Summer!!!

I'm feeling the full blown effect of summer now with this week's heat wave! But why does it feel like summer is already over?!!

All the plane travel in March-June has worn me out and I'm exhausted. I think it is a good exhaustion, but nevertheless, I'm not feeling the uplift of summer just yet. But I think these activities will do the trick:

Summer goals
1) Annual summer Hollywood bowl concert, this year with fireworks!
2) A big beach bonfire
3) Thursday Santa Monica beach concert
4) Channel Islands
5) Catalina Islands (this is the year for islands)
6) As many surf sessions as humanly possible
7) Swimming laps at the pool
8) Maybe another national park...Zion? Yosemite?
9) A lazy day at LACMA
10) Hike Mt. Baldy, inspired by this story
11 and 12) I cautiously add a couple more that seem like a long shot but possible....camping!! and learning to sail.

Basically can I do anything and everything involving water and the beach this summer? :)

Looking back at my summer list last year, not too much has changed with the addition of more outdoor activities. I must have liked what I did last year and I'm excited to make some of these summer LA traditions.

Time

Do you ever get that feeling that you're giving too much time away to things that you don't really care about ...or you feel like you aren't protecting your time enough from people who don't seem to appreciate it.

I feel that way these days.

I know people say time is money, but I think time is worth more than money.  As my sister says, you can always earn money, but you can't get back time.

The good thing is that for the most part, time allocation is something that I can control. Maybe this year, I'll practice the art of saying No.

Summer bucket list

My LA summer bucket list includes:

1. Watch a movie at Cinespia  

2. Host a beach bonfire

3. See a concert at Hollywood Bowl

4. Camping

5. Go see a movie at one of the free outdoor movie events

6. Attend a free outdoor concert on Santa Monica Beach 

7. Hike the Bridge to Nowhere

8. Surf as much as possible 

9. Spend a day at Laguna Beach 

10. Picnic at Malibu Wines

11. Visit Escondido Beach 

12. Have dinner at Perch 

13. Harry Potter World! 

14. LA County Fair

15. LA Night Market

  

Zen Habits

One of my favorite blogs is Zen Habits.

I stumbled upon it years ago and have been following it since.  Recently, I have been ignoring the weekly email updates, but as I recognize myself in a downward spiral these days (in terms of motivation), I revisited his blog for some help. 

Of all his suggestions, I think these rules will help me keep motivated the most since it is all about accountability! 

1. Make someone else pay for your failure. This is a really powerful form of motivation. Set a challenge for yourself for a month, and if you fail, then a friend agrees to have something bad happen to her or him. For example, if you don’t run three times a week for the month of January, then your friend Amit gets an ice bucket dumped on him. Or your wife has to go three days without her phone. Obviously your friends have to agree to the consequence, but you can agree to be each other’s consequence, and pick a consequence you’d be unhappy about but willing to do. This is much more powerful than if the consequence of your failure happens to you, because you really don’t want to be the cause of someone else’s misfortune.
2. Make someone else benefit from your success. This is just the reverse of the previous idea … if you succeed at your monthly challenge, then a friend gets to have something nice happen to him or her. This is really nice, because you will be motivated to make someone else happy.

Though I think these will be effective...I couldn't find a single sorry sap who wanted to volunteer to be rewarded or punished by my efforts. haha I guess I can't blame them. 

Well... back to square one. Maybe just doing without thought is the answer.

My favorite post of Zen Habits is Breathe. and I come back to this several times a year. 

2016 goals

At the beginning of this year, I quickly jotted down some goals for myself.
So far... one thing has been accomplished, but it is a very big thing so I don't feel so bad about being behind on the others. I'm working on the others on a more day to day basis, and figure I safely cross off goal 5. blog.

2016 goals
1. Have a wedding
2. Arrive at work by 8am (finally starting to do this)
3. Graduate to a different surfboard (summer is here!)
4. Make dinner twice a week (getting better at this)
5. Blog
6. Stay off phone at home (doing poorly here)
7. Exercise 5 times a week (doing very poorly here)
8. Do some career goal planning
9. Work on cutting down those student loans to 45K (on track!)

With only half the year left, I think I need to re-prioritize those big goals to focus.

2016 Birthday goals
1. Graduate to a different surfboard  (this is going to be a reach)
2. Re-evaluate career goals and come up with a concrete plan for 2017
3. Student loan goals= 38K
4. Comfortably fit back into my black dress
    a. Swim 3 times a week until December
    b. Go to class at least 2 times a week until December