Thursday, May 4, 2006

Don’t know why, but I’ve really felt like updating this blog a lot lately. It feels…comfortable.

As you may have noticed, I’ve been reading quite a lot lately. Finished The 80/20 Principle, All Marketers Are Liars, and Communicating at Work. All of which have got me thinking:

What’s my story? (hmm, shades of All Marketers Are Liars.) Who am I? How do I want to present myself? The obvious answer is “Be yourself,” but to quote Walt Whitman, I contain multitudes. What aspects of msyelf do I most want to make public? What do I most want to get across to people? Since I want to make the world a better place, what can I do to make that happen?

I’m realizing that I spend most of my time on things that don’t feed my long-term goals, and that I don’t clear out time for things that I do find important. Why do I spend hours making and checking backups when I could be writing? It’s the classic 80/20 principle: I spend 80% of my time on things that deliver 20% life value.

What would happen if, every day, I concentrated on doing things that fed my desire to help people? What if I taught people—in some way—before I open my mail or check Anime News Network?

(And I’m not saying I should work, work, work every minute of every day. I’m saying I should re-prioritize the Important stuff over the nagging stuff. I can still relax, and I can still do the nagging stuff, but I’ll be absolutely sure to do the Important stuff.)