The Kramer Method
Tags: productivity, devjournal, mentalhealth, challenge
Published: 2022-06-16 23:59:17

I've been seeing a lot about the [Seinfeld](https://sidetrak.com/blogs/news/using-the-seinfeld-method) [Method](https://jamesclear.com/stop-procrastinating-seinfeld-strategy) [recently](https://medium.com/optimal-life/dont-break-the-chain-the-seinfeld-strategy-9e959de7995c).  I'm not sure why i'm seeing this more as this strategy is not entirely new, and it sounds like a fine way to gauge one's goal progress over time.  The tl;dr is you get a large calendar, preferably one that displays all the days of year, and hang it in a predominant location in your abode.  Something like this:

![Full-year calendar](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/wy1h1moqz5aw90ib4ilp.jpg)

Then you focus on a goal and what it means to you to progress toward that goal, be it studying, coding, or in Seinfeld's case, writing.  Keep the daily goal effective but reasonable to accomplish every day - think 10 pushups, 30-60 minutes of study, whatever fits your idea of progress for your goal.  Then, when you've completed that for the day, place a big fat red X over the date.  Do that again tomorrow.  Make it a habit and "don't break the chain" of X's on your calendar.  

![Calendar with red Xs](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/v5c4w62n8zt2bfa2qjxc.jpg)

It sounds like a solid plan for someone to make progress on any goal really.  I have one issue with this method however...

I don't have one goal running at a time.  Quite the contrary, the older i get, the more goals i stack.  Today while pondering this i started listing everything i currently have running right now as "goals" in my life, including personal and professional.  I'm talking things that i actively, daily (or at least _most_ days) pursue with an end goal in mind and that i spend at least 20 minutes a day practicing.  I'm hovering right around 9-12 depending on the day.

Some examples include exercise, meditation, studying for certifications (currently AWS CCP), learning new technologies (working through the Udemy Ansible course now), reading (3 books at the moment with 78 on my [to-read list](https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/4641657-greyfang?shelf=to-read))... 

I suddenly wondered if there might be something very wrong with me.  

![Kramer Seinfeld](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/j86w53mbckwgi1voary1.gif)

Then i started thinking more about that guy across the hall.  Granted, Cosmo Kramer is a fictional character, yet he began to resonate with me in this context.  It seemed in every show he was doing something completely different, from playing rounds with golf pros to installing a garbage disposal in his shower to swimming the East River.  _This_ is someone who literally bounces off walls.  On the surface he looks aloof at best and hopelessly scattered at worst.  I can relate.  

But Kramer embraces his quirks.  He chases his dreams regardless of what his friends think.  If he had a calendar for all his goals, they'd cover the walls of his apartment and probably be covered in a plethora of rainbow hues.  

And he's usually a pretty happy guy.  Wound a little tight perhaps... but more at peace with himself than the other regulars on the show.  

So yeah, i bounce between personal projects daily.  I've got probably a hundred hours of project work on my backlog.  I've got progress log spreadsheets, daily reminders, Outlook tasks, and Todoist just full of things i'm actively working.  I've got a 29-week streak of at least 3 labs/week on Immersive Labs.  I'm working my way through _The Phoenix Project_.  I'm about to build my first Ansible playbooks.  I'm weeks away from taking my CCP exam.  

I'm just not a single calendar kind of guy.  Sometimes i wonder what that's like.  But that's the beauty of DevSecOps after all: there's never a shortage of new things to learn, and while i'm committed to finishing that which i start, i simply can't _not_ want to learn so much more.  

So new things arise, as they should.  New things go on my backlog, as they should.  I keep plugging away at everything i've chosen to put on my plate, as i should.  And i'll look to the master of multitasking for my project management mentoring needs  =]


![Kramer Seinfeld Shrug](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/o8z8b46f4alj4j3dza4g.gif)