New Years Resolutions

Jeez its fucking January. Ive been off the rag for a couple weeks cuz they took the internet away at work :(. Lame.

Ok so relating to my post on goals here is a little more concrete list of goals for this year. Once again one thing at a time.

Basically, I think the whole life project deals with my tendency to procrastinate. It may be oversimplification, but basically my difficulties with Japanese, waking up, and otherwise getting done what needs to get done can be boiled down to a tendency to voluntarily delay an intended course of action despite expecting to be worse-off for the delay.
I don't wake up on time because i can always wake up later and always rush out the door. I don't go to bed on time because whatever i'm doing at the time seems more important than sleeping, or at least more fun. Anyway I'm being too vague. Basically, I'm gonna learn some time-management techniques and learn to put those into practice.

Mental tools. Here's some books that I'm gonna read to learn some time management. these seem like the best place to start: Getting things Done and The Now Principle.
First, buy those books.
Second, read those books. 20 minutes a day until they're done.
Put the stuff in the books into practice right away.
Record progress in a notebook - using a spreadsheet-type calendar.
I hope that I can get one of those done in english and then the other one done in Japanese. Depends on where I'll be with the RTK

That Brings me to number 2: Sleeping, waking up, and being on time to work.
My goal is to, by the end of the year, wake up not just on time, but early. Early enough to meditate for 20 minutes in the morning. Possibly early enough to do SRS for about 20 minutes.
Despite seeming simple, this has been very hard for me up to now, which probably means the goals have been too many, too big and far away, or too fuzzily defined. So I'm gonna break this shite down right here and right now.

Going to bed: Stopping work at 10:30. This is tough. Just stopping when my alarm goes off. I have a tendency to just continue to work until i get tired. I'm not tired at 10:30, but if I don't go to bed around then, I'll be highly tired the next morning and feel awful and fall asleep at work. So here's the system: at 10:30 when the alarm goes off, look at what you are doing. Figure out the next best place to stop. Finish the sentence you are reading. Finish the SRS item. If whatever you are doing is "not completely finished" at that time, fuck it. This is important. Fuck it. Writing an e-mail; it can wait until tomorrow. Watching a movie or show? Turn off the TV. Reading the Interweb? Shut down firefox immidiately and turn off the computer. Its not importatnt. Talking to friends on Gchat? Sorry everyone, sorry mom. Gots to get da sleeps. Type the magic phrase: Sorry, but I have to go. Talk to you later. I know, I know, I want to keep talking to you too. Yes yes, I know its the middle of the afternoon there and its only 10:30 here. But it's bedtime. Sleep leads to good health, good health leads to long-term happiness. Talking to friends and surfing the internet bring short term rewards, but I gotta think about the bigger picture cuz I'm an adult now :(.

Ok so 10:30. LET IT GO. STOP. DROP.
From there, there is a pretty set order of operations to follow:
Turn off computer
Put computer and power cable in bag.
Prepare other work bag: Only one book per day, notebook, ds, pens.
Put both bags by the door.
Turn on heating blanket
Take melatonin (natural sleep aid, to get me in the rhythm)
Decide on tomorrow's work clothes
Gather tomorrow's work clothes.
Put "pocket stuff" on the bookshelf
Change into pjs
Brush teeth/wash face
GO TO BED

This whole thing should really only take like 15-20 minutes, so I'll be in bed by 11:00, and if I wake up at 6:35 that gives me like 7.5 hours of sleep. That should be enough, but eventually I'll aim for more sleep, and an earlier waking time.

Ok i need to continue this so i'll post more later...