Day 1411 Record Keeping
Day 1383 Fixed Meditation (10 min, vipassana/gratitude)
Day 1258 Writing (3, 13-min pomodoros)
Day 797 Rowing (10 min/ 1700 m)
Day 538 Mobility/Stretching (10 min, hip stretch & back smash)
Day 188 Social Media (all tweets for week, 53 min)
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Bad sleep. Back from a long much needed break. I attempted to push my writing to finish my proposal before the new year. I failed. I found it incredibly difficult, but, just like my previous year's NaNoWriMo win in 5 days, I found shortening my Pomodoros to 13 minutes much more efficient. It's bizarre, but I would stress out all day about doing 20 or 30 min sessions, and fail to do anything through phenomenal procrastination.

Nevertheless, 13 minutes for some reason was low enough for me to get started and almost addicting. I continued to do more and more as I got into the rhythm of 13 minute sets, often not taking a break, as Pomodoros usually call for.

I wonder if this could be a potential method for easing into particularly difficult skill pushes...

I want to really spend more time focusing on writing, in what productivity blogger and author Cal Newport calls Deep Work. I'm now reading his book – Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World – which I find quite fascinating.

I'll be doing a 2017 year in review shortly, as well as sharing some thoughts in parallel skill pushes.

Day 1350 Record Keeping
Day 1322 Fixed Meditation (Metta)
Day 1197 Writing (Misc small tasks)
Day 736 Rowing (50 min, walking)
Day 477 Mobility/Stretching (DID NOT DO)
Day 127 Social Media (Misc reading)
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Early to Rise
Day 505 Sleep Recording (DID NOT DO)
Day 476 Bedtime Curfew
Day 314 Wakeup Alarm (DID NOT DO)
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Great sleep.

Finally Back Home!
I haven't been in my apartment for more than 2 weeks since July. This trip, two weeks after Iceland, we hit Chicago, Albuquerque, Kona, Hilo, Honolulu, Kauaii, and Houston. I'm utterly exhausted. I got sick twice, my computer died, and I thought I lost my proposal, which was around 9 months of work (happily I got it back).

Looking back over my notes I'm surprised at how much I've managed to do in regards to my habits. It's nowhere near perfect - I have huge gaps, but whenever I had time, I was working, meditating, mobilizing, and when I had a set amount of time not traveling I even did my meal prep. This was unthinkable even last year.

Somewhere along the way, I also started to get a better feel for writing. The Pomodoros, the idea of being able to fit in a quick session here and there – and the new format I have to deal with multiple rewrites – have done wonders for me. In addition, the new format for habits I alluded to in a previous post (I'm getting around to a bigger post on it) seems to be helping everything move along.

I have some more travel coming up, but thankfully I'll have a few months before then. I'm not back to my usual regularity, but I'm bouncing back!

Day 1411 & Happy New Year!

Day 1350 & Finally Back Home!