-tripped south to Des Moines for AWAKEN friends Blair and Alica's wedding, and got to spend quality time with other AWAKEN folks there. Once again my heart was reminded how torn I am between three cities I could call "home" (Minneapolis, Los Angeles, Des Moines/Ames).
March.
Kicking off what quickly turned my conversations into a broken record, I began work on March 1 on an online extras casting database for the company I run, Samaritan Casting.
After years of suffering year-round allergies, and seeing dwindling results from prescription meds, I started allergy shots - once a week, shot in each arm. As of this writing (August) I've worked up to what they call a "maintenance" dose, so now only need to go for shots bi-weekly. (Update: as of the actual publishing date, I'm back to once a week, because my allergies this summer have been that miserable).
You might dread taxes, but mine were exciting! Between leaving full-time employment at Minnehaha to become a contractor at Cray, starting on COBRA, dealing with HSA reimbursements, and taking over a small business, my money was well-spent to let someone else deal with all my 2012 tax details. Conveniently, it happens that one of my movie-making friends' wife is a CPA; Cheryl and I met early in 2012, she gave me guidance throughout the year, and then when it came to tax time, she made the whole experience as painless as it possibly could be. If you ever need a tax person, ping me and I'll put you in touch with her.
Mid-month, I wrapped up taking the level I improv class at ComedySportz in Uptown. I have no ambition to be an on-stage performer there (they call them "actletes": a combination actor + athlete), the class was just for fun, for personal growth, and to push myself out of my comfort zone. Missions accomplished.
Also mid-month, I road-tripped south to Des Moines for AWAKEN friends Blair and Alica's wedding, and got to spend quality time with other AWAKEN folks there. Once again my heart was reminded how torn I am between three cities I could call "home" (Minneapolis, Los Angeles, Des Moines/Ames).
Where's Jeremy (2013) - Introduction
This is post #1 in Where’s Jeremy (2013)
Almost all of 2013 has flown by with only a scant few blog writings from yours truly. Where has Jeremy been, you ask?
The short story is: working. And working. And working some more. As a result, I was extremely unhappy with my life. I'm writing this series of blog posts to help decompress. And also as a slap-in-the-face reminder to my future self, who might feel a little arrogant and once again think I can take on all the things.
The longer story has become a novella, and so I’ve broken it into a number of upcoming posts: (hyperlinks will be added as each post is published)
Part 1: A logistical summary
Part 2: Cray
Part 3: Samaritan Casting
Part 4: Emotional reflections, lessons learned, and "what's next?"
Almost all of 2013 has flown by with only a scant few blog writings from yours truly. Where has Jeremy been, you ask?
The short story is: working. And working. And working some more. As a result, I was extremely unhappy with my life. I'm writing this series of blog posts to help decompress. And also as a slap-in-the-face reminder to my future self, who might feel a little arrogant and once again think I can take on all the things.
The longer story has become a novella, and so I’ve broken it into a number of upcoming posts: (hyperlinks will be added as each post is published)
Part 1: A logistical summary
Part 2: Cray
Part 3: Samaritan Casting
- Misconceptions
- The Database (or, why Jeremy hated his life for four months)
- The Database, continued
- Selling the company
Part 4: Emotional reflections, lessons learned, and "what's next?"
Saturday, October 19, 2013
Re-instated as a blood donor!
3 years ago the Red Cross mistakenly tagged my donated blood as "inconclusive" for HepC, and they black-listed me from donating for life. Despite a letter from my doctor with clean test results, they refused to budge.
Every so often I called the Red Cross to ask (politely) if they'd gotten over themselves yet and would let me donate again. To my surprise, a few months ago the answer was "maybe" - they've finally created a donor-reinstatement program - so we scheduled an appointment to re-test my blood.
At the donor center, I was happy to find Beverly, my favorite bloodletter, still worked there; we got to catch up on the last three years while working through the paperwork and blood-sampling.
A couple weeks ago, the donor reinstatement lady who'd been helping me left me a voicemail: my results were clean, and I'd receive an official letter in the mail once their new computer system was up and running.
That letter arrived in this morning's mail, which means I’m officially re-instated! Heading over to www.redcrossblood.org/make-donation to schedule an appointment now. Maybe you'll join me?
Every so often I called the Red Cross to ask (politely) if they'd gotten over themselves yet and would let me donate again. To my surprise, a few months ago the answer was "maybe" - they've finally created a donor-reinstatement program - so we scheduled an appointment to re-test my blood.
At the donor center, I was happy to find Beverly, my favorite bloodletter, still worked there; we got to catch up on the last three years while working through the paperwork and blood-sampling.
A couple weeks ago, the donor reinstatement lady who'd been helping me left me a voicemail: my results were clean, and I'd receive an official letter in the mail once their new computer system was up and running.
That letter arrived in this morning's mail, which means I’m officially re-instated! Heading over to www.redcrossblood.org/make-donation to schedule an appointment now. Maybe you'll join me?
Sunday, October 13, 2013
eDiscord
This is post #8 in Where’s Jeremy (2013)
My friend Melanie and I made a pact that we would sign up for eHarmony on July 1st (after I had finished work on the online casting database I was developing [future blog post], and she had finished some of her own projects/soul-searching).
Signing up for eHarmony reminded me of my psych exams when I started pursuing Seminary last year: "on a scale of 1-8, how much does this word describe you?" and, "how important is this aspect in your relationship?" and the more classic, "how often do you drink/smoke/go to church/exercise/blah blah blah?"
Finally, at long last, after an hour of Q&A, I arrived on the final page. All right, let's do this! I clicked the giant "save my answers, show me my matches" button, and...
Excuse me?
Seriously? I just spent an entire hour filling out your questionnaire, and you won't even take my money?
Now, let's be clear: it's not like I limited my search parameters to "I'm only interested in blondes within a 5 block radius of my house who have green eyes and are exactly 5'7" tall" - I said I'd be open to meeting people in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand (basically all the places with awesome accents). You're telling me that in FOUR ENTIRE countries you can't find a single person [pun intended] you think I could match with?
I wrote customer support to ask what red flags they'd spotted, and they replied with a completely non-helpful, generic answer. Even though I should have recognized it as a losing battle, I replied anyway. As I explained to them: I wanted to understand if they were rejecting me because of something transient (for example, my particular mood or emotions when I happened to fill out the profile), or something more core/substantive to who I am (for example, my faith, career, etc).
The reason this matters, is because I probably wasn't in the best mood that day, and therefore [I'm educated-guessing here] may have indicated some level of depression in my answers. Not only had I been working my butt off for the last four months on the casting database project, but also just a few days earlier one of my best friends was sentenced to nine years in prison. So, I will concede: my emotional state was dubious at best.
With that said, I'm also suspicious they thought I was goofing off, because at one point in my exam they accused me of answering questions too quickly and not taking it seriously. Hey, don't punish me because I'm a fast screen reader and mouse-clicker, okay?
Customer support replied with another generic, non-helpful "blah blah blah have a nice life." Whatever. I can laugh about it now.
In the mean time, I took eHarmony's rejection as an opportunity for self-examination. Let's say, for argument's sake, that they did spot something in my psyche that I should be addressing. With this in mind, I came to one realization, and one actionable task.
My realization was that the women I've typically been attracted to, seem themselves to be attracted to men who are more spiritually-conscious than I am. What do I mean by that. I mean, I see myself as having a lot of spiritual growing to do, to become closer with Jesus, to be more in tune with listening to the Holy Spirit's Call on my life, and not just my life in the grand sense, but in each tiny moment also. And let's also be clear: I'm not wanting to change myself for the sake of becoming what someone else wants me to be. I want to pursue this growth in myself for the sake of who I want me to be. Conveniently, my impression is this growth may come with the side-effect of making me more into the type of person that the people I'm attracted to, are attracted to in return. And even if it doesn't, I've still grown more in my relationship with God.
My actionable task, only somewhat related to the above, was to start going to therapy. I don't have depression, I'm not an alcoholic, I don't have any major red flags that would call for therapy, so why would I want to do this, you ask? The simplest answer is: I go to my doctor regularly for physical checkups, I attend church regularly and have friends who help give me spiritual checkups, so pursuing mental checkups just makes sense. I've also heard very positive feedback from more than one friend about their therapy experiences - specifically, the way their therapists challenged them, or asked just the right questions to help lead their way of thinking about a problem. I knew I could benefit from that. So as long as the opportunity was there, I figured "why not?" I called up a delightful therapist named Beverly, recommended to me by one of my friends, and I've been visiting her since July.
Where does that leave me with eHarmony? At some point I think I will give it another go (when I'm for-sure in a good mood). I'll also adjust my answers toward what a normal, level-headed-Jeremy would say, and try to remove myself from whatever emotions I might be feeling right at that particular moment. I'll let you know how it goes. (or, hey, maybe I'll meet someone before then! Who knows?)
My friend Melanie and I made a pact that we would sign up for eHarmony on July 1st (after I had finished work on the online casting database I was developing [future blog post], and she had finished some of her own projects/soul-searching).
Signing up for eHarmony reminded me of my psych exams when I started pursuing Seminary last year: "on a scale of 1-8, how much does this word describe you?" and, "how important is this aspect in your relationship?" and the more classic, "how often do you drink/smoke/go to church/exercise/blah blah blah?"
Finally, at long last, after an hour of Q&A, I arrived on the final page. All right, let's do this! I clicked the giant "save my answers, show me my matches" button, and...
Excuse me?
Seriously? I just spent an entire hour filling out your questionnaire, and you won't even take my money?
Now, let's be clear: it's not like I limited my search parameters to "I'm only interested in blondes within a 5 block radius of my house who have green eyes and are exactly 5'7" tall" - I said I'd be open to meeting people in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand (basically all the places with awesome accents). You're telling me that in FOUR ENTIRE countries you can't find a single person [pun intended] you think I could match with?
I wrote customer support to ask what red flags they'd spotted, and they replied with a completely non-helpful, generic answer. Even though I should have recognized it as a losing battle, I replied anyway. As I explained to them: I wanted to understand if they were rejecting me because of something transient (for example, my particular mood or emotions when I happened to fill out the profile), or something more core/substantive to who I am (for example, my faith, career, etc).
The reason this matters, is because I probably wasn't in the best mood that day, and therefore [I'm educated-guessing here] may have indicated some level of depression in my answers. Not only had I been working my butt off for the last four months on the casting database project, but also just a few days earlier one of my best friends was sentenced to nine years in prison. So, I will concede: my emotional state was dubious at best.
With that said, I'm also suspicious they thought I was goofing off, because at one point in my exam they accused me of answering questions too quickly and not taking it seriously. Hey, don't punish me because I'm a fast screen reader and mouse-clicker, okay?
Customer support replied with another generic, non-helpful "blah blah blah have a nice life." Whatever. I can laugh about it now.
In the mean time, I took eHarmony's rejection as an opportunity for self-examination. Let's say, for argument's sake, that they did spot something in my psyche that I should be addressing. With this in mind, I came to one realization, and one actionable task.
My realization was that the women I've typically been attracted to, seem themselves to be attracted to men who are more spiritually-conscious than I am. What do I mean by that. I mean, I see myself as having a lot of spiritual growing to do, to become closer with Jesus, to be more in tune with listening to the Holy Spirit's Call on my life, and not just my life in the grand sense, but in each tiny moment also. And let's also be clear: I'm not wanting to change myself for the sake of becoming what someone else wants me to be. I want to pursue this growth in myself for the sake of who I want me to be. Conveniently, my impression is this growth may come with the side-effect of making me more into the type of person that the people I'm attracted to, are attracted to in return. And even if it doesn't, I've still grown more in my relationship with God.
My actionable task, only somewhat related to the above, was to start going to therapy. I don't have depression, I'm not an alcoholic, I don't have any major red flags that would call for therapy, so why would I want to do this, you ask? The simplest answer is: I go to my doctor regularly for physical checkups, I attend church regularly and have friends who help give me spiritual checkups, so pursuing mental checkups just makes sense. I've also heard very positive feedback from more than one friend about their therapy experiences - specifically, the way their therapists challenged them, or asked just the right questions to help lead their way of thinking about a problem. I knew I could benefit from that. So as long as the opportunity was there, I figured "why not?" I called up a delightful therapist named Beverly, recommended to me by one of my friends, and I've been visiting her since July.
Where does that leave me with eHarmony? At some point I think I will give it another go (when I'm for-sure in a good mood). I'll also adjust my answers toward what a normal, level-headed-Jeremy would say, and try to remove myself from whatever emotions I might be feeling right at that particular moment. I'll let you know how it goes. (or, hey, maybe I'll meet someone before then! Who knows?)
Monday, August 05, 2013
Goals - August 2013 revision
Since 2010, each summer I set out a list of goals / areas for self-improvement for myself for the coming year. Let's review how I've progressed since my February update on my 2012-2013 goals.
Set reasonable, achievable goals
Also, Stop stressing about how much I can't accomplish
A roller-coaster of success. In the smaller, day-to-day type things, I'd say I achieved this goal. However, as you'll read in a future blog post, I made some epic-scale miscalculations / poor decisions about time-management between March and June, that effectively revoke my earlier statement. Let's call this one a wash (for now).
Sub-goal: Punctuality
Still measurable success. My follow-on goal is to take a step further: aim for being early rather than just punctual. Aka, plan for bad traffic and other unexpected hold-ups.
Avoid procrastination
I'll get back to this one. Ha. Get it? No, actually, I'm doing decently. I mean, everyone procrastinates to some degree. I would argue that the majority of my procrastination has been of the form: "project A is not urgent, but project B is, therefore, I must post-pone my plans for project A and instead work on project B right now." My next step is to identify which of the "urgent" things are actually important. See Randy Pauch's lecture on time management for further explanation.
Focus on tasks that matter
Loaded question. Mmmm... Still sorting through the emotions on this one. See a future blog post about my casting database work from March - June. This again relates to Randy's time management lecture.
Focus on people that matter
This I have done.
Take one thing at a time
Constantly reminding myself, "just do this one thing, focus on this one thing", because otherwise I thrash. I'm working on how to reduce the "clutter" that induces thrashing, like having too many separate todo lists, or physical todo piles, etc.
Accept that I cannot solve every problem
The first couple weeks in July have done wonders in this area for me. Trying to keep it up.
Strive toward better anger management
Rocking this one. My friend John has been a great anger management counselor, and I'm doing much better at biting my tongue.
Move on from Minnehaha
As I wrote in my mid-year update, moving on has been a very natural progression. Emotionally, I needed that slow transition. In July, my successor successfully rolled the back-to-school forms database for the new school year, which was our last major "transition" hurdle. Additionally, I added an "I don't work here anymore" auto-reply to my Minnehaha email, and no longer check it regularly. I call this a healthy success.
Eat more healthfully
I'm trying. Also my doctor insisted I keep a food journal (as related to my Crohn's; he called me out on all my excuses, because, well, I have a smart phone that can take notes, so, I don't have any valid excuses). Tracking what I eat has actually made me more conscious about it. Sugar is still present, but I'll think twice because I know I need to journal it.
Take responsibility for my own actions
I haven't consciously thought about this one in a long time. I'm definitely getting better at admitting fault, which is related (though not the original intent of this goal). Yes, I'd say I'm owning my responsibility.
Sub-goal: be discerning about whose opinions I let matter
Still succeeding. And still work to be done (always :)
Second sub-goal: find my value in the Lord; aka, be myself, and do so unashamedly
Over the past month I've been pushing hard on the first half. For years I have defined myself by the measure of my job / career, income, number of friends, relationship status, number of blood donations, the movie projects I've worked on, and so on. That is not how God sees me. And therefore it is not how I want to see and define myself, because each of those status symbols is transient: I could lose any of them at any moment. I saw this happen to one of my best friends a year and a half ago: he lost his career, his business, and most of his "friends" (fair-weather friends, and let's be honest, I'm judging pretty harshly). Point being: I am forced to acknowledge that I do not completely control my life. Therefore, I so strongly desire to find my value in something eternal, which is what Jesus / God offers me. That cannot be taken away by life's happenstances.
Regarding the "be myself": I only know how to be myself, so I desire to worry less about what other people are seeing and respond with simply: "This is me. Deal with it."
Spend time with God
Overall success. Pushing myself to do even better. I've committed myself to making it to at least one of my churches each week (I'm part of both Jacob's Well and Upper Room). Interesting story: on my way home from Iowa a few Sundays ago, my car stopped wanting to accelerate (broken O2 sensor) - I did make it home okay, but then didn't want to risk taking the car out that evening. I told my parents I was just going to stay home, but they knew I'd come home early specifically so I could go to my evening church service, and so they offered that I could borrow their car. Had that not worked out, my friend Joe also offered to make a special trip to pick me up in between services. Read whatever you will into the story. I read it as God affirming my longing to spend time with Him. (masculine pronoun for convenience only)
Continue maintaining a healthful life/work balance
Absolute fail March - June. Success otherwise.
Take more risks
Yes. As specifically relates to the fear of failure of asking someone out, I've done well at getting over myself. (still single and looking, though).
Don't ever settle
Continuing to do this one too well. Spending 3 - 4 hours looking for the perfect fold-up lawn chair, for example, may not have been the best use of my time. Four stores later, I ended up going back to the first store and one of the first chairs I looked at. However, I definitely feel I did not settle :)
Take a vacation
I've visited friends in Iowa a couple times, and have plans scheduled to visit friends in Los Angeles later this year. I do still need to get better at taking time for me, though.
Mini-vacations also count, I think. There was a moment on the 4th of July, I was with a group of friends sitting out on the grass relaxing, when someone asked what time it was. I realized: I didn't have my phone on me (it was in a bag a few dozen feet away), I didn't know what time it was, I wasn't connected to the world, and that was okay. You might call this "living in the moment". I desire more moments like that.
Always speak my heart
I'm going to re-frame this one, to not only speak my heart, but continue getting better at speaking what I hear God asking me to say.
For 2013-2014, I continue to hold all the above goals, and I'm adding a few more:
Let go of some grudges
Years later, there are still grudges I hold in my heart, that I need to let go. Specifically: several "friends" who took advantage of me financially, certain past and present Minnehaha employees with whom I butted heads, a former pastor, and the list probably goes on. I really need to get over this.
Gossip less
Years ago, my co-worker Cathleen commented to me her respect that I didn't gossip around the workplace (something like that; I lack an eidetic memory). This has stuck with me, and weighed heavily the last few years as I've found it less and less true anymore. I suppose one might argue that there are different types of gossip, some more or less harmful than others, but for once, I'm not interested in the semantics.
Being where I should be
Earlier this summer, while I was at a friend's going-away get-together, another group of friends repeatedly texted asking why I wasn't hanging out with them at Merlin's (our go-to restaurant/pub). I replied that "I'm where I need to be right now", and would join them later. In this case the decision was easy: because my friend would soon be facing sentencing, and we didn't know how long he would be going away, there was no question that I was where I should be. Granted, punctuality is another goal of mine, but there are times when you need to drop everything and simply "be" with a person; my goal is to continue that discernment, to know in-the-moment where I am supposed to be, and live it out.
Know thyself
I desire to know myself even better than I do now, and, more specifically: to understand my motivations. At any given moment, why am I feeling what I'm feeling? If I'm elated, is it because I'm finding value in something eternal or transient? If I'm depressed, is it because, despite what I might have tried to tell myself, I set unrealistic expectations and was let down?
Recognize when there is no one "right" choice
Wild guess: most choices aren't between "right" and "wrong", but between "right" and "right". And that is okay. My goal is to be more comfortable in that lack of a dichotomy.
Thus concludes my list of goals for 2013 - 2014.
Set reasonable, achievable goals
Also, Stop stressing about how much I can't accomplish
A roller-coaster of success. In the smaller, day-to-day type things, I'd say I achieved this goal. However, as you'll read in a future blog post, I made some epic-scale miscalculations / poor decisions about time-management between March and June, that effectively revoke my earlier statement. Let's call this one a wash (for now).
Sub-goal: Punctuality
Still measurable success. My follow-on goal is to take a step further: aim for being early rather than just punctual. Aka, plan for bad traffic and other unexpected hold-ups.
Avoid procrastination
I'll get back to this one. Ha. Get it? No, actually, I'm doing decently. I mean, everyone procrastinates to some degree. I would argue that the majority of my procrastination has been of the form: "project A is not urgent, but project B is, therefore, I must post-pone my plans for project A and instead work on project B right now." My next step is to identify which of the "urgent" things are actually important. See Randy Pauch's lecture on time management for further explanation.
Focus on tasks that matter
Loaded question. Mmmm... Still sorting through the emotions on this one. See a future blog post about my casting database work from March - June. This again relates to Randy's time management lecture.
Focus on people that matter
This I have done.
Take one thing at a time
Constantly reminding myself, "just do this one thing, focus on this one thing", because otherwise I thrash. I'm working on how to reduce the "clutter" that induces thrashing, like having too many separate todo lists, or physical todo piles, etc.
Accept that I cannot solve every problem
The first couple weeks in July have done wonders in this area for me. Trying to keep it up.
Strive toward better anger management
Rocking this one. My friend John has been a great anger management counselor, and I'm doing much better at biting my tongue.
Move on from Minnehaha
As I wrote in my mid-year update, moving on has been a very natural progression. Emotionally, I needed that slow transition. In July, my successor successfully rolled the back-to-school forms database for the new school year, which was our last major "transition" hurdle. Additionally, I added an "I don't work here anymore" auto-reply to my Minnehaha email, and no longer check it regularly. I call this a healthy success.
Eat more healthfully
I'm trying. Also my doctor insisted I keep a food journal (as related to my Crohn's; he called me out on all my excuses, because, well, I have a smart phone that can take notes, so, I don't have any valid excuses). Tracking what I eat has actually made me more conscious about it. Sugar is still present, but I'll think twice because I know I need to journal it.
Take responsibility for my own actions
I haven't consciously thought about this one in a long time. I'm definitely getting better at admitting fault, which is related (though not the original intent of this goal). Yes, I'd say I'm owning my responsibility.
Sub-goal: be discerning about whose opinions I let matter
Still succeeding. And still work to be done (always :)
Second sub-goal: find my value in the Lord; aka, be myself, and do so unashamedly
Over the past month I've been pushing hard on the first half. For years I have defined myself by the measure of my job / career, income, number of friends, relationship status, number of blood donations, the movie projects I've worked on, and so on. That is not how God sees me. And therefore it is not how I want to see and define myself, because each of those status symbols is transient: I could lose any of them at any moment. I saw this happen to one of my best friends a year and a half ago: he lost his career, his business, and most of his "friends" (fair-weather friends, and let's be honest, I'm judging pretty harshly). Point being: I am forced to acknowledge that I do not completely control my life. Therefore, I so strongly desire to find my value in something eternal, which is what Jesus / God offers me. That cannot be taken away by life's happenstances.
Regarding the "be myself": I only know how to be myself, so I desire to worry less about what other people are seeing and respond with simply: "This is me. Deal with it."
Spend time with God
Overall success. Pushing myself to do even better. I've committed myself to making it to at least one of my churches each week (I'm part of both Jacob's Well and Upper Room). Interesting story: on my way home from Iowa a few Sundays ago, my car stopped wanting to accelerate (broken O2 sensor) - I did make it home okay, but then didn't want to risk taking the car out that evening. I told my parents I was just going to stay home, but they knew I'd come home early specifically so I could go to my evening church service, and so they offered that I could borrow their car. Had that not worked out, my friend Joe also offered to make a special trip to pick me up in between services. Read whatever you will into the story. I read it as God affirming my longing to spend time with Him. (masculine pronoun for convenience only)
Continue maintaining a healthful life/work balance
Absolute fail March - June. Success otherwise.
Take more risks
Yes. As specifically relates to the fear of failure of asking someone out, I've done well at getting over myself. (still single and looking, though).
Don't ever settle
Continuing to do this one too well. Spending 3 - 4 hours looking for the perfect fold-up lawn chair, for example, may not have been the best use of my time. Four stores later, I ended up going back to the first store and one of the first chairs I looked at. However, I definitely feel I did not settle :)
Take a vacation
I've visited friends in Iowa a couple times, and have plans scheduled to visit friends in Los Angeles later this year. I do still need to get better at taking time for me, though.
Mini-vacations also count, I think. There was a moment on the 4th of July, I was with a group of friends sitting out on the grass relaxing, when someone asked what time it was. I realized: I didn't have my phone on me (it was in a bag a few dozen feet away), I didn't know what time it was, I wasn't connected to the world, and that was okay. You might call this "living in the moment". I desire more moments like that.
Always speak my heart
I'm going to re-frame this one, to not only speak my heart, but continue getting better at speaking what I hear God asking me to say.
For 2013-2014, I continue to hold all the above goals, and I'm adding a few more:
Let go of some grudges
Years later, there are still grudges I hold in my heart, that I need to let go. Specifically: several "friends" who took advantage of me financially, certain past and present Minnehaha employees with whom I butted heads, a former pastor, and the list probably goes on. I really need to get over this.
Gossip less
Years ago, my co-worker Cathleen commented to me her respect that I didn't gossip around the workplace (something like that; I lack an eidetic memory). This has stuck with me, and weighed heavily the last few years as I've found it less and less true anymore. I suppose one might argue that there are different types of gossip, some more or less harmful than others, but for once, I'm not interested in the semantics.
Being where I should be
Earlier this summer, while I was at a friend's going-away get-together, another group of friends repeatedly texted asking why I wasn't hanging out with them at Merlin's (our go-to restaurant/pub). I replied that "I'm where I need to be right now", and would join them later. In this case the decision was easy: because my friend would soon be facing sentencing, and we didn't know how long he would be going away, there was no question that I was where I should be. Granted, punctuality is another goal of mine, but there are times when you need to drop everything and simply "be" with a person; my goal is to continue that discernment, to know in-the-moment where I am supposed to be, and live it out.
Know thyself
I desire to know myself even better than I do now, and, more specifically: to understand my motivations. At any given moment, why am I feeling what I'm feeling? If I'm elated, is it because I'm finding value in something eternal or transient? If I'm depressed, is it because, despite what I might have tried to tell myself, I set unrealistic expectations and was let down?
Recognize when there is no one "right" choice
Wild guess: most choices aren't between "right" and "wrong", but between "right" and "right". And that is okay. My goal is to be more comfortable in that lack of a dichotomy.
Thus concludes my list of goals for 2013 - 2014.
Wednesday, March 06, 2013
Cray Re-org (aka, Jeremy freaks out with change)
Friday morning, February 8, my manager called a last-minute meeting with me and some other coworkers. Ruh-roh.
Short version: Cray re-organized the people under my boss's boss['s boss?]: teams shifted, people moved to different managers, managers moved to different directors... and I was moved away from the sysadmin group. where I spent the majority of my work time, to 100% in the batch / workload manager group, where I previously spent only a quarter (maybe a third?) of my time. Mysteriously, my manager has always been under the impression that I spend most of my time in batch / WLM, but, that never actually has been reality.
Now the obvious good news is: no lay-offs. As one of my friends put it, oftentimes "re-org" is a diplomatic way of throwing people off the Titanic before it hits the iceberg.
Yet I was distraught. Even though I still had/have my job, it's completely changed. The skills I spent 10 months learning, largely are no longer applicable. After 10 months, I felt like I was finally getting the hang of things, and even working on bugs and contributing [small amounts of] source code. My world was turned topsy-turvy, and so my gut reactions were panic and frustration.
In my new group, I do no system administration at all. This is unfortunate, because I enjoyed that work (and, again, because I finally felt like I had a handle on things). Instead I'm supposed to be work more on batch related software integration and testing, which... is fine... but... change scares me. Honestly it's the fear of failure that terrifies me. There were mumblings that I'd be writing code in the new group, where everything's written in C, a language I haven't touched since 2006 or 7. It's not that I can't re-learn it, that's not the issue. It's that I've spent almost a year learning something else - why not leverage that?
After panicking, I set about considering how to fight change. I asked my [former] team lead, "got any openings for a contractor in your new group?" She laughed and identified with me - in addition to losing me, she lost two other [much smarter than I am] people from the group, and the whole change was a surprise to her as well.
On the other hand. My friend Ben (college roommate, who's worked at Cray for years) pointed out: it's not often a company will pay for your time to learn a new skill - if they want me coding in C, and are willing to bring me up to speed, well, that's not a bad thing. Also, unless I know for sure that development isn't what I want to do, there's not much reason to fight it.
Okay, with a month's perspective on this: at the get-go I heard I'd be working on some important up and coming project related to one of out batch vendors. Well, it's been a month, and I've yet to hear anything about that. So while I'm not exactly twiddling my thumbs, I definitely have spare cycles. Which is frustrating, when I know my old group is still understaffed. I've approached my manager and asked him for more work; I think he's asking around to see what can get added to my plate, but this is really, really frustrating: why was he so adamant I not continue in the old group for a transition period (again, when they're so understaffed), when he doesn't even have anything for me to be doing? Doesn't seem like the best use of resources. Also not the first time we've been down this road, but at least in the past, I had my team lead who could give me direction and projects. Now she's in that other group :(
One month later, and I'm still angsty. However, my manager did say he was trying to get me hired full time, so right now I'm just biding my time and waiting to see what'll happen. (you need to understand how huge this is - coworker after coworker has said how they hope the company will hire me as a real employee, but last week was the first time I heard my manager actually express his intent for that!)
Perspective: these are first-world problems, and I acknowledge that. However, they are still real problems, and I'm tired of telling myself that my problems aren't big enough or third-world enough to be legitimate.
Short version: Cray re-organized the people under my boss's boss['s boss?]: teams shifted, people moved to different managers, managers moved to different directors... and I was moved away from the sysadmin group. where I spent the majority of my work time, to 100% in the batch / workload manager group, where I previously spent only a quarter (maybe a third?) of my time. Mysteriously, my manager has always been under the impression that I spend most of my time in batch / WLM, but, that never actually has been reality.
Now the obvious good news is: no lay-offs. As one of my friends put it, oftentimes "re-org" is a diplomatic way of throwing people off the Titanic before it hits the iceberg.
Yet I was distraught. Even though I still had/have my job, it's completely changed. The skills I spent 10 months learning, largely are no longer applicable. After 10 months, I felt like I was finally getting the hang of things, and even working on bugs and contributing [small amounts of] source code. My world was turned topsy-turvy, and so my gut reactions were panic and frustration.
In my new group, I do no system administration at all. This is unfortunate, because I enjoyed that work (and, again, because I finally felt like I had a handle on things). Instead I'm supposed to be work more on batch related software integration and testing, which... is fine... but... change scares me. Honestly it's the fear of failure that terrifies me. There were mumblings that I'd be writing code in the new group, where everything's written in C, a language I haven't touched since 2006 or 7. It's not that I can't re-learn it, that's not the issue. It's that I've spent almost a year learning something else - why not leverage that?
After panicking, I set about considering how to fight change. I asked my [former] team lead, "got any openings for a contractor in your new group?" She laughed and identified with me - in addition to losing me, she lost two other [much smarter than I am] people from the group, and the whole change was a surprise to her as well.
On the other hand. My friend Ben (college roommate, who's worked at Cray for years) pointed out: it's not often a company will pay for your time to learn a new skill - if they want me coding in C, and are willing to bring me up to speed, well, that's not a bad thing. Also, unless I know for sure that development isn't what I want to do, there's not much reason to fight it.
Okay, with a month's perspective on this: at the get-go I heard I'd be working on some important up and coming project related to one of out batch vendors. Well, it's been a month, and I've yet to hear anything about that. So while I'm not exactly twiddling my thumbs, I definitely have spare cycles. Which is frustrating, when I know my old group is still understaffed. I've approached my manager and asked him for more work; I think he's asking around to see what can get added to my plate, but this is really, really frustrating: why was he so adamant I not continue in the old group for a transition period (again, when they're so understaffed), when he doesn't even have anything for me to be doing? Doesn't seem like the best use of resources. Also not the first time we've been down this road, but at least in the past, I had my team lead who could give me direction and projects. Now she's in that other group :(
One month later, and I'm still angsty. However, my manager did say he was trying to get me hired full time, so right now I'm just biding my time and waiting to see what'll happen. (you need to understand how huge this is - coworker after coworker has said how they hope the company will hire me as a real employee, but last week was the first time I heard my manager actually express his intent for that!)
Perspective: these are first-world problems, and I acknowledge that. However, they are still real problems, and I'm tired of telling myself that my problems aren't big enough or third-world enough to be legitimate.
Saturday, February 09, 2013
Perspective
There's a crazy retired guy from my church named Darrell. But when I say "crazy," I mean that truly in a loving, awe-filled, I-respect-this-man-beyond-words-for-his-radical-ideas kind of way. I'm not saying he's Jesus, but, I think he and Jesus have a lot in common. They both like serving people. They both like challenging the status quo. They both like skipping the small talk, and diving right into the deep stuff. And they both balk at religion.
These are my kind of people.
I don't remember how I met Darrell or how I got onto his "Salt Shakers" email list, but a year or two ago I started getting these mass emails from him, asking for volunteers to serve food to the homeless. Beneath each plea was also a [long] paragraph or two of Darrell's recent thoughts about church/religion/living out faith. At first I thought, "what a weirdo!" Then, as I read more and more of his "crazy thoughts" (his own description), they grew on me. In fact, I started really looking forward to Darrell's writing, to the point that I'd drop everything I was doing to read his emails when they popped into my inbox. I knew his words would inspire me. I knew this one email, out of the hundreds of emails I would read in the day, carried with it the potential to change the way I encounter my world.
Monday morning this past week Darrell and I met for coffee and conversation, and I finally made a commitment to help at one of his monthly food-serving things. It's long been a[n overly romanticized] dream of mine to serve at a soup kitchen on Thanksgiving; an otherwise boring and routine Thursday night in February isn't exactly Thanksgiving, but close enough. I've put this off long enough.
My week leading up to Thursday had been very stressful. The contractor at the desk next to mine was let go on Tuesday, and this sent me into an unwarranted minor panic attack about my own job security. (I say unwarranted, because I asked my boss if I needed to be worried, and he said "no") My "todo" list at work keeps growing - no chance of being bored anytime soon - and that got me stressing out with worry (though again, unwarranted - my coworker Wendy reassured me I had my priorities set correctly and was exceeding their expectations). And the casting company was hired to book some extras for a commercial next week, as well as host auditions, and then the online software had a major bug and things weren't working and the friend I was going to hire to help with booking people got sick so I had to do ALL THE THINGS myself and did I mention I'm terrified of failure and disappointing people?
Breathing.
By Thursday evening I was frazzled, albeit on the mend, but still, frazzled.
Time for a perspective check.
Darrell had gathered a dozen or so people to help, and for most of us this was our first time serving. We gloved up, put on some adorable hairnets and plastic aprons (hint: "adorable" in this context means "not actually all that attractive"), and then the doors opened and I found myself scooping hot dish onto trays and giving them to the homeless people walking by on the other side of the serving table.
To be cliché, I feel like I got more out of the experience than I gave. Let's see: my biggest problems are that I'm over-employed, have an active social life, and ... why exactly was I complaining again? It's hard to pay attention to my own first-world, upper-class problems, while looking into the eyes of a man, woman, or child, who will be sleeping in a shelter tonight.
My calming change in perspective may have been short lived (blog post coming soon about the emotional turmoil of Friday), but for that short period of time, I felt much more at ease with my "issues." I told Darrell to count me in for next time.
These are my kind of people.
I don't remember how I met Darrell or how I got onto his "Salt Shakers" email list, but a year or two ago I started getting these mass emails from him, asking for volunteers to serve food to the homeless. Beneath each plea was also a [long] paragraph or two of Darrell's recent thoughts about church/religion/living out faith. At first I thought, "what a weirdo!" Then, as I read more and more of his "crazy thoughts" (his own description), they grew on me. In fact, I started really looking forward to Darrell's writing, to the point that I'd drop everything I was doing to read his emails when they popped into my inbox. I knew his words would inspire me. I knew this one email, out of the hundreds of emails I would read in the day, carried with it the potential to change the way I encounter my world.
Monday morning this past week Darrell and I met for coffee and conversation, and I finally made a commitment to help at one of his monthly food-serving things. It's long been a[n overly romanticized] dream of mine to serve at a soup kitchen on Thanksgiving; an otherwise boring and routine Thursday night in February isn't exactly Thanksgiving, but close enough. I've put this off long enough.
My week leading up to Thursday had been very stressful. The contractor at the desk next to mine was let go on Tuesday, and this sent me into an unwarranted minor panic attack about my own job security. (I say unwarranted, because I asked my boss if I needed to be worried, and he said "no") My "todo" list at work keeps growing - no chance of being bored anytime soon - and that got me stressing out with worry (though again, unwarranted - my coworker Wendy reassured me I had my priorities set correctly and was exceeding their expectations). And the casting company was hired to book some extras for a commercial next week, as well as host auditions, and then the online software had a major bug and things weren't working and the friend I was going to hire to help with booking people got sick so I had to do ALL THE THINGS myself and did I mention I'm terrified of failure and disappointing people?
Breathing.
By Thursday evening I was frazzled, albeit on the mend, but still, frazzled.
Time for a perspective check.
Darrell had gathered a dozen or so people to help, and for most of us this was our first time serving. We gloved up, put on some adorable hairnets and plastic aprons (hint: "adorable" in this context means "not actually all that attractive"), and then the doors opened and I found myself scooping hot dish onto trays and giving them to the homeless people walking by on the other side of the serving table.
To be cliché, I feel like I got more out of the experience than I gave. Let's see: my biggest problems are that I'm over-employed, have an active social life, and ... why exactly was I complaining again? It's hard to pay attention to my own first-world, upper-class problems, while looking into the eyes of a man, woman, or child, who will be sleeping in a shelter tonight.
My calming change in perspective may have been short lived (blog post coming soon about the emotional turmoil of Friday), but for that short period of time, I felt much more at ease with my "issues." I told Darrell to count me in for next time.
Monday, February 04, 2013
Goals update for 2012-2013
Last October I set a[n ironic] goal for myself of setting "reasonable, achievable goals." Let's see how I'm doing:
Set reasonable, achievable goals
Also, Stop stressing about how much I can't accomplish
Measurable success. I'm still overly-optimistic in my list-making, but I actively give myself grace, by accepting my daily list of tasks is not a "must get done" list, but rather a smorgasbord of things I could during my day. As former coworker Keith frequently reminded me, "if it gets done, it gets done."
Sub-goal: Punctuality
Measurable success. Still a ways to go, but making headway towards leaving and arriving on time!
Avoid procrastination
Measurable success. I love when I get into a "get things done" mood, such a natural high.
Focus on tasks that matter
Marginal success; I still have a hard time saying "no."
Focus on people that matter
Measurable success. I need to become even more discerning, but feel I've done pretty well allocating time thus far.
Take one thing at a time
Success. The multi-tasking I do choose to do, I'm able to handle, and the moment it becomes too much, I back off and remind myself "just do this one thing."
Accept that I cannot solve every problem
Lies!
Okay. I'm trying.
Marginal success.
Strive toward better anger management
Mostly successful. I still catch myself writing an exasperated Facebook comment every now and then, but when it comes to "stupid people emails," I'm rocking it. One time John (my friend who volunteered himself as my anger-management mentor) even said there's nothing he would change from what I'd written!
Move on from Minnehaha
Marginal success. Overall it's been a natural progression - Cray is taking most of my time, so there's not a whole lot left of me to give to MA. I still miss the half of my job that I loved (building cool web tools and scripts), and I suppose I will miss that for a while.
Eat more healthfully
Sure.
I mean, marginal to measurable success. I'm cutting down on the sweets, let's call that forward progress.
Take responsibility for my own actions
Owning it. Success.
Sub-goal: be discerning about whose opinions I let matter
Success.
Second sub-goal: find my value in the Lord; aka, be myself, and do so unashamedly.
Fail on the first half, success on the second half. I am definitely more comfortable in my own skin, I'm owning my beliefs, I'm owning my actions. At the same time, I continue to judge my self-worth based on the wrong metrics (job, relationship status, cool things I've done, number of friends, etc). That needs to change.
Spend time with God
Success at first, fail in recent weeks.
Continue maintaining a healthful life/work balance
Success at first, fail in recent weeks. This is my highest priority to change.
Take more risks
Mostly success. I just started ComedySportz's intro level improv class, and that is pushing me to stretch myself in the risk-taking arena.
Don't ever settle
Success. If anything, I might be doing this one too well.
I'd like to add two goals to this list:
Take a vacation!
Self-explanatory :)
Always speak my heart
The most obvious example is not waiting to tell someone how you feel about them (specifically I have in mind ἔρως or φιλία). A less obvious example might mean standing up for what I know in my heart to be true, whether that's about God's love, stopping the spread of gossip, words of encouragement, or something else completely - I'm rather bad at coming up with examples.
Set reasonable, achievable goals
Also, Stop stressing about how much I can't accomplish
Measurable success. I'm still overly-optimistic in my list-making, but I actively give myself grace, by accepting my daily list of tasks is not a "must get done" list, but rather a smorgasbord of things I could during my day. As former coworker Keith frequently reminded me, "if it gets done, it gets done."
Sub-goal: Punctuality
Measurable success. Still a ways to go, but making headway towards leaving and arriving on time!
Avoid procrastination
Measurable success. I love when I get into a "get things done" mood, such a natural high.
Focus on tasks that matter
Marginal success; I still have a hard time saying "no."
Focus on people that matter
Measurable success. I need to become even more discerning, but feel I've done pretty well allocating time thus far.
Take one thing at a time
Success. The multi-tasking I do choose to do, I'm able to handle, and the moment it becomes too much, I back off and remind myself "just do this one thing."
Accept that I cannot solve every problem
Lies!
Okay. I'm trying.
Marginal success.
Strive toward better anger management
Mostly successful. I still catch myself writing an exasperated Facebook comment every now and then, but when it comes to "stupid people emails," I'm rocking it. One time John (my friend who volunteered himself as my anger-management mentor) even said there's nothing he would change from what I'd written!
Move on from Minnehaha
Marginal success. Overall it's been a natural progression - Cray is taking most of my time, so there's not a whole lot left of me to give to MA. I still miss the half of my job that I loved (building cool web tools and scripts), and I suppose I will miss that for a while.
Eat more healthfully
Sure.
I mean, marginal to measurable success. I'm cutting down on the sweets, let's call that forward progress.
Take responsibility for my own actions
Owning it. Success.
Sub-goal: be discerning about whose opinions I let matter
Success.
Second sub-goal: find my value in the Lord; aka, be myself, and do so unashamedly.
Fail on the first half, success on the second half. I am definitely more comfortable in my own skin, I'm owning my beliefs, I'm owning my actions. At the same time, I continue to judge my self-worth based on the wrong metrics (job, relationship status, cool things I've done, number of friends, etc). That needs to change.
Spend time with God
Success at first, fail in recent weeks.
Continue maintaining a healthful life/work balance
Success at first, fail in recent weeks. This is my highest priority to change.
Take more risks
Mostly success. I just started ComedySportz's intro level improv class, and that is pushing me to stretch myself in the risk-taking arena.
Don't ever settle
Success. If anything, I might be doing this one too well.
I'd like to add two goals to this list:
Take a vacation!
Self-explanatory :)
Always speak my heart
The most obvious example is not waiting to tell someone how you feel about them (specifically I have in mind ἔρως or φιλία). A less obvious example might mean standing up for what I know in my heart to be true, whether that's about God's love, stopping the spread of gossip, words of encouragement, or something else completely - I'm rather bad at coming up with examples.
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