For the past few weeks, as I’ve been doing more and more, I’ve been sleeping less and less because I’m still waking up at 5 AM every morning. I’ve been wanting to sleep in, but my desire to stay on schedule and show up to do my work is stronger than my desire to stay in my warm bed longer than I have to. I love what I’m doing, and I want to be awake to do as much of it as possible, but at the same time, I feel like I should give myself some sort of break every once in a while.

When I first started this blog, I gave myself strict limits on what I could and couldn’t do so I can focus on bettering myself as much as possible. I made huge mistakes that I hated myself for, and all I wanted to do was get away from that person and toward someone else. I’m definitely not the same person I was when I made those mistakes, but instead of relaxing those limits I set on my self, I’ve added to and increased those limits. I don’t know if I can function as productively and as focused as I am today without limits.

I am afraid of falling back to my old ways. Even if I don’t consciously think about it on a daily basis, every now and then, whenever I’m at the grocery store or whenever I’m feeling lonely or for some other reason, I think about relaxing and doing something I’ve been depriving myself of. That fear exists, and I don’t know what to do with it. I don’t think I’m being hard on myself, even though that’s what it may sound like. I’m thriving with these self-imposed limits, and I love everything I’m doing.

The challenge that I’m having is not caring what other people think. Other than those who read this blog, nobody I know knows what I do every day, and I’m afraid they might find me boring if they find out. I’ve been especially thinking about this as I’ve slowly built up a few friendships at work. I’ve told a few people a rough sketch of what I do after work, and I’m always afraid of revealing more for fear of being seen as boring. That fear is real and strong and very, very stupid.

No matter what anyone else thinks, I’m not boring. I’m focused. I’m showing up every day and doing my job. Every limit I’ve imposed on myself has been imposed for a reason, and I’m thriving because of them. I’m a writer who writes thousands of words a day now. I’m in the best shape of my life, and I’m only getting better every day. I started reading Don Quixote this week, and soon, I’m going to read more fiction from authors I’ve never read before all in an effort to be a better writer. In the end, that’s all I want to be.

By giving myself limits, I’ve been able to focus myself on the essentials, and I’m living the best life I’ve ever lived in my life. It’s hard, and I don’t get as much sleep as I used to, but I’m happy and loving every minute of every day I’m alive. That, to me, is a sign of success.

For the past few weeks, I’ve been learning about and setting up a piece of software called System Center Configuration Manager 2012 R2. How Microsoft chooses to name these things is beyond me, but most everyone on the internet chooses to refer to it by SCCM 2012, so that’s how I’ve come to refer to it. What it does, in a very uninformed (because I’m still learning it) and simplistic way, is help me deploy software across all my Windows machines, including a way to deploy Windows 8.1 sometime in the future. It helps me build a library of approved software for teachers and students to download from either a piece of software I’ve pushed out to everyone or by following a link to a page on our server. It’s super cool, super useful, super complicated, and super fun. I’m still learning all the little intricacies of a very small piece of what it can do, but even just that makes me happy and satisfied.

One of my favorite teachers at work told me about a problem she was having with her SMART Board. These boards have touch capabilities, and she likes writing stuff with her pen on it and manipulating Windows and whatever else on it, which is cool and it should just work™, but it wasn’t working. I checked a few settings and tested out what was going on with it. Everything worked for me. She saw me doing everything she wanted to be doing, and she was frustrated. A running joke with everyone at school is that whatever problem staff members and teachers are having is automatically solved by me just showing up. Like my presence fixes everything. And that’s what seemed to be going on. I told her to try to recreate everything that led up to the issues as much as possible, but it seemed like stuff she wasn’t able to do yesterday was working with me just standing there. What made this whole situation really funny and really fun was that her class was super amazed that everything was working. They were all telling me that the computers like me and that it’s only working because I’m there, and the teacher also was joining in on the teasing, and I laughed because I didn’t know what I could do. I told her to call me as soon as it starts acting up again because I want to see what’s going on.

This has happened a bunch of times to me since I’ve been here. There are problems teachers seem to be having, but once I come to take a look, those problems disappear. It’s frustrating because I believe that they are having problems, but I can’t fix it because they don’t know how to explain themselves fully and correctly and because I can’t recreate the issues myself. Another teacher today has been complaining about his wifi the entire time I’ve been working here, but every time I go into his room and check it out, it works just fine. Today he wanted me to check out a few of his laptops because they were having issues. I tested them and they all seemed to be working fine. I took them into my office and did some routine maintenance to appease him and brought them back in time for a few of his students to test them out. They all worked just fine. They were all stumped, and all I could think was that maybe I do have some superpowers. Maybe I’m like Aquaman but with technology. Technoman. Digiman. Netman.

I feel more confident at work, and I look forward to coming to work every day, and I love what I do there and what I want to do, and I love joking around and getting to know all the students and teachers and staff members, and a big reason why I’m able to do all that I want to do is because work doesn’t tire me out. I don’t come home stressed and tired and irritated. I come home energized, and that energy is important because I need to write, work out, read, and write some more. I wouldn’t be able to do this if I was unhappy, and I’m the complete opposite of that. I’m lucky and grateful.

I’m going to try something different with my blog. For months, my blog has felt like a place where I had to try to say something important, in a sense. Something that could maybe attract readers beyond my group of Facebook friends. It didn’t work. Instead, I lost interest in writing here every night, and that felt unfair to me. Every morning I would pour through my Metrics and feel great when my subscribers went up or really sad when they went down. Sorry, but my blog isn’t really for my (lack of) readers. It’s for me. It’s for me to try things, to succeed, to fail, to learn, and to write better.

I don’t care if my posts aren’t coherent or well-structured or well-written or proofread to shit. I don’t think short-term with many things, but I was thinking about the short-term with this blog. Like I wrote above, every entry had to be good, and that meant sacrificing sleep and in the end, quality and honesty. I’ve been writing in here on a nightly basis for 193 days straight. I honestly don’t know if I’ve improved as a writer or just got really good at writing bullshit. But 193 days from now? One year from now?

I want to look back at all these entries and see my progress. I want to get better. That’s been a big theme of this blog since the very beginning. I’m writing more now than I’ve ever written in my life. Just to restate my habits: write my novel in the morning, write my novel after work, journal about my novel, journal about some personal things, journal about three things I was grateful for today, and write a blog post. All that is over 2,000 words spread across six different sessions. And I still don’t think I write enough and I still want to write more.

I really believe the work I’m doing now on this blog will produce something really good down the line. I’m learning by writing these entries every night. I’m showing up and doing the work. I really want to write well-written and very personal essays. That seems really fun to me. That seems like I something I know I can do and that I want to do. I like writing about myself. I like writing about my life. I like learning something new about myself through writing. At the same time, I don’t spend any time really trying to produce something that I spent my time on. All these entries are written in about an hour, most times less than that. A lot of that time was spent thinking about what to write about, and the longer I took, the worse the product seemed to be.

I gave myself an arbitrary limit of 500 words because that seemed to me like enough time for me to say something about my day. Sometimes I go way over that when I really shouldn’t have. Other times I could’ve cut out a lot and not have reached it. Those are the times when I wished I could go back and add and revise and improve my product. I’m not sure if I’ll be able to do that while I’m on this path toward 365 daily entries. One missed night will kill me.

Another thing about all these entries are the titles. Sometimes I copy/paste a line or a word that I wrote about in the entry and move on. Other times the title just comes to me, and I like those. Most of the time, though, I just toss something up there without much thought. Fewer entries will definitely help me out there. Not today, though.

For the longest time I didn’t know if I wanted to continue paying for a blog past the one year mark. Now I really think like I should. I really want to, and I’m going to. This is my place. My name is up at the very top for the world to see because I’m not afraid of who I am. This is me and this is my life. I don’t need validation. I need to revise and make my shit better.

Not tonight, though. Tonight I want to sleep.

Take nothing for granted. Life is short and anything that impedes your ability to live it as fully as possible should be excised immediately.

When somebody smiles at you, smile back. Somebody had a pleasant thought of you in their minds when they saw you and smiled as a result; it’s very special to have this connection with someone else.

Don’t repress your emotions. It causes more harm than good because going against the self is restrictive and harmful to your soul. You are who you are and you should be you as freely and as much as possible.

Stop projecting what you think other people think of you toward your actions or inactions. It’s harmful toward your self and to the world around you. Be free and be as true to yourself as possible.

Stop wishing you were different. If you don’t like something, change it. Otherwise, accept who you are. It’s okay to be who you are. No one else will ever get to be you.

Focus your actions toward something beneficial. Don’t waste your time doing something unimportant. Life is too short.

Do what you love and love what you do. As long as everything you do falls under that philosophy, then you are doing all you can do to live the best life possible. If what you’re doing doesn’t fall under that philosophy, change it or cut it out immediately. It’s not worth it.

Treat your friends and family fairly and with love. At the end of the day, they are the ones that truly make life worthwhile. They help you understand the world in ways you can’t even imagine. They help you when you’re down and need help. Their love is unconditional, and you must honor and respect that and reciprocate it as much as possible.

Don’t let writing beat you up. Even when your writing isn’t going well, just remember how nothing else in the world is as fun as writing. Also, don’t worry if it’s not good the first time. You can always revise.

Have fun. Sometimes all you need is a moment of pure joy. Laugh. Play games. Joke with friends. Go running. Dance. Life is too short to not have fun.

Don’t be hard on yourself. Don’t let work interfere with sleep and with fun. But don’t slack off, either. You’re not where you want to be yet, and the only way to get there is through work. Write every day. Read every day. Get better every day. That’s the only way to get better. There are no shortcuts. Show up every day and work.

Above all, sleep. Don’t let work or fun or people interfere with your sleep. Rising early is beautiful and amazing and quiet and starting the day with a good hour of work is awe-inspiring. Don’t let distractions keep you from sleep. We sleep for a third of our lives for a reason: to make us energized and inspired enough for the other two-thirds of our lives.

A week or so ago, I decided to ignore the girl I developed a crush on at school. I’m not speaking to her, smiling at her, looking at her. I’m moving on because she’s only 18, and I’m a full ten years older than her. The age difference doesn’t bother me; it’s the fact that she’s 18 that bothers me. She hasn’t lived yet. She doesn’t know what life has to offer her yet. I’m trying to reserve one day a month to being social. That means going out somewhere and meeting people. Novel idea, right?

A few entries ago, I somewhat committed myself to meeting one new person a day. I haven’t started that yet, but I did put it in my OmniFocus app and am awaiting the time when I muster up the courage to actually try to do it. Don’t know when that’ll be, and I know for sure I’m holding off on it because it makes me uncomfortable. I’m an introvert, and I just finished this book about introversion that is really, really good. Every aspect of introversion that Susan Cain, the author, described rang true to me so much that it hurt and felt good at the same time. I think I can attribute most, if not all, of my depression when I was younger to my introversion. I believed that something was wrong with me because I wasn’t more social or that I didn’t have many friends. I would try very hard to be more extroverted, but I almost always failed, and I was aggrieved by that failure.

Failure is one of those things that depends completely on the person going through it. As a younger man, failure paralyzed me. I would hate myself every time I failed, and my subconscious would berate me constantly, telling me I didn’t deserve to live, that I should just end it because I’m just a waste of oxygen. This happened every day, from morning to night. It happened so much that I became numb to it all, even though it kept happening. I had zero confidence in myself, and I always felt defeated. Like nothing I did mattered. Which is why suicide felt like the most natural thing to do. What’s the point? Nobody cared about me and I didn’t care about me so who would miss me if I was gone?

The man I am today thrives on failure. I expect failure to teach me where I went wrong so I can refine and improve myself so I won’t fail next time. I’m able to do so much today because I’ve committed to this dance for six years. It took me years before I realized how to develop habits, more years after that to string together a series of different habits that stuck, and about 191 days to choose the right habits, string them together with other right habits, and live as fulfilling and productive a life I’ve ever have before.

Sometimes I wish I could go back in time and talk to my old self. I will tell him that things will get better. If I had someone back then to tell me that, then I think I wouldn’t have attempted suicide the one and only time I ever tried. But at the same time, I wouldn’t be the man I am right now if I didn’t go through all that. Maybe all I needed was a friend. I had friends, but not many who wanted to listen to my problems. I still don’t really have that person in my life, except anyone who reads this. This blog is my friend, my sounding board, my therapist, and I’m grateful for all of it.

In chess, there’s a stage in the game called the endgame. It’s when the players are left with very few pieces on the board. The good players are always thinking about the endgame and how they can turn it to their advantage. Every now and then I think about my own endgame. Not of life, even though I do think about that sometimes, but on this blog and this journey I’ve embarked upon. I’ve come a long way since day one, and I can’t really recall what life was like back then. I remember feeling hurt and sad and frustrated and angry, and I remember thinking that I needed to change and do something about my stagnant and unfulfilling life. So I started a blog and wrote about my frustrations and successes, wishes and experiments. I wrote about writing every morning, starting Insanity and eventually committing to over two hundred days of it, and reading every day. I wrote about a girl I don’t care about anymore, about my own wish to date and not doing it yet, and about a hundred other things. I’m left now with my own personal endgame.

Over the past few months, I’ve been slowly writing more and more every day, and it culminated to today, where I added another novel writing session in the afternoon. I really didn’t want to write because I was tired and annoyed after work, and I really wanted to watch the latest episode of the Walking Dead. But I made a plan, and I wrote down each small step I needed to take to ensure I complete this task, and I did it. I made my Primal Fuel shake, placed my laptop on my mStand, put my headphones on and picked some music, opened Scrivener in full-screen mode, and read the words I wrote this morning. It all seemed familiar. In the morning I usually have a cup of hot and tasty black coffee, but today I had a simple shake. I drank it all before I wrote one word, which was funny to me because I usually take a sip of the coffee in between thoughts. I didn’t have that this afternoon. Once I got started, though, the words came out just like they always do. I finished my words, crossed off the task from my list, and then started my workout. It all felt good.

I started another experiment today. I don’t know how it’ll evolve in the future because I haven’t had the time to feel it out yet. The new experiment was cooking various new recipes. I spent a good hour yesterday planning out the next two weeks worth of meals. I started off slow — many of the meals are familiar and I’ve done them many, may times before. I interspersed new meals, though, and one of those was a Western Omelet for breakfast this morning. It was simple, easy, and super delicious. I bought all the ingredients yesterday at Safeway¹, and it all came together with a very delicious, healthy, and filling breakfast. I need to do it more because I really need the practice. I need to add fewer veggies or else I won’t be able to fold the eggs in half well enough. I also need to play around with the right heat level on my stove because the directions asks for medium-low, but I think medium to medium-high works better for me. This breakfast really affected the rest of my day because I was full and very satisfied and energetic.

I’m piling up all these habits and routines, and I’m living the most fulfilling life I’ve ever lived, but like I’ve said many times before, I don’t really think this will last forever. It can’t, right? It’s too much for one man to handle, and I’m a man, and I can totally foresee myself not being able to handle this forever. What am I trying to do? What are my goals? I honestly don’t think I need an endgame or goals. I think the process is the point. The journey is everything, and I’m loving every minute it.

My life is a rough draft that I haven’t finished revising. I’m flirting with a bevy of things to do every day, and for the most part, I’ve automated many aspects of my life. It’s great! Except when I’m not in the mood to do something. Then life sucks, and I fight against all my natural urges and do the habit because I have to check it off my list to be happy. Or I have days like today, a day not very different than any other, and I love everything I’m doing that I’m going to do even more so I commit myself to one more habit while keeping all my other, more important habits, and removing one of my “unproductive” habits, a.k.a watching TV after work, just to have the time to do it. Will I succeed? Who knows! But I’m trying it anyway because I want to see this through.

The new habit is writing another 300 words every day at around 4:15 PM, or after I come home from work. It doesn’t take me very long to get started in the morning and get those 300 words written. I usually read what I wrote the previous day or two, and I simply continue the book. I can apply the same routine later in the day, right? I’m about to find out. I want to do this for many reasons. Writing 300 words a day isn’t that much in the grand scheme of things. I can double my output and pace if I double that. What I can produce in two months I can produce in one. That thought intrigues me. Another reason is that I’m on the first draft of the second draft of this story I’ve been working on since 2011. I threw away the first draft and started over with this new draft. First drafts are supposed to be shitty. Mine’s shitty, so that rule holds true. Let me just get this shitty draft over with, then I don’t have to stare at a blank page anymore. I can revise revise revise, and only then can I push my novel to the limits and produce some good work. In the end, that’s the goal.

I want to be published, yes, but I don’t want to publish shitty first drafts, even if they are good enough to be published (which they aren’t nor ever will be). I want to write well, and I want to write good novels. If I was the main character in some freshman screenwriter’s first screenplay, I want to be published, but I need to write well. To write well, I have to write every day. The best way to write every day is to set up a routine, and my routine is to get up at 5 fucking AM in the morning, brew a cup of coffee, sit down by my desk, open Scrivener, enter full screen mode, and start writing. I keep hitting ⌘⇧T to view my statistics, to see how close (or far) I am from 300 words. Eventually I get there, and then I start my morning routine and the rest of my day. For those of you taking notes, it’s all about consistency. I have this poster on my wall that says Slow and Steady Wins. That’s my philosophy with all this routine shit. Little by little we build the life we want by doing the things to get us there. And I figured I wasn’t doing enough, so I decided to write more every day because I don’t already write enough.

There’s this idea I learned today from Josh Waitzkin that he wrote about in his book, The Art of Learning, which I want to read. He describes this concept of making smaller circles. This is how he describes it:

In Making Smaller Circles we take a single technique or idea and practice it until we feel its essence. Then we gradually condense the movements while maintaining their power, until we are left with an extremely potent and nearly invisible arsenal.

Right now I’m doing all I can to see what works and what doesn’t. That’s really what I’ve been doing and documenting since September, which is when I started this blog. For the most part, most everything I’ve tried has stuck and has become ingrained into my life. I’ve found that I’m left with very little time for anything else, which sucks, and I’ve found that I don’t sleep as much as I would like, which doubly sucks, and I’ve found that I always want to do more, which doesn’t suck that much until I decide to actually follow through and do more, which then sucks when it inevitably eats away at my time and sleep. Which is why I found that Josh Waitzkin quote and concept so mind-blowing. If I keep working at my habits, keep focusing them and reducing them down to their essence, I may — just may — reclaim my time and my sleep and possibly do even more than I’m doing now. Maybe one day I can quickly get started on my tasks, do consistent and high quality work at a fraction of the time, and go on with my day. I’m not sure if that’s how Josh Waitzkin describes his concept since I haven’t read his book yet, but that idea alone excites me.

I need to focus, I need to be consistent, and I need to reduce my habits and routines to their essence so I have more time to live my life as happily as possible. That’s so easy I can do it in my sleep.

In the past few years, I’ve written over a thousand pages of my novel in a couple of drafts, hundreds, possibly thousands more pages in my various journals, and over 340 pages for this blog, and I’m still afraid I’m not supposed to be a writer. I read this article today by Ryan Boudinot for The Stranger that humbled, inspired, and frightened me. In it, he said:

Occasionally my students asked me about how I got published after I got my MFA, and the answer usually disappointed them. After I received my degree in 1999, I spent seven years writing work that no one has ever read—two novels and a book’s worth of stories totaling about 1,500 final draft pages. These unread pages are my most important work because they’re where I applied what I’d learned from my workshops and the books I read, one sentence at a time. Those seven years spent in obscurity, with no attempt to share my work with anyone, were my training, and they are what allowed me to eventually write books that got published.

I’ve been writing seriously since I was about 16 years old, and I really don’t think any of my stuff is any good. I was fortunate to be accepted to the USC School of Cinematic Arts Writing for Screen & Television when I was 18, and which I graduated from when I was 22. I turn 29 in a few months, and I don’t think I’m any closer to getting published. I just don’t think I’m good enough. I’m trying — god knows I’m trying — to be the best writer I can possibly be, but part of me feels like I’m not trying hard enough. I don’t write enough or read enough or read the right books enough or a million other reasons. I can toil away for 16 hours a day every day for years and I still don’t think I’ll be good enough to be published.

I signed up yesterday to Skillshare, which is this really cool service that bills itself as a place for creators to learn from other creators. Yesterday, I devoured Susan Orleans’ — yes, that Susan Orleans — class on Creative Nonfiction: Write Truth with Style. After watching the class, I felt super excited to write. I learned some useful techniques to implement into my workflow that I’m grateful I learned. Today, however, I went through Yiyun Li’s class on Writing Character-Driven Short Stories. I felt like I was learning a lot as the class progressed, but there was a comment she made that struck a chord. I won’t mention it here because the comment itself doesn’t matter; it was how it made me feel. It made me feel worthless. It made me feel like I should find something else to do.

I shouldn’t have felt that way. The easiest thing for me to do is to go through my writing and revise it. That’s really it. Revise and rewrite, revise and rewrite, revise and rewrite. Problem solved. But then I read Ryan Boudinot’s article after that, and he seemed to pile more doubt onto my mind all I’ve been thinking about and feeling is that I’m not supposed to be a writer.

You know what, though? Fuck that. You know those stats I rattled off in the beginning? That fucking inspired me. I’ve written thousands and thousands of pages, and I know that I’m a much better writer than I was yesterday. I suck as a proofreader because I just don’t do it, but as a writer? I know I’m good enough to be published. I know I can be published. And yes, it involves trying harder. There’s nothing wrong with that. I’m trying hard already, but you know what? I’m not published. So I need to try harder. I need to finish my novel, and I need to write more stories, and I need to read more fiction books and fewer non-fiction books, and I need to not quit. I need to keep fucking pushing because nobody else can do this but me. Nobody else wants this as much as I do.

I love writing because it’s the purest and best form for me to express myself. As an introvert, I don’t get much of a chance to express myself in many other areas of my life. Writing is that outlet for me, and I love it. I love telling stories, and I love getting to know characters and empathizing with them, and I love telling the truth as I see it. This is my world, and I love exploring it through writing. Doubt sucks, and it makes me question everything, but I think I need that sometimes because it only reaffirms my commitments toward doing what I think is right for me. It’s all on me. Nobody else is worried about my happiness but myself. That’s the truth, and I need to get my ass off the damn floor and do the fucking work.

I’m an introvert, and I don’t like going out. I like staying in, reading and writing and living “a life of the mind”, a phrase I read in Susan Cain’s book, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking. I’m really, really enjoying this book, and I’m super glad I’m reading it at this time in my life. I gain a lot of energy by being alone. I love the solitude that writing and reading and meditating and simply bettering myself day by day brings. I don’t know if I would be able to do half of what I’m doing if I lived with people or was more of an extrovert. Conversely, I need some human contact, and I’m not giving myself much of it nowadays. I socialize at work, and I like most of my co-workers, but that’s all they are, co-workers. It’s hard to admit this but I really don’t have any friends here. I have friends, but they mostly live out-of-state and not here in Montana. I want to change that.

I’m scared of going somewhere to meet people by myself, but I think that’s something I have to do. Not just going to a bar or a nightclub¹ or something like that, but going to a class and learning something, like martial arts, cooking, art, or whatever. Logically, this all makes sense to me. If I want to meet people, I have to go somewhere where there are people. If I want to meet people who might be similar to me and/or I’ll like, I have to go do something that attracts those types of people. It’s tough, though, for an introvert like me. The thought of doing all that versus doing something like staying in by myself and reading always loses. I’d rather do the comfortable and familiar than the scary and unfamiliar.

I’ve definitely outgrown the shell I used to be entrapped in growing up. Hell, I don’t think I really outgrew it until my senior year of college, maybe even sooner than that, at around my junior year. I’m comfortable and confident with who I am. I like myself, and I like what I’m doing, and I think I’m a catch. It’s just showing that to someone and letting them get to know me that’s tough. I can’t wrap my head around that whole concept. Some people find it super easy to be around people and hitting it off with someone. I don’t, and I wish I did. No, that’s not true. I wish I gave myself more opportunities to be around people because I’m a cool guy and I know I can find at least one person in a crowd full of people I’d hit it off with.

The friends I’ve met here in Montana have all come from either work, firefighting, or through family. I don’t have a friend up here that I’ve met outside of that. I’ve seen people create goals for themselves like meet one new person a day, and that goal scares me. I’d be lucky if I met one new person a month let alone every day. But maybe I have to do something that scares me to be happier and live a more fulfilling life.

If it’s not hard, it’s not worth doing, right? Well… shit. Am I committing to meeting one new person a day? Fuuuuuuuuuuuuck. I should. I know I should. I’m scared. Oh shit. What does a day like that even look like? How the hell would I do that? Haha, I just thought of a new notebook idea: logging ever new person I met. Jeeze. I have a problem. But oh god. Oh god. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. I should do this. I should definitely do this. A day, though? Jeeze. Oh jeeze. Where would I go? Oh god. What would I say? Knowing me, I’d probably get pepper sprayed the first day I do this. Hell, I got pulled over the first day I went out driving. But… shit. I have to do something like this. I have to. Well, okay. Okay. Okay.

Shit.

I need to sleep. I’m exhausted, and I’m pushing myself a little too hard. I’m excited that I have a lot of energy to do a lot of things, and I’m grateful that I’ve been having so many ideas on various things recently, but god fucking dammit I’m tired. I’m sore because the Asylum hybrid workout is no joke, and it’s kicking my ass. Physically, I’m in shape to do them; mentally, though, I’m somewhere else. It feels like I’m drugged, and I’m not acting like myself. It’s a frustrating feeling, and this is going to feel like a frustrating entry to read.

I’m pressuring myself to do more than I can realistically do. There are so many things I wan to do, and I’m trying to fit them all into a 24 hour period, and that’s impossible. I’ve been trying to slow down, and it works for like a day, but then I find the energy to do something else or come up with an idea to do something else and I’m back to where I was. It feels like I’m in a race, and I have to go as fast as possible to win. But I don’t know who I’m going up against or know what the prize is if I win. Does winning even apply here? I don’t win; I’ll never win. I’ll still be working up until the day I die. Then I guess I’ll finally get my sleep.

All I want to do is create and consume, create and consume, create and consume. I want to write my novel, write a journal about my novel, write a journal about my personal personal life, write a journal about the things I’m grateful, write a blog entry about how I’m trying to be better than I was 186 days ago, trying to start a drawing habit, trying to keep an analog commonplace book, trying to read a book a week, trying to keep up to date on the news of the world, trying to read my current and past comic books, trying to organize my digital information, from photos to text files to miscellaneous other data, trying to become as physically fit as I possibly can, trying to eat as healthily as I can, trying to meditate 15 minutes every day and be as centered as I possibly can, and I’m trying to do all of this while also getting sleep. There’s more, I’m sure of it, but this was all I could think of at the moment.

I’m also trying to find someone. This week, for some reason, I’ve been playing Sufjan Stevens on repeat. There’s a song he has called Arnika from his All Delighted People EP. There’s a lyric in there that gets me:

I’m tired of life; I’m tired of waiting for someone.

I’m tired. I need to take better care of myself and have some fun. I want to drink again. Some Pinot Noir. That was my favorite wine. I want to have dinner with friends. I want to have a long chat with a good friend. The simple things. I need to find time for that stuff in my life. It doesn’t matter if I create everything I’ve ever wanted; it doesn’t matter to me if I’m not happy. And right now? I don’t know if I’m happy. All I know is that I’m tired, and I’m going to bed.