My new year’s resolution
By: Bogdan Samoletskyi
Tags: New Year Resolution

for the first quarter of 2021.

Photo by Javier Allegue Barros on Unsplash

Decide it now, decide it fast.

We all thinking about what to do in the next year, what to achieve and where to put our effort in this drastically changing world.

Idea for this post first appears as the answer to the brilliant article of David O. , where he proposed to create two lists. One list of 7 items for something money can buy and second that relationships can bring to you.

The reason why these lists only for the first quarter is that you can measure it after this term and redefine if necessary. Or, maybe, circumstances changed and there’s no reason to stick to this list and it’s time to rewrite it hugely or throw to the dustbin entirely.

I just copy and paste my lists here:

Ok, 7 things money can buy:

PC upgrade. You know all this hype about one game , which released yesterday. Also, who knows, maybe I will get back to ML and modern videocard would be helpful. PС notebook. Just in case I will find a side hustle I will need it. Already took a quick look and chose one cheap model, which should be enough. Not sure it will end by 1st quarter, but I have a project of race car for amateur races. It’s in progress now. Mechanic is very talented, but very busy, so it’s not going fast. New tires for current race car. We bought a cheap car , prepared for local autocross in January. And, despite we (only my son participate) have only 2 races this year, I consider it as as one of the biggest achievement of the year! He won the second race in his class! And it gave as a lot of fun to race and to fix it! Next year I planning to use it more and go to the amateur rally, but it will need some preparation. Ugh, let it be buy some clothes, as because of all this lockdowns I find out that mine are outdated (I still continue going to work everyday, but clothes shops closed). Fix my car. Bring it to the good condition. It needs to be slightly welded and resprayed. Suspension also need to be revisited. Last, I think , should be something for unexpected fun or need. So I let it blank to be filled in the future ).

And another 7:

Find the side hustle. The problem here — I cannot decide what exactly. Recently I’ve passed the AWS developer exam and want to find something related. Preferably it should stacked up with my current desires, such as ML, or current experience (I’m a full stack web developer). Writing on medium once per week at least. Find it pretty hard, but hope soon it’ll became a habit. Visit my hometown. Because of this situation didn’t be there almost a year and really miss it. Participate in amateur races. This is my passion as you can see. This year I made step from dreaming to doing something and want double down my efforts. Participate more in toastmasters. At least it should be one local contest, or meeting with more than one club. Go to dance school. Maybe the hardest one, as I dreaming about it many years. There’s a lot of dance schools there, but almost all of them about salsa or something, but I’m not a huge fan of such dances. But, I need to make first step, somewhere, and after that decide about next steps. Losing weight. Again, because of latest events I stop going to gym and tennis, I need at least get back to it. Oh, and start to pay more attention to the food finally.

What conclusions can be drown from this lists?

Quick look on these lists revealed my interests very clear. As a computer guy I’m still have passion for computer hardware and games. Also this is my craft — programming. And my desire to go further — to the Data Science and Machine Learning. I will definitely search for some side hustle, preferably related to Data Science and Cloud Computing.

Second hobby is cars and car racing. So far it’s a low-key racing on the cheap car, but even this is a great fun and I plan to double down my effort on it. I hope all these lockdowns will come to the end and it will be more races in the next season. if you ask me what’s the profit of it? So far no profit at all, at least in money equivalent. But we gained some skills how to fix the car and sheer fun from races.

I want to pay more attention to my health. But now almost all places, which I’ve used to go closed. No gyms, squash, or table tennis. Hope soon situation will changed, or I will search for new possibilities. Maybe jogging, I don’t know. Also dances remain to be a dream until lockdown gone. And diet, maybe fasting, counting calories… will see.

Family and friends. I think here’s everything is fine, except that I’m almost year weren’t visit my home town.

Soft skills, such as writing and presentation. Trying to writing at least 1 article per week. Will pay more attention to the toastmasters club in the next year and, basically, that’s all.

What I've done so far?

#4 from the first list almost done, soon we will buy a new tires.

#5 form the same list is also, partially done by Christmas shopping today.

#1 from second list is in progress. I will attend Machine learning courses from Andrew Ng from Monday, so next 11 weeks will be hot here. I don’t know, maybe it will be such form of procrastination to not to go from the comfort zone and not searching for new project. Hopefully not.

Final words.

Hope you also has your own new year’s resolution. It well organized, don’t have mutually exclusive points and achievable.

Merry Christmas and happy new year!