What's On My Mind
“Hmm I need to adjust how I position myself now”
One of my supervisors is leaving us for another department. This is the same supervisor I am working with to get me to do more side projects and less on doing my usual daily task. Why? I just like to keep things fresh. While repetition is the mother of all skills, it can be boring as f*.
What I do at work is unique, despite what my job title tells you. My goal is not just to be valuable but to provide a unique kind of value to the team. That’s how you stand out. And if you stand out, it’s less likely that you’re gonna get cut off from the team. Though there is no guarantee that won’t happen. Things are always gonna be uncertain. But learning how to stand out greatly increases the chance to preserve employment or a client.
And because what I do is unique, it raises the concern of, “Who is going to do RJ’s work I do if he decides to go on vacation, leave for another company, or go on paternity leave?”
It’s a legit concern, which is why I was tasked to create projects to pass on what I know so that our team won’t feel crippled if I’m not there to address the issues. That sounds fair but doing that would reduce the unique value I provide. So now I need to figure out another way to allow me to provide “unique value”. Perhaps a change in job responsibility?
But things didn’t happen the way I envisioned it. Change happens, often unexpected. COVID-19 took everyone by surprise, so as my supervisor’s departure. The projects we are working on together are now going to be placed in the back burner. This means that I won’t be focusing on teaching others what I know.
Everything will stay as is, so I better find a way to do my job in a less boring way.
A Year Ago This Week
- I talked about why I cancel last minute, even though I find that to be annoying. Yup I’m a hypocrite lol.
- Got into an argument with Reyvi.
- Overwhelmed with my to-do-list.
- Looked into time-restrictive eating and weight loss.
[read here]
Weekly Update
Personal Projects
I just finished reading Jordan Peterson’s [12 Rules for Life]. It is what I used to practice speed reading. Why? He goes through a series of ideas, stitched together to come to a conclusion. I can sometimes relate because I do the same – it takes me a while to get to the point. I do that to make sure the other person fully understands why I say what I say and avoid the “Ya ya ya I get it” response. Because most of the time, they don’t – at least not in the way I intended to be understood.
Going back to speed reading, I can confidently say I can now read a little faster. But I can’t say how fast. I didn’t do any measurements. Why? It didn’t matter. While that’s true, what’s truer is that I’m too lazy to gauge myself. It’s extra work but for whom is that extra work for? I don’t need it. I don’t think others need it. So why bother?
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My new page is up: [SOUNDCLIP]. Weekly posts started last Monday. [Listen here]
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I’m thinking about writing a guest post for other publications in Medium. The question is, “What the hell am I going to write about?”
I wanted to write for a publication that has a “filter”. Meaning, the article I write will be reviewed and gauged if it’s a good fit for the publication. This is my way of checking how good my writing is to others.
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I also started rehearsing the presentation for insurance. I realized how much work I need to do after hearing myself talk. I don’t like how I sound in real life lol. It took me over an hour to practice the 30-second intro I wrote.
I am now going to read a book on communication I picked up years ago. It wasn’t a priority back then…but it is now. It’s another skill I wanted to acquire: effective VERBAL communication.
Routine
I’m pretty consistent with my 5 AM quick workout on weekdays.
But the weighing scale tells me I gained weight. Huh?
I suppose that makes sense. It’s not like I drastically changed my habits. But I’m hoping that the slow and steady approach makes the change more permanent.
Finance
I finished going through the free [FI101 course], where “FI” stands for “Financial Independence”.
Here are my takeaways:
- It provides basic and generic advice to help you reach financial independence.
- The course provides other free resources if you wanna go deeper into the subject.
I already knew much of it so I didn’t find it super helpful. They provided the same advice I got from [Ramit Sethi]. But note that the course is valuable if you haven’t been exposed to the idea of financial independence before.
PLUS…it’s free.
Find more of my work here, here and here