March Commitment: Meals at Home and Mornings to Myself

As part of my "focus" theme this year, I've decided to commit to a different exercise in self-discipline each month. This is partly inspired by Murakami, who struck me as an organic and surreal writer, but upon further research, had actually learned to be quite disciplined in his writing process. Talent is nothing without focus and endurance.

Again, this is really for myself. Self-proclamations that keep me personally accountable:

Meals at Home: The month of March, I will not eat out at restaurants. I will spend money on food only from the grocery store. I can, however, eat at friend/family houses or very special occasions (birthdays don't count but my friend's wedding reception does!).

Mornings to Myself: The month of March, I will wake up by 6:30am on weekdays. The first thing I will do in the morning is put on my robe and start hot water for my morning cup of tea.

Two challenges I'll face this month:

One, spring forward is March 13th. Which means 6:30am will feel like 5am after that date. I'll find a way to make it work!

Second, eating out at restaurants is how one socializes on the fly. But it's a commitment and I think my friends will understand. I'll solve this by bringing my own food and having meals prepped.

Currently Reading: What I Talk About When I Talk About Running (Haruki Murakami, 2007)

“I am struck by how, except when you're young, you really need to prioritize in life, figuring out in what order you should divide up your time and energy. If you don't get that sort of system set by a certain age, you'll lack focus and your life will be out of balance.” 

Books and Movies of 2015

Books

Fell short of my goals and read less than last year! But I'm okay with that... because I was part-time for part of last year. 2015 had books that I started but didn't finish -- and books that I sped through.

• Mother Night (Kurt Vonnegut, 1961)
• Ready Player One (Ernest Cline, 2011)
• The Art of Racing in the Rain (Garth Stein, 2008)
• The Martian (Andy Weir, 2011)
• The Sirens of Titan (Kurt Vonnegut, 1959)
• The Time Machine (H.G. Wells, 1895)
• Where Does it Hurt?: An Entrepeneur's Guide to Fixing Health Care (Jonathan Bush, 2014)
• [discontinued] The Island (Aldous Huxley, 1962)

My favorite was The Art of Racing in the Rain because it really reflected how I've been learning to live my life -- fluid, one step at a time, and with joy.

The most interesting was Mother Night because Kurt Vonnegut's writing never disappoints me. "We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be."

The funniest was The Martian because the writing voice was unabashed and it catered to the nerdy soul and engineer in me.

The most disappointing was The Island by Alduous Huxley... because there was too much content. It had so many great ideas but I couldn't get past the writing. I didn't finish but I will try again another year.

Movies

I watched a lot more movies this year and also re-watched a lot of movies. The movies are listed alphabetically but size indicates how it ranks among the other movies I watched in 2015:

• Back to the Future (1985)
• Bridesmaids (2011)
• Broken Circle Breakdown (2012)
• Chicago (2002)
• End of Watch (2012)
• Gone Girl (2014)
• Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
• Her (2013)
• Inside Out (2015)
• Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
• Pulp Fiction (1994)
• Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015)
• The Fault in Our Stars (2014)
• The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1 (2014)
• The Interview (2014)
• The Theory of Everything (2014)
• Wild (2014)
• [re] Aladdin (1992)
• [re] Beauty and the Beast (1992)
• [re] Hitch (2005)
• [re] Sweeney Todd (2007)
• [re] Tarzan (1999)
• [re] The Emperor's New Groove (1999)
• [re] The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
• [re] Titanic (1997)
• [re] Wolf Children (2012)

I am truly, truly blessed.

I've intentionally started to detach myself from my major social media outlets: Facebook and Instagram. I only post on Instagram on weekends (and on Marvin's phone where it's installed). And I'm a little ridiculous because I even made a secret pact with myself that I would only post pictures to Facebook seasonally (once every 3-4 months) unless I had a big trip update.

Why do this? I think, essentially, I really want to be more authentic and connected with people physically around me rather than be distracted by image crafting. I want to capture pictures for the memories.

It's harder than it sounds, though:

1) Facebook is really helpful in keeping memories logged chronologically, so I do see some contradiction and pointlessness in my resolve.

2) In person, I have to give story context in a more engaging way (which I'm getting better at). And, if I haven't told a story many times before, I'm less practiced.

3) But the most difficult part is... sometimes I just want an outlet for my feelings.

Sometimes I just want to shout out to the virtual world.

So here is my most recent one:

"When he's your best friend, training partner, and life teammate, every day is happiness."



Life has been so stressful lately. But he's been a bright spot in my life. He keeps my grounded and full of perspective. I am truly, truly blessed.