As promised, I continue to publish my monthly life reports, where I'm covering some highlights from the previous month, including lessons learned, income, personal expenses, fitness, and other useful resources.
Why monthly reports?
I feel I really needed to start writing these reports a while ago. The good thing is that at least I have started now.
Monthly reports help to reflect better, feel responsibility, and keep myself in check every month.
Lifestyle optimization is impossible without tracking. By tracking your activities, habits, and time, you can most definitely become more aware and conscious about what are you doing, when, and most importantly - raise the question why.
I don't want to spend my time in a miserable way or in a way how society expects me to live it. Since design is what I do, I think the best way to live your life is by designing it yourself.
If you're not going to design life yourself, someone else will do it for you.
March somehow felt really fast. It's the first month of calendar spring, and, I guess, the highlight of the month is that I have finally started my very first position as a user experience designer at a Scandinavian bank.
The month was quite intense while meeting new people, adjusting to new environment, and trying to keep my motivation for the challenges.
Income
As mentioned before, March was the month when I finally got a decent job offer from a Scandinavian bank, which I accepted. This means, of course, a stream of stable income from this day job, while I can still look for various freelance gigs to improve my design skills.
In my Life Report: February 2019, I wrote that I'm planning to live and learn from my savings until ~September-October, 2019. Well, this suddenly changed and it's a good thing. I feel I need this stable income to be less anxious about my future, and I guess it's normal to feel this way.
Security is okay but there's no need to be obsessed about it, there are so many ways to make a living, relax. However, I feel so good to be making money from the area I'm really passionate about, and this is only the very first step of my design career. I feel excited AF about this!
Most of my month's income came from job's salary (for 2 weeks) and grants.
Personal expenses
Last month I managed to stay extremely lean with my finances since I wasn't working at that time. In March, however, the expenses increased around 30%.
I spend some more money on purchases like clothing (well, needed some new stuff for my new job), hygiene stuff, and gifts. Entertainment spent was also bigger (Keymono concert, also film festival 'Kino Pavasaris'). Fitness was HUGE in March - been having private gym sessions with my wonderful coach, which isn't very cheap but... health is a priority no matter what.
Self-development spent was lower since I didn't buy more online courses, and I found some needed books online, instead of buying them from Amazon.
Overall, not too proud of myself for my spending in March, however, still not spent more than I gained, so I'm in a safe spot, I guess.
Fitness & Nutrition
Well, in terms of pain levels, March was way better than February. I guess the work I put in in January and February really started to feel on my body as my weak spots got stronger.
For those who don't know, I'm still dealing with a back injury (spinal hernia) since late Fall.
My fitness pattern stayed the same - I'm I'm hitting the gym twice per week with my coach Kristina, and getting a massage once per month, too. Also, my every day starts with yoga & stretches for 30-40 mins.
I was still feeling some pain in different parts of my body, however, it wasn't my back or legs that I've been working on. We start to feel that this might not be injury related but mostly psychosomatic pain because of anxiety and/or stress. Well, need to work on my mind more to get rid of all this then.
Fasting. Obviously, there's no need to change what's working for you. That's why fasting is still my. daily nutrition pattern. I'm keeping a usual 16:8 pattern, meaning that I don't consume any calories for at least 16 hours a day, and have my 'eating window' for remaining 8 hours.
Productivity
March was quite diverse in terms of productivity. Overall I'm happy that I'm staying really consistent with my habits.
However, by starting a new job in mid-March, some rhythms were interrupted, which, I guess, is normal. Now, I need to spend at least 8-10 hours per day at one place (the office), which isn't that easy after a break.
New people, lots of people around, actually. This is both good and bad, since it tends to drain my energy, which is also natural.
Nevertheless my new job, I'm still keeping with my routines on reading every single morning (made a few slip-ups when I did sports in the morning), meditating, also learning design by reading or doing courses.
Actually, I have also started to do "Daily UI" challenge for 100 days. So, I'm trying to work on a new interface every day, using Sketch. Practice is the only way to get better at this.
A few other things left the same - I'm still working by using Pomodoro Technique, focusing on deep work for 25 minutes, and then resting for 5 minutes.
This allows to remain concentrated for a span which is kinda normal for a human being. A short break allows to rest your body and mind a bit, and then you start another Pomodoro period of work.
My peak performance partner and me really found our best time to call and chat over our achievements in previous week, and plans for the upcoming one. Really happy about this.
Deeper reflection for the past week, and some planning for the next one, during a 30-45 minute call is still in place, too.
Peak performance partner listens to how my week was and why, all the realizations, frustrations, and a-ha moments, then we review my plan for the upcoming week. Of course, I do the same for him.
An article on why it's worth it to have a peak performance partner is coming up next. Stay tuned.
Finally, I was quite consistent with my habits too. Was getting better at waking up on time, and only failing this because of physical pain at night. Also, no trouble at all with meditation, daily gratitude, reading, and daily movement. One thing that bothers me is that some days I keep taking my phone in the morning, so I guess I need to buy a proper alarm clock and not use my iPhone as an alarm anymore. Simple.
Books, articles & resources
I read 2 books in March (8 in 2019):
The Way of the Superior Man: A Spiritual Guide to Mastering the Challenges of Women, Work, and Sexual Desire by David Deida
My review: This is truly a bible for a modern man. From a general perspective of life to work, sex, and mindset. Will definitely add this to my "read at least once a year" list. The biggest part of the book is related to relationships and woman tho. You can (and definitely should) learn how to think of a woman, how to treat and respect her, how to make love to her, and what's important in a relationship between your two, and the one with yourself.
Meditations by Marcus Aurelius
My review: Read this book back in 2018, and re-read it in March 2019. This is one of the most essential books ever to help you on life's perspective, anxiety, stress, fear of death, and much more. Couldn't recommend this more.
Marcus Aurelius didn't write all this to be public, he wrote it for himself as notes. That's funny tho that all these problems and challenges with your own mind were present in years 120-180 AD, and they are all present now in 2019.
All what's important, what to care about and what not to care about. I would say this book goes really well with "The Subtle Art of not Giving a Fuck" by Mark Manson.
Articles worth reading
I want to ask you a question. How many hours per day do you think?
“I never thought about that.” So let me get this straight. You’re thinking all the time, and yet, you never think about how much time you spend thinking.
So, what's the problem with thinking, constant thinking, and obsessive thinking?
So many want the promise. So many crave a contract. So many want a guarantee. But love is not property or an investment. Like it was in the 50’s. Where you revolve your life around building the perfect picket fence, wearing pretty dresses, and walking on egg shells. Love is a space. And in that space, a belief is born. Around that belief, the action of love is wrapped. Like arms. And that action, assuming it’s healthy, protects the space where the belief continues to grow.
A pretty good perspective on love in 2019 (well, or 2000s in general).
The unfortunate truth is most people have little to no savings at all — and I don’t mean “savings for that vacation to Hawaii,” I mean retirement.
A small but useful tip how to start saving. Simple. Effective.
Music finds
Every month I put up a playlist from some new tracks I discovered and also some good oldies I remembered from way back. Enjoy:
March flicks
Here's a new section - my fav flicks I took during the month. Enjoy.
Thanks for reading,
V.
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