J.D. Moyer

science fiction author, beatmaker, against fascism

Category: Creative Work/Career Page 19 of 24

A New Approach to Goal Setting (Introduction, and Reservations)

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On November 27

In Creative Work/Career, Getting Organized, Life Purpose & Goals, Metaprogramming

Go with the path or hop the fence?

Over the last six months I’ve started using a new approach to goal-setting that I’ve found to be effective, enlivening, and motivating. I’m still ironing out the kinks in the system, but I’m far enough along that I want to share my approach and my results so far.

As I’ve mentioned before I consider myself to be (in role-playing game nomenclature) a “multi-classed character”. I have many interests and ambitions, and I find it difficult to pursue one at a time. I’m probably in the majority; it’s a rare human being who naturally has a single-minded pursuit or singular quest throughout their entire lives. Most people have many interests, like to do many different things, and want to acquire a wide range of experiences. Overall it’s an effective strategy — the multi-class character ends up with multiple skills set and diverse social networks, and is thus less vulnerable to economic downturns, changing popular tastes, and other vagaries of modern life.

The drawback of going broad, in life, is that you don’t necessarily get to go as deep (or if you do go deep, it takes you longer to get there). It takes longer to level up (to acquire achievements, recognition, mastery, and so forth).

So that’s one reason I’ve been refining and developing my goal-setting system; I want to go deeper and level up in certain areas. But it’s not the main reason. The main reason is …

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Results and Impressions of 3-Year "Life Vision" Planning Experiment

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On March 20

In Creative Work/Career, Getting Organized, Life Purpose & Goals, Lifestyle Experiments, Metaprogramming, Writing

Forest path (photo by Stuck in Customs).

About three years ago I wrote a detailed essay envisioning what I would like my life to look like in three years. I included details about where I would be living, what my house and working spaces would look like, what I would be doing during the day, who I would be spending time with, and so on. I included details about career, health, relationships, home improvement, spirituality, finances, my various businesses, and what I wanted to be doing for fun/entertainment. It came out to about 2500 words.

For the next few months, I allowed myself to make minor edits. Sometimes I would add a short section about a part of my life I had yet to consider in detail. Sometimes I would change something that just didn’t feel right. Some of the hopes and dreams I thought I had for my own life turned out to just be baggage from an earlier me. I no longer wanted those things, but it took writing them down to realize that. So I deleted those sections.

Then I saved the essay to a folder on my hard drive and went on living my life.

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Working From Home – Six Ways To Bring Up Your Game

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On March 9

In Creative Work/Career, Getting Organized, Metaprogramming

One of the many break-time activities available to people who work from home.

As a music producer/freelance database developer/blogger, most of my days are spent in my home office. I love working from home, and I hope I never have to “go in” on a regular basis again, but I remember I had a rough transition year or two (in terms of working-from-home flow and productivity).

I went completely freelance (no employer) around 2001, at the age of 32. I left a good job as the database administrator for the San Francisco Symphony (though I continued to do contract work for them for a number of years). I liked my boss, my co-workers, and the organization, but at the time I was tired of reporting to a small windowless room, tired of commuting from the East Bay to San Francisco, and bored with the actual work. I wanted to spend more time writing music and working on Loöq Records. In addition, I wanted to take a shot a writing screenplays.

The Lost Years

Over the new few years I went through some working-from-home growing pains.

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Tap Your Potential by Going Deeper Into Your Comfort Zone

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On March 1

In Creative Work/Career, Culture Rants/Shares, Writing

The annoying comfort zone graphic.

The annoying graphic above has been showing up in my social feeds a lot lately. Why is it annoying? For one, it makes no sense. Why is being tired, depressed, and fearful in the comfort zone? Why can’t I be comfortable, and also wealthy, confident, and passionate?

I understand the idea that the graphic is (unsuccessfully) trying to communicate, which is that if we are never willing to leave our comfort zone, we will miss out on opportunities that require a certain amount of social or emotional risk-taking. But there is bizarre anti-logic inherent in the idea that we should always strive to push outside of our comfort zone.

For example, the other day I was standing in line with my wife and daughter at Cactus Taqueria on College Avenue. Between the front of the line and the counter there’s a space of about five feet that people usually keep clear. My wife, who was really hungry and in a hurry to order, stepped into the “in-between space” when we reached the front of the line. My inclination, on the other hand, is to wait until a cashier is actually available before stepping forward. As a mental experiment in “moving outside of my comfort zone,” I stepped into the space as well, and felt awkward until it was actually our turn to order.

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Letting Your Motivation Find You

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On December 31

In Creative Work/Career, Life Purpose & Goals, Metaprogramming

Intrinsic motivation flows from the subconscious.

All good things must come to an end.

In my case, it’s a two week vacation during which I did not travel, but instead watched Portlandia, played Skyrim, finished the Song of Fire and Ice series, visited friends, ate and drank too much, got along well with my family, and let my brain totally uncoil.

Intrinsic motivation fascinates me. I was curious to see what work (if any) would pull me back, engage my mind, and get me up early and ready to go. It’s not that I don’t have certain tasks I have to do (everyone does — even the 1%), but at least 60% of my working hours are consumed with tasks that I pull out of thin air (writing, making music, etc.).

Why spend all this time and energy trying to create stuff?

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