Monthly Archives: February 2017

Of Fulfilling Weeks and Self-Assessment

After a long day at work today, having struggled with a critical bug for the past few days, and having finally found a breakthrough to the solution, I return home to conclude what could be considered as a fulfilling week.

I order some food, and tune in to my watch later playlist on youtube. After dinner over loads of jovial banter and jokes with my flatmates, I find myself retiring into the solace of my room.

I switch to the dim lights and put on some Norah Jones to let her voice help me unwind as I recollect the events of the entire last week. I glance at the scribblings on the whiteboard behind my closed door, showing me the incomplete wireframes of a side project. Distant echoes of a train persistently chugging along it’s tracks remind me of being far from home.

There are primarily 5 questions that I ask myself at the end of each work week, that help me assess my personal growth and direction.

  1. Did I learn something new at my primary skill?
  2. Did I learn something new beyond my primary skill?
  3. Did I make full use of the opportunities that I had?
  4. Did I expand my network?
  5. Am I a better me than what I was last week?

I won’t lie and say that I honestly answer positively to all the above five assertions every week. That would be really tough to achieve, and I am yet to attain that level of self discipline and integrity (if ever). But the few weeks that I do, it gives me immense pleasure and a sense of fulfilment. And that is a really good motivator for the week ahead.

Learning, networking, and grabbing every opportunity that comes my way constitute the core part of how I enjoy functioning. There are often weeks where I end up learning nothing new, or networking with no new people, or missing a lot of opportunities that came my way. Those weeks are boring and make me wonder why time machines haven’t been invented and commercialised yet.

TLDR;

You’re no better than you were last week if you haven’t learnt something new, haven’t expanded your comfort zone, haven’t expanded your network, and haven’t made best use of all/most (of) the opportunities that you had.