Summary - 2010 Arbitrary Dividing Point In Time Resolutions

Well it is that time of year again, i figured i would review the successes and failures from this years Arbitrary Dividing Point In Time Resolutions before i publish new ones for 2011 tomorrow.

1. Develop a business that makes £2000/month after tax - Failed ... Miserably. 
Don't think i've earned £2000 from the business all year, never mind per month.

2. Develop a business that is location independent - Technically succeeded ... but really failed.
Technically i have a business and technically it is location independent. However as noted above it doesn't make any money, so while the work could be done anywhere, i couldn't afford to live anywhere else.

3. Visit at least 4 new countries - Failed ... mostly.
Only managed to visit one new country (The Netherlands) this year, which i suppose is better than none, but not looking good for 30 by 30.

4. Read 1 book per week - Success
Ideally i would have preferred to be more regular in my reading - starting and finishing a book each week - but i suppose averaging a book a week will do.

5. Write 1 Moleskine page per day - Success
Over the course of the year i missed a few days for various reasons, but the overall number of pages was right.

6. Watch a maximum of 1 TV episode per day - Failed ... Miserably.
I'm not sure this resolution lasted a day, instead i have ended up watching more TV than ever. In fact even when there was nothing on i have been getting whole series to watch (e.g. The Wire, The Sopranos, Deadwood etc) which resulted in watching up to 12 episodes in a day.

7. Write a blog post once a week - Technically succeeded ... but really failed.
According to the rules of the Blog Duel each week missed had to be caught up on, i missed 18 weeks in a row and then caught up on them all this month, so i technically succeeded. On the other hand the real purpose of the Blog Duel was to write regularly - and in my case improve my writing - in that regard i failed miserably.


Unfortunately the failures don't really fall into neat patterns of recommendations for resolutions: I failed on a frequent feedback resolution (daily TV) and a publicly accountable one (weekly blog posts). I also succeeded on a frequent feedback resolution (daily Moleskine page) and a publicly accountable one (weekly book). Maybe the mistake was not combining frequent feedback and public accountability?

I suspect the first 3 were doomed to failure almost from the start: Resolution 1 was predicated on a certain plan i had for starting a business, when i gave up on that plan the resolution didn't seem important or feasible. Resolution 2 was based on the plan from Resolution 1 and Resolution 3 required the success of Resolutions 1 and 2. It was a bit of a cascade failure really, once the first domino failed to fall, nothing else happened.

I think next year i will focus on relatively simple daily habits that can be publicly accountable and will assist me in implementing wider goals as the year progresses.


Tomorrow i shall unveil my Arbitrary Dividing Point In Time Resolutions for 2011 ...

2010 Reading List

1 - The Collaborative Habit by Twyla Tharp

2 - 59 Seconds by Richard Wiseman

3 - The War Of Art by Steven Pressfield

4 - The (mis)behaviour Of Markets by Benoit Mandlebrot

5 - Drive by Daniel Pink

6 - Velocity by Dee Jacob et al

7 - The Art Of The Start by Guy Kawasaki

8 - Brave New World (f) by Aldous Huxley

9 - Linchpin by Seth Godin

10 - Rework by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hanson

11 - The Management Myth by Matthew Stewart

12 - The 4-Hour Work Week (r) by Tim Ferriss

13 - Maverick (r) by Ricardo Semler

Q1 Bonus - The Dice Man (f) by Luke Rhinehart

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14 - Confessions Of A Public Speaker by Scott Berkun

15 - The Man In The High Castle (f) by Philip K Dick

16 - Presentation Zen by Garr Reynolds

17 - Neverwhere (f) by Neil Gaiman

18 - The End Of Faith by Sam Harris

19 - The Knowing-Doing Gap by Pfeffer and Sutton

20 - The Design Of Business by Roger Martin

21 - Speak Human by Eric Karjaluoto

22 - Childhood's End (f) by Arthur C Clarke

23 - Outliers (r) by Malcolm Gladwell

24 - What The Dog Saw (r) by Malcolm Gladwell

25 - Blink (r) (a) by Malcolm Gladwell

26 - The Elements Of Style by William Strunk

Q2 Bonus - American Gods (f) #1b1t by Neil Gaiman

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27 - What Should I Do With My Life? by Po Bronson

28 - The Upside Of Irrationality by Dan Ariely

29 - Foundation (f) by Isaac Asimov

30 - Let My People Go Surfing by Yvon Chouinard

31 - The Big Short by Michael Lewis

32 - Foundation And Empire (f) by Isaac Asimov

33 - Leading Change by John Kotter

34 - Second Foundation (f) by Isaac Asimov

35 - Into The Wild by John Krakauer

36 - Delivering Happieness (a) by Tony Hsieh

37 - The Complete Stories Of Sherlock Holmes (f) by Arthur Conan Doyle

38 - Roomanitarian by Henry Rollins

39 - Win Without Pitching Manifesto (e) by Blair Enns

Q3 Bonus - Tell-All (f) by Chuck Palahniuk

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40 - The Bootstrappers Bible (e) by Seth Godin

41 - Neuromancer (f) by William Gibson

42 - The Paleo Diet by Loren Cordain

43 - Then We Came To The End (f) by Joshua Ferris

44 - Fascinate by Sally Hogshead

45 - Player One (f) by Douglas Coupland

46 - Notes On The Synthesis Of Form by Christopher Alexander

47 - Head First Rails (e) by David Griffiths

48 - Agile Web Development With Rails (e) by Sam Ruby et al

49 - Pragmatic Version Control With Git (e) by Travis Swicegood

50 - Unbearable Lightness of Being (f) by Milan Kundera

51 - The Art Of Non-Conformity by Chris Guillebeau

52 - The Metamorphosis (f) by Franz Kafka

Q4 Bonus - The 4-Hour Body by Tim Ferriss

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Key:

(f) = Fiction

(r) = Re-read

(a) = Audio

(e) = Electronic

2010 Reading List - Quarter 2 Update

This is just a quick summary of my progress towards one of my Arbitrary Dividing Point In Time Resolutions. Some of you may have noticed the 2010 Reading List in the sidebar of the blog, i'm using this to keep track of what i have been reading each week.

You might be thinking: "But Steven, Quarter 2 isn't finished until the start of July, why are you updating now?". Well unlike the first quarter, i have been reading more than 1 book a week consistently since the start of April and consequently have finished my 14 books for the quarter in 7 weeks. There are a couple of reasons for this:
1) More Fiction - This quarter i read 4 fiction books and i finished them more quickly as they require less concentration (so i can read later into the night) and are generally more compelling than non-fiction books.
2) More Re-Reading - I re-read 3 of Malcolm Gladwell's books; other than the fact his writing is almost as compelling as well-written fiction, it is always faster to re-read a book than read it fresh.

The theme of 'influencing, marketing and sales' that i predicted in the Quarter 1 Update didn't quite materialise. The closest i came to those topics was Speak Human, which is almost an anti-marketing book - in a good way. In fiction i have made a start on reading some Sci-fi classics (more to come in Quarter 3) and two Neil Gaiman books (Neverwhere recommended by @TFerriss and American Gods as part of #1b1t) both of which were excellent. In non-fiction, the only lose theme i could claim is epistemology - how to we know what we think we know. While i had not previously made the connection - and it is not explicit - most of Malcolm Gladwell's work relates to epistemological failures; why what we think we know is wrong. The Knowing Doing Gap, The End of Faith and The Design of Business could also fall under this category.

I'm much happier with my reading rate now and am really enjoying it, so no predictions for a theme next quarter.


Other Arbitrary Dividing Point updates:
1. Business - No progress other than starting company.
2. Business - No progress other than starting company.
3. Travel - No progress, but expected it to be back-weighted in the year.
4. Reading - See Post Above.
5. Writing - Managed to write in my Moleskine every day since the last post.
6. Watching - Still watching 2 or 3 shows every day. Quite a few of the shows i watch just now are finishing and i will not be picking any up next year, so that should help.
7. Blog At Least Once A Week - Recently most of my posts have been pretty weak, but there have been a couple that i am reasonably happy with.

2010 Reading List - Quarter 1 Update

This is just a quick summary of my progress towards one of my Arbitrary Dividing Point In Time Resolutions. Some of you may have noticed the 2010 Reading List in the sidebar of the blog, i'm using this to keep track of what I have been reading each week.

I haven't been quite as consistent in this resolution as i would have liked, a couple of times i was more than a week ahead and at least once i was a couple of weeks behind. Though overall i have averaged a book a week this quarter. Why quarterly updates? Well monthly seems like too frequent, at most there would be 4 or 5 books and it would be quite likely I would be ahead or behind where i should be. Also around the middle of March I was looking at my reading so far this year and i noticed a pattern in what i was reading. 

In the first quarter of the year, most of the books i was reading were inspirational for what i want to achieve in business. Some books were successful at inspiring me; The War Of Art, The Art Of The Start and Rework. Some ended up being downright depressing (The Management Myth) but all were interesting. After i noticed this pattern i decided to to finish the quarter with the book that originally inspired my interest in business improvement; Maverick. While i now know a lot more about manufacturing and business, it is still as relevant and inspirational as it was 5 years ago.

I have decided that the theme for my next reading (though it might not last a whole quarter) is going to be; influencing, marketing and sales. It fits in with what i need to do with my business and is an area that i am currently not very well versed in. I will continue to update the reading list in the sidebar and am considering doing a summary of each book as i go. 

Overall i could have read more, but i'm happy that i managed to squeeze in a bonus book this quarter, as my fiction/non-fiction ratio was getting a little skewed. 

Other Arbitrary Dividing Point updates:

1. Business - No progress other than starting company.

2. Business - No progress other than starting company. 

3. Travel - No progress, but expected it to be back-weighted in the year. 

4. Reading - See Post Above.

5. Writing - Missed quite a few days when i got back from Australia, but managed every day in March.

6. Watching - I have cut down my TV viewing a lot, but still watching 2 or 3 shows every day. This should come down over the summer.

7. Blog At Least Once A Week - Although not originally on the list, in light of the Blog Duel it seems logical to include it. I've had a few crap cop-out/short posts, but also had a pretty epic series too. I'm aiming to be more regular, more consistent and better crafted going forward. 

Slipage

Since i got home from Australia i have experienced some slippage in my Arbitrary Dividing Point In Time Resolutions, slippage of course being management speak for totally screwing up.

While i technically posted in time on the blog last week, it was a particularly poor effort. A top 5 list isn't really a proper post, it took next to no time and is somewhat against the spirit of the challenge. So going forward i need to make more of an effort to do real posts.

I have also let my reading slip rather badly too. By reading The War Of Art in an afternoon, i got 1 week ahead on my reading. I did start The (mis)behaviour Of Markets, however i have not made any progress on it since the flight last week. So going forward i need to stop watching junk on TV (yes actual junk, on an actual TV :-O) and start reading every night.

Finally i have badly failed on writing in my Moleskine. Again i was sticking to the resolution well until i moved home and since then i have only written one page while at a lecture. Part of this was lacking a pen (lame excuse i know), part was being lazy and mostly it was a change in routine. So going forward i need to make writing in my Moleskine part of my new routine.

So now that i have identified the fact i have been failing on these less than a month in, i really need to do something about it. Previously i would have accepted the failure, ignored what i had committed to doing and moved on. This time, i am going to recommit to these resolutions and work them into my new daily routine from Monday.

Blogging Duel!

The challenge; Upload a blog post by Friday every week in 2010.

Rules:

• Set aside 1 hour a week to write the post (everyone can find an hour somewhere).
• Note down ideas (and details) when you think of them, so that you always have material to write about.
• Just write, it doesn't have to be perfect, it doesn't even have to be interesting, it just has to be uploaded.
• Podcasts and Video Blogging also count.
• No excuses! Going to be away? Schedule a post. Really busy? Come on it only takes an hour. Really stuck for ideas? Do a Top 5/10 of something.

PS This post doesn't count ;-)

Arbitrary Dividing Point in Time Resolutions

Here are my Arbitrary Dividing Point in Time Resolutions for the year:

1. Develop a business that makes £2000/month after tax.
2. Develop a business that is location independent.
3. Visit at least 4 new countries.
4. Read 1 book per week.
5. Write 1 Moleskine page per day.
6. Watch a maximum of 1 TV episode per day.

The first three are longer term goals that will need to be broken down into smaller segments. The latter three are ones that i can track on an ongoing basis.

The main reason for posting these online is so that i am accountable, i.e. If you notice i am not following through on them, please kick my ass!