With everything drawing to a close, and everyone hoping all’s well that ends well, I have a piece of advice for everybody, but mostly for myself: “Goodness gracious, it’s that time of the year to forget all the embarrassing, stupid, regretful, frustrating moments we once had in 2005!”
Like how they keep scores at the pool table, it’s always good to see what has actually been accomplished in a year’s worth of to-do lists. Let’s see:
1) to get driving license in November 2005 =c
reason/excuse: if I had black paint to cover the yellow boxes on the roads…
2) to be proactive in lessons =)
comment/ego trip: I am proactive in tutorials!
3) get cap score of 4 and above for sem 1 =c
reason/excuse: I came I saw and I was scared out of my wits at the sheer amount of readings we have to sift through - an average of 20 pages of content rich and ambiguous language even richer readings everyday.
4) get at least 6h of sleep everyday =)
comment/ego trip: this was quite adhered to, though the time I wake up varies with what time I sleep
5) smoke as little lecturers and tutors as possible =c
reason/excuse: I did not manage to digest and assimilate all the readings and pass out the hot sh*t during exams. I am a late bloomer!
6) secure IPPT silver =c
reason/excuse: I am on the holding list ie no reservist unit yet! (I am amply amazed at how some people spell it as “reservice”. Then again I shan’t laugh at them, so what if you have good grammatical skills, they are looking out for content, as I have learnt the hard way.)
7) have an idea of profession =)
comment/ego trip: Yeash, I am either looking at Public Relations or Journalist as a profession as a student majoring in Communications and New Media program.
8) groom self to be confident speaker =c
reason/excuse: Do your readings junior! To know what you’re talking about of course.
On News Radio, which I resolve to listen to more of nowadays, either Lush or News Radio, I learnt a way to make short work of goal setting. They are taught in the following five steps which spells SMART:
1) Specific: down to the last detail what you want to achieve
2) Measurable: the amount of output in must be able to show in units
3) Attainable: targets that are within reach in the year
4) Realistic: something that is not out of the blue, consider limitations
5) Trackable: monitor the progress so that past achievements spur you on when you’re down
The article can be found at http://www.mayoclinic.org/news2005-mchi/3149.html
With this goal setting skill armed, I shall now try to set some goals for 2006. It’s 1am, 1 hour into the New Year as I ponder.
How about:
1) Practise 1h of guitar everyday according to specific lessons from the guitar gym articles, and finish the lessons by end of January. The metronome will testify to my improvement. Have a checklist on PDA to tick every time I’m confident with a specific set of training.
2) Spend 1h a day per module seriously poring over the course packets from 5 modules. That will be 5 hours on revising. Tracking to be done in soft copy of commentary and summary of the articles I have read. This will go on till exams first day 21st April.
3) Be more worried about project work. Form up with effective team members. If they are not, make them. Get my own facts right first. Sum up of day’s events by recalling news radio and reading channel news asia website. Leave 3 days allowance to project deadline.
4) Run 2 times a week, once during the weekend and once on a free day at Bedok Stadium. Distance to be covered at least 2.4km. Maintain 12 pull ups, 40 sit ups everyday. Even on days where I wake up groggy.
That was fun. Now to make it happen. At least it wasn’t a mere carry over from last year’s goals and resolutions. Good night world, Frostbled will be heard. I will not give my parents a reason to nag at me till the wee hours of the morning not just to shut them up but to show that I understand fully their intentions and their goodwill to me. A term once mentioned by baby made my blood freeze in the veins: mid-life orphans. Then my colleague’s grandmother passing away in Vietnam, my own grandparents’ gradual aging. All these events have reminded me that the amount of time we spend with our parents in our lifetime isn’t exactly very long. Either they’re at work and you’re in school or out with friends or you’re in army or they’re overseas at work or you’re staying in hostel and they’re doing the night shift. I truly dread the experience of losing someone close to me.
Sad to end on a depressive note. Maybe it’s Marvin from the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. But I’m really quite stable right now, quite well rested after yesterday’s Crazy Elephant trip where I downed 2 mugs of Tiger. It helped that I watched Dennis the Menace movie in the afternoon then Ice Age in the evening while eating a great New Year meal at baby’s house prepared by her and cooked by her mum. There was vermicelli, curry chicken, roast duck (woot!), or kuan (yam nest wrapped around corn, vegetables, and carrots), more vegetables, and root beer and Coke! Happy New Year to all!
