Category: Personal Challenge #2

Personal Challenge #2, Day 7

Every second accounted for, 7 days later. What did I learn, achieve, and what will I continue to do/change..

The challenge revealed a way to achieve maximum efficiency. Through planning out every second of my day, I found that after a couple of days, I had done more than weeks of slowly inching forward. Planning is key, and having my entire day scheduled gave me something to fall back on when things get tough.

This is how I planned out my day, after I woke up I would immediately challenge myself to get out and run. Then, I would start working on Android Development until lunch, and I would go back to Android Development with 30 min breaks after each 2 hour session. The breaks were probably the most important part, and I had to rough tune along the way to account for over scheduling and under scheduling.

The reason behind having multiple breaks thrown into my day, was to first give my brain a breather and also make it easier to follow through (less stressful). Breaks also helped when I was around the 5th or 6th hour of Android Development for the day, and I was feeing hungry. I would look up at the clock every 10 minutes and having that break coming up, I felt like I didn’t need to cheat, and it made it easy to continue until the dinner bell rang.

When things got tough, and I wanted to stop, the schedule I spent so much time setting up gave me support to fall back on, and that helped me a lot during the challenge. However, the scheduling didn’t always go as planned. There were multiple times where I would be really energized to code, but I scheduled to long of a break. Out of sheer, wanting to stick to my plan, I didn’t come back until the exact minute, but I could see how that could be an area to improve on.

The biggest mistake I made, was changing my schedule too lightly. Of course, situations will arise where moving around time slots will be necessary, but not shortening or stretching activities. A proper reason to change something around mid day, would be when some unforeseen obstacle pops up. An example, I had to run up to my college financial aid department, to fill out some paperwork, and the time I gave that entire process was much less than the actual time it took. That’s not the biggest issue, all I had to do was move the time slots around to make up for that overlap. Here is a rough look at what my days would consist of.

Typical Plan (General Outline w/o specific time slots):

  • Wake up -> Run -> Shower
  • Grab a snack -> Start 2 hr Android Development session
  • 30 min break -> 30 min Code Review
  • 15 min break -> Start 2 hr Android Development session
  • 30 min break -> 30 min Code Review

And so on…

Reflecting back on the past 7 days, I can tell you that it was not all smooth sailing. The challenge did require some pain, but the pain was worth it. Everyday, I stuck to my 6-8 hr planned Android Development I felt empowered. When I looked back at the week and I had run 8.5 miles from start to finish, I felt accomplished. Having a detailed plan of attack, with every second accounted for, afforded me the opportunity to make tweaks and follow my progress a lot better. I also, got my hands dirty in a whole slew of stuff like Navigation Drawers, interfacing, apis, SQL/PHP, and using built in SQLite to create a database inside the app rather than using XAMPP with SQL/PHP to host a server that would house my database then using GET requests to query the database. Transitions are fun.

I’m in the middle of moving back home to Portland, Oregon so I don’t think I’ll be able to continue this challenge until I get reestablished up there. However, I do want to continue pushing myself in this manner. It’s only been a week, but I could tell after the first 2 days that doing this everyday multiplied by a couple of months would be lightyears ahead of my current knowledge.

John Sonmez (Simple Programmer), said “Find what will get you to your goals 100% and do that. People have told me that if I can run 20 miles, I can run a marathon (26 miles). However, if I can run 30 miles then 26 miles will be easy, and that’s how I 100% get to my goal of running a marathon.” This spoke a lot to me, and is partly why I decided to do this challenge. I was seeking a way to 100% reach my goal and take hope out of the equation. My goal is to become a working software developer, and this is how I get there.

Personal Challenge #2, Day 1

New Challenge, Every Second Accounted For..

Well, I decided to challenge myself again. Except, this time I’m preplanning my entire day, every second of it. In my previous challenge, filed under Personal Challenge, I did more talking than action, I didn’t construct a plan, I kind of just hoped that I would figure it out and stick to whatever I figured out (no wonder it didn’t work out, lol). The previous challenge, consisted of not watching TV, not playing video games, and not getting on social media. And thus, without a solid plan in place, of how I would spend my day, I fell into old habits almost immediately.

Now it’s different, I’ve constructed my entire day, from waking up in the morning, to going to sleep at night. I’m writing this post, after my first day of the challenge. Here is some of what I’ve gotten done.

First Day of Challenge:

  • Ran 30 minutes, right after I woke up.
  • Studied 6 hours, for my Math final (I did this in 2 hour blocks).
  • Studied 1.5 hours, for my Sociology Final.
  • Took my Math Final, passed!
  • Finished the remaining work for my SPCH Final.
  • Wrote a blog post.

I’m shocked at how productive, the past day has been. I know it’s still early in the challenge, but I stuck to every single written instruction I gave myself. I have finished off my entire plate, for the remaining days of the Winter semester, and I even had room to add a blog post.

Tomorrow, will be my second day of the challenge, and it will be centered around Android Development. I’m going to apply what I did today with Math, to my Android Course, and I should make some solid progress sticking to my plan. I have 6 hours of Android Development planned, with breaks in between, and code reviews after every 2 hour block.

Surprises from my First Day:

  • I didn’t feel fatigued the entire day from running in the morning.
  • I stuck to the schedule, even when I was grinding my teeth, around the 5th hour of Math.
  • I completed even more than I planned, because I over scheduled a few areas (like how long my Math Final would take).
  • I just started feeling tired, and it’s 9:50 pm.

Okay, well that about wraps up my first day. I will post a photo so anyone reading can see exactly how thoroughly I planned my day, and the next three days of the challenge. Not quite sure, if I will continue past these three days, but I can already tell that if I did commit to such a rigorous regiment, I would be miles ahead of my current self, even a week from today. Here’s my 3-day schedule. I had a problem scaling, but you can see the detail, even with the blur.