31-Days-of-Journaling

For Day 19 of The Art of Manliness Journaling Prompts – The one romantic relationship I am in is with S, my wife of just over a year. As highlighted in my response to the Day 5 prompt, it has hardly being the smoothest of relationships, not helped by living apart and both being very busy people. The one area I’d like to improve is improving the quality of our relationship primarily from the perspective of making clear to her that she is the priority in my life and that every other thing including work and sustenance lies in second place. To achieve this my intention is to communicate better with her, making the effort to stay in touch on a daily basis regardless of what pressures work and life pose. Fingers crossed.

[caption id=“attachment_178” align=“alignnone” width=“2976”] For Day 14 Currently on my reading list is David Leeming’s tell all biography of James Baldwin. Whilst it is a hefty read - and I have spent the most of the last month plodding through it between doing life and work - a few themes have stood out, including the influence of church, the civil rights movement and his struggle with his sexuality. The more I read this, the clearer just how great an intellect he was is under scored in my mind. I’ll never read Go Tell It On The Mountain or Giovanni’s Room the same way again.

Photo by Glenn Carstens-Peters on Unsplash – For Day 13 of the AoM 31 Days of Journaling Challenge; A Brain Dump using the GTD Trigger List. Work Projects Started Not Completed DL Management Strategy OFC Transition CCMTs & CCMT Action Management UKCS TAR Work Programs T T-A Communication File Note Area Reviews S Area PW Failures RCFA Work Projects That Need To Be Started CMS Year End Review T CCMT Preparation 2019 PoB Requirements for UKCS Projects 2018 Spend Reconciliation 2017/18 Appraisal Personal Projects Started Not Completed archive.rustgeek.me relaunch News31 EoY Video Preparation News31 EoY Review for magazine Personal Projects Yet To Start archive.rustgeek.me theme modifications 2019 objectives and planning Alicante Trip with S

Photo by Helena Lopes on Unsplash --- For Day 11, the question is “Do you have a gang of friends who push and support you? If not, how could you make some good friends?” As with all the questions so far which have related to friends, I’ll have to hold my hand up again and say this is an area where significant improvement is required. That being said, I have a number of acquaintances in this city with whom I could be better engaged. A number of them are in the same season of life as I am which bodes well I suspect for our being able to band together for mutual support. First things first then, I’ll look to schedule a catchup with a couple of the guys, particularly D and R.

Photo by Brett Patzke on Unsplash --- The Hero’s Journey makes for interesting reading, showing how in 12 stages the boy becomes a man as he journeys through a life. Although based on myths, the underlying idea behind this framework is that these myths work because they represent how we understand how life happens to us. Vogler’s model, which the folk at AoM espouse, is an abridged version of the original in the Joseph Campbell book (The Hero with a Thousand Faces) and identifies 12 steps (from the Wikipedia page) as below: ...

Day 9: My Day – Up at 4.42 AM and unable to go back to sleep. Meetings with senior leadership at work on my mind. Played around with some CSS for some modifications I have been mulling over for this blog Finally out of bed at 6.00 AM to start prepping for work. Off to work at 7.00 AM, glad for some respite from what has been terrible weather. Relief ends up short lived because it opens up again half way through. Arrive at work wet and cold at about 7.30 AM. Arrival routine kicks in; cup of coffee, read and respond to emails, catch up quickly with office mates. First hour spent reading up on latest version of slide deck for meeting, then attending final dry run In between, I sort out delivery of equipment required for a mobilisation offshore in two weeks. Spend rest of the morning in chasing final bits of data for meeting. Lunch @ 12 NOON, quick walk to Boots at Union Square for a sandwich, pepsi max, protein pot and two snack bars (meal deal) Back at 12.30 PM for final check of meeting requirements and then into meeting. Meeting from 1 to 3, a bit of a grilling but I feel like we do ok. A number of things to follow up on even though the consensus seems to be that it has been yet more talking shop. Hopefully real behavioural change kicks off after this. After the high of the meeting, rest of the day is an anti-climax of sorts. catch up with R for the first time this week now that I can catch my breath. Eventually it is 4.30 PM and home time. Walk home and arrive at 5.00PM Dinner, more CSS modifications and then soon it is sleep time.

For Day 8 of the AoM 31 Day Journaling Challenge: Reflect on Your Career. – Work for me has focused on materials, particularly ferrous ones, and how they perform in a variety of oil and gas environments, on two continents; Africa of my birth and Europe where I have spent the last few years. My journey began in December of 2003 with being hired straight out of University in 2003 as a trainee engineer through progressing via a number of roles in various aspects of the corrosion and materials discipline and eventually leaving in October of 2008, thanks to a mixture of burn out and the opportunity to return to the university for graduate studies. Since graduating in July of 2009, I’ve gotten back into the Corrosion & Materials field first with a service provider and latterly with an oil & gas production company where I am Corrosion & Materials Technical Authority. ...

Image source: rawpixel @ unsplash – And so comes Day 7. Whilst those who believe in numerology think seven is the number of perfection, the past few days have been anything but perfect. What they have been though is an opportunity to flex thinking and writing muscles which I haven’t used in a while, which were to put it bluntly beginning to atrophy. The general idea has been to try to block time out in the morning- between waking up, devotions and heading out to work- to pen a few words in response to the challenge of the day. There have been hits and misses along the way but thankfully I’ve managed to show up. Here’s to discipline winning through and birthing delight in the end.

Photo by Tom Grimbert on Unsplash. For Day 6 of the AoM 31 Day Journaling Challenge. – My six word memoir: Global Thinker, Local Contributor. Lived Intentionally.

For the Day 5 prompt from AOM’s 31 Day Journaling Challenge. --- It wasn’t love at first sight but a slow melding of hearts and mind into a coherent whole, a journey of a thousand miles started by a single step which very quickly became a leap of faith into the great unknown of the future. Now with the benefit of a year behind us, it is clear that there was something here all along, gems hidden beneath the hard outer crust of life and all the bumps and scrapes it sent our ways. There is hope though, that bumps and all we will get there, somehow.