Public Commitment 2015 – Q3 Recap

Technically this is only the second update, in the summer I wasn’t blogging that much, so let me start with an overview of the goals I had the last 3 months:

Career	1	I have transferred my blog into a braindump + review site I have written 1 guide + goal-poster website (launched) on goal-setting I have grown Queal 20% per month
Fun	6	I have discovered a new country I visit a museum 2+ times a month
Personal Development	2	I study leadership and related topics 9 hours per week I have read and reviewed 12+ books I have completed 2 online courses I have a solid plan including A/B tests of time-management, energy levels, and activity management
Health	3	I have participated in 1 obstacle run I have visible abs (<12% BF) I have kept my strength levels
Relationships	4	I have got to know Kris even better
Finance	5	I have written a mini-guide (possibly website) on investing for young professionals I invest 20%+ of my income I spend <1000 on expenses I donate 10% of my income

Overall the last few months have been good to me. I’ve had a wonderful trip to Costa Rica. We moved offices and the view and atmosphere here are very positive. My knee is finally getting a bit better. And I feel that I am both learning and contributing to the world. Here is a full recap of all the goals:

 

Goals Q3 2015 Recap

Career – I have transferred my blog into a braindump + review site – I have written 1 guide + goal-poster website (launched) on goal-setting – I have grown Queal 20% per month

It took a while to figure out what I wanted to do with my blog. First I thought about dividing it into the topics I found interesting and making separate blogs out of them. But in the end, I decided that focussing on this one blog is the best thing to do. For the last few weeks, I have been blogging once a day. I will keep this up for a few more weeks (for a total of 30-40 days) so that the habit of blogging is engrained in my system. I’ve also chosen to make the reviews of books shorter and to focus on what I learned from it, instead of giving the less personal/more boring overviews of the books.

It’s not officially launched, but please take a look at www.aldrin.io. Together with Onno and Julian, I’m working on making the website your go-to place if you want to work on your goals and start being committed to them. Our final deadline if during the next In The Making event (21 November in Arnhem). Before that date, I will probably have informed you about us going live already! Stay tuned.

Queal has been growing steadily in the last few months. It hasn’t been exactly 20% but we’ve come pretty close. Behind the scenes, we’ve worked on making everything streamlined and we now have everything set. The coming months will also focus on the expansion of our sales so expect a similar goal for Q4.

Fun – I have discovered a new country – I visit a museum 2+ times a month

Two countries to be precise – Costa Rica and Nicaragua. The trip with jaarclub Steen was amazing, I loved every day of it.

In my free time, I’ve been to a few museums this summer. If I also count the museum in Nicaragua I exactly hit the target. Earlier I spoke about the Keith Haring exposition, I still highly recommend it.

Personal Development – I study leadership and related topics 9 hours per week – I have read and reviewed 12+ books – I have completed 2 online courses – I have a solid plan including A/B tests of time-management, energy levels, and activity management

In retrospect, I think the first two goals of personal development could have been combined. On average I listen to books/podcasts for more than 2 hours a day (at 1.6 or 2x speed). I also read quite some articles and take 30 minutes most mornings to read. If everything is related to leadership, I guess not. What I mean to say is that I’m learning a lot in diverse fields, not only leadership. So I would say yes to learning, but maybe that not everything is related to leadership.

In the past months, I’ve read about 20 books. The one I liked best was Start With Why by Simon Sinek, it explores the topic of ‘your life purpose’, something I will be learning more about in Q4.

I’m sorry to have to say that I’ve not completed any online courses. I started one but didn’t make the time to commit to it. What I could have done better is allocate a specific time slot to it and work on the course material at that time. At Queal, we might introduce a specific time to do just that. What I did do was watch the videos from Crash Course, I now know a lot more about Astronomy and Economics.

Health – I have participated in 1 obstacle run – I have visible abs (<12% BF) – I have kept my strength levels

The obstacle run is this Sunday, wish me luck! And in about 3 weeks I will do one that is 19km long so that knee of mine better behave.

At the beginning of September, I lost about 3kg in no time. After that, I hit a plateau. The main problem is that other habits (i.e. drinking with friends) that are fun interfere with this goal. For the next three months, I will first think about how I can best combine these types of goals.

In relation to strength, I think not much has changed. My legs (of course) are a lot weaker, so when my knee if fully restored I have quite the workload in front of me.

Relationships – I have got to know Kris even better

Kris and I had a great time together. She’s a great person and I enjoyed every moment with her. But we’re not together any more. And as much as I like to share with you on this blog, if you want to know more you have to ask me in person.

Finance – I have written a mini-guide (possibly website) on investing for young professionals – I invest 20%+ of my income – I spend <1000 on expenses – I donate 10% of my income

Why are finances so boring? It’s something every one of us has to live with, learn to manage and can help us greatly. I haven’t found the right motivation to write about investing for young professionals. What I will do is write more about it on the blog here and use that as a basis to figure out what I really want to do with it. I still think a lot of my peers (and I) don’t know exactly what to do with our new-found wealth, so more information is always welcome.

Investing is going well. I automatically set aside some money and everything goes into a basket of global stocks. I can write about this process in the next month.

With regards to spending, I think I’m spending a bit more than the 1000 euro per month. I’ve bought some new clothes, went out to eat sometimes. At the same time, I eat Queal a lot, buy things when they are discounted and try and limit spending whenever not necessary. The next two months will probably see me spending less, December will be a bit more expensive.

And yes I’ve made some more donations to the Against Malaria Foundation. Read more about effective altruism on GiveWell.org .

 

Final Notes

I recently heard a podcast in which someone speaks about ‘systems vs goals’. With this ,he means that he prefers to make a system in which he will learn, no matter the final outcome (goal). I like the approach, at the same time I think that is also what I’m kinda doing with my goals. They are dots on the horizon and sometimes I end up somewhere else, but they do challenge me to go towards that direction in the first place. Also more about this in a future blog.

Stay tuned for my new goals in tomorrows post!