When I was a graduate student, I didn’t like how others would say, “You’re still in school” as if somehow I was on vacation or not working as hard as everyone else. Mind you, I was also working as a teaching assistant and still had my old computer tech job so I was easily pushing a 40+ work week.
Now that I’ve graduated though, there is a subtle difference.
Pushing myself to grow is completely on me now. There’s no longer an external, judging force of professors, grades, and applications hanging over me pushing me to learn or grow.
At my job, I’ve been there for five years so the intial learning curve has been well passed.
All my past activities like improv classes and doing trapeze were ways of exploring new activities and expanding my horizions. But, they weren’t my passion or my focus. Maybe interests I would like to eventually develop further at best.
But, I do have a few projects in mind for this year that would radically alter my future. I’m investing the bulk of my time, energy, and my life savings into these projects. High risk, high reward. The one thing I will not accept is living a mediocre life. Not only because I know that my potential has yet to be reached but because it’s an insult to all of those people in less fortunate circumstances. I did not have a fairy tale childhood, but the very fact that I have all my limbs, have an American passport, and not drowing in debt means I have more opporunities than the vast majority of the world.
The Year of Challenges is June 2010 – June 2011, my journey to radically grow and succeed in the areas I identified as most important to me at the present moment. However, I’m not going to reveal what exactly I’m doing quite yet.
Look, it’s not in my nature to be mysterious, but I can’t talk about it, and I can’t talk about why.
Most of my close friends know what I’m doing although the details are likely unknown.
In short, I’m quite busy despite being finished with graduate school (did I ever get my diploma?). Once I start building momentum and success, I’ll start writing updates….maybe.