Planning

“It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him.”J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit

Struggle with planning

I am still struggling with planning, planning related to goals, planning related to achieving goals. And my trip of 2016 has made me think what is different here in Malasag, home, from what I experienced during my trip. As during my trip I achieved virtually all my goals, and I achieved them easily, even though I was often scared not achieving them, but here at home I seem not to be able to plan properly and achieve my goals.


A goal not (yet) achieved

And I saw I wrote more about planning, like in my two posts about planning: planning post 1 and planning post 2. And of course there is the principle of success Organized Planning from Napoleon Hill, but that is more about finding people, looking for help, inducing people, than just planning, making a plan. And I realize now, when I wanted to add some photos, for getting better Google ranking (sorry), that I did not reach my main goal, the supposedly farthest point of my trip: the most northern point of Luzon. I also realize I was happy during my trip and I was also happy making the decision not go for my goal this time, even though it was a hard decision to make. Or actually I was not happy making that decision at the time I was there, so close, only two kilometers away from that goal. But I knew it was the right decision and I knew I could go back, would go back one day, to finish my trip, achieve that goal.

Lack of desire and needs

And I am a few days further now, since I started this page, and I noticed that I did not follow any real planning and that I don’t seem to have any real goals. I also notice that I have been distracted very much by my network and computer setup issues. As my computer network is not stable, or at least not set up as I want it to be, and that makes me uncomfortable and that makes me focus on those issues first. And setting that up to my liking takes an awful lot of time, actually an enormous amount of time, as I have spent most of my time on that since I arrived home from my trip. And that trip was the sample of how I did plan properly and did reach goals, or not.

So what is different? Well, the main thing is that I don’t feel comfortable when my computers are not set up properly. And I don’t feel comfortable also that I still don’t have enough income. And I don’t feel comfortable that I still don’t know where my relationship is going, or actually where my love life and related relationship is going. And all those things are kind of dissatisfiers that keep me stuck, that keep me busy, but keep me also not going anywhere.

And thinking further, just now, behind all this is the lack of desire. Or actually not the lack of desire, but the feeling that I don’t have much control over what I want, what I really want, that I can’t influence or make a plan to get to the things that I really want in life.

So what was or is the difference between being stuck with e.g. my DoctorsConnect project and having planned and reaching virtually all my goals during my recent trip? Ah, and that was exactly what I wanted to write about in this page, that is exactly what I would like to analyze.

What is the difference?

So what is the main difference? Well, with DoctorsConnect I believe I need a team and I need clients, doctor clients. And I feel dependent on others for that. And during my trip I did not feel dependent on other people in the same way. Until now I have not been able to create a stable team and I have not found even one client; or at least not a client that has been really using the system. And those things seem to be insurmountable, even though I know in the end I will succeed, at least if I persist.

And time to sleep now, rest now, especially as I also noticed that I don’t easily rest, that I just keep going and going and going, without proper thinking, planning or resting.

What keeps me from goals and plans

So yes, I know there are several things keeping me from reaching goals, achieving things, getting what I want. Maybe just make a list:

  • Lack of desire, lack of an inspiring definite purpose. Or maybe the last is not true. Maybe it is just not knowing what to do to achieve the things I set as my goals and as my definite purpose. Maybe they are too big. I just don’t know how to split it up in manageable pieces or something. Or they are just not achievable with ordinary means.
  • Being distracted by many things. Not doing things according to specific goals or plans. Kind of wasting my time, but it is more than that, as yes, my weeding the grass is kind of an escape, but it also relates to some goal of mine, where one of the goals is to change all the grass into Bermuda grass. And yes, that goal relates to things in my Desire Document or things I want that are now specifically written down.
  • Feeling powerless over certain things, maybe many things, like how I could restore my relationship and how I could find team members and clients and staff for my DoctorsConnect project.
  • Ah, and setbacks, like yesterday I found Napoleon Hill may have been mainly a scammer and many things he wrote in Think and Grow Rich may have just been made up or fantasized or imagined (see ). Still, the things he wrote in Think and Grow Rich make a lot of sense, even if you look at his real life, even if his stories were mainly made up.

So where to go from here, as I am writing here and I am not working, not doing actions to earn money or go towards my goals. Or am I? Because the main purpose of writing here was to get a better way of planning. Or at least a better way to get closer to my goals or maybe better, achieving them, reaching them.

What is planning

Google results for planning.And maybe do now what I kind of planned(?!) at the start of this article: do some research about planning, like what does the word planning actually mean and are there some articles that can tell me how to make proper plans. So I’ll do a Google search on the word “planning” now. And the results are:

  1. The first result is Google’s interpretation of planning: the process of making plans for something.
    synonyms: preparation(s), organization, arrangement, design; forethought, groundwork
    “how much planning has gone into this event?”
    the control of urban development by a local government authority, from which a license must be obtained to build a new property or change an existing one.
    “the local planning authority”
    .
  2. The second is (of course) a link to Wikipedia: planning on Wikipedia. The description as shown in Google says: planning (also called forethought) is the process of thinking about and organizing the activities required to achieve a desired goal. It involves the creation and maintenance of a plan, such as psychological aspects that require conceptual skills.
  3. The third result is a link to a building planning portal site: https://www.planningportal.co.uk/. It appears weird to me the results are so much related to building.
  4. The fourth result is a link to planning on businessdirectory.com.
  5. The fifth result is also linked to planning related to building and city planning: http://www.planningresource.co.uk/.

I think there are more relevant results further down the line. It is still weird to me Google gives results mainly related to building and city planning, but that may be a personalized result. I may add more results later, but for now I will go from here, especially as normally Wikipedia gives a lot of useful information about most subjects. So I’ll start reading there further.

And the Wikipedia page starts a bit different than the description shown in Google: Planning (also called forethought) is the process of thinking about and organizing the activities required to achieve a desired goal. It involves the creation and maintenance of a plan, such as psychological aspects that require conceptual skills. There are even a couple of tests to measure someone’s capability of planning well. As such, planning is a fundamental property of intelligent behavior.

And this last definition worries me a bit, as I know I am not good in planning (am I not?), meaning I am often not behaving intelligent (as I often don’t achieve my goals). And of course the last is probably not true, as I often do achieve my goals. I think everybody achieves many goals every day and everybody somehow makes plans for that, even if it is implicit. And I read somewhere else that training myself for planning, for making plans to achieve goals, can be done by making a plan for every little goal I want to achieve, even things like getting or having a cup of coffee. Or writing an article like this. And yes, since I encountered that suggestion, I am more aware of my daily goals and I have been more mindful about planning for them, yes including writing this article now, or actually updating it.

So yes, without consciously knowing it, I think I have already set myself up for better planning, for better planning to achieve goals, as I have started the process of planning things more consciously,  starting with planning little things. And yes, that made me more aware of the distractions that often keep me busy, that often take a lot of time.

Human limitations

Ah, and yes, I realize more and more how little time I have in each day, that it is so limited what one human being can do in one day. And yes, I think I did many more things in a day before, in another life, but still, I realize more and more how little I can do in just one day. And that made me more aware of planning and how important it is to maintain focus, focus on what I really want. Still, what worries me most is that I don’t know the “how” for my main desires in life, my main projects in life, my main goals in life.

And this is where I recently often go back to Higher Power or Infinite Intelligence; or God if you want. And that thinking started with reading Think and Grow Rich, no, not the first time, but after a lot of time and a lot of reading. And it started to be more clearly with my Twelve Step Coda program, as Step 2 and Step 3 make me realize more and more that I, as a human being, am not in control of many, many, of most things in the world, not even in my own environment, like taking care of my dogs, feeling responsible for my dogs, or even the people close to me, the people in my environment. So there must be some invisible force driving everything, kind of being in control of everything, and no, I still don’t have any clue how that works, and often I still don’t have the faith or belief that it is a positive force, a loving force, as so many things still seem to be wrong in my life, and I still don’t understand why. And it is still hard to accept that things are as they are. But yes, it is the truth, I am not in control; and neither are you.

Start small

I have been thinking about goals and planning, especially related to DoctorsConnect, and I came to the conclusion I could set some mini goals, like finding one team member and finding one doctor using the system. “Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.” from Martin Luther King. And I mostly forget the word faith in this quote, that the quote is about faith, not about taking the first step. So let’s start from these mini goals and try to make some planning from that. I will make a page for that: goals and planning DoctorsConnect (learning how to plan). And I just did, so if you want to learn from my experience or want to go with me on that journey just go to that page.

And yeah, it seems distraction and not taking proper rest, not relaxing, seem to be my biggest hurdles towards proper planning, as I have not been doing things related to planning and related goals the last few days, at least not in a structured manner. I will start with mentioning dates, so I can see, analyze, what is going on. While writing this paragraph it is January 9, 2017 and I started this page on December 27, 2016. So I have kind of ‘lost’  about two weeks by not working structured, by not planning properly. At least that is my feeling now. So right now I need to stop, relax, do something else, as I have been hooked up to my computer and my grass weeding project for most of the day since I woke up. And those things were mainly distractions, at least that is how it feels, although I use my grass weeding project to think about planning and things like that.

A new way

And it is still January 9, 2017, and I just tried something new, something I read somewhere in a quote or something. Yes, from someone famous, and successful I presume. She is a writer and said that she just started writing and then stopped after one hour, no matter what, no matter how interesting the idea or whatever was that she was working on. And I tried something like that before, but didn’t stick with it. So just this evening, about one and a half hours ago I decided to do something similar, like working on DoctorsConnect for one hour and then stop. So I set the alarm and I did. And what saved me was the annoying alarm from my phone, as that doesn’t stop after a while. It just goes on for ten minutes or so if you don’t snooze it or stop it.

And yes, the hard part was that I was, of course, also in the middle of something. And it is a rule in programming, and I guess in many other jobs, not to stop in the middle of something, like leaving half finished work. And yes, that rule is important in programming. But I still stopped, as what I was working on is just too big. And yes, it is pretty defined, so nothing really goes wrong with the half finished stuff, as I am just working on a new page and I will remember that. And yes, just now I set the alarm again at one hour. As I want to stop whatever I am doing (on my computer), after one hour again. As I know I will just continue doing things, like writing this blog, this site, this page; or do my SFI work.

And I did not tell you yet that I just don’t like to be on a schedule. I want to feel free. And if I schedule something too precise I feel unhappy. It just doesn’t suit me. But yes, I need some way to ‘schedule’ somehow, as if I don’t do that I will exactly feel like what I don’t like to feel: not free. So I just need to find a way to somehow schedule and set goals in a way that suit me. And maybe the one hour rule will help me exactly do that.

Ah, so much in my mind about my goals and plans how I want to do that now. And seemingly so little time to do or even write about that. Yes, that is something else that is happening to me. That I just feel overwhelmed with all the things that I ‘have to’ do; or want to do; or need to do?

 

I want this to be a page about planning, so you can’t comment on it. I created a related post about my goals and plans where you can put comments if you want.