August: A tale of two different months

August started as a beautiful month. I had free time in the evenings, I read something like 8 different books, I spent time with friends going to Symphony Splash, celebrating a friend getting married, watching Pacific FC win, and taking in movies in the park. We wrapped up the summer soccer season by coming in dead last, after losing both our playoff games in a penalty shootout, and I reunited with my 11-a-side team as we began practicing for the winter season.

The end of August was a little (okay, a lot) more hectic as orientation season got ever closer, but we got through it and survived!

So, I survived August. But did my goals?

Habits

August’s habit was to be in bed by 12 p.m. By the end of the month, I was getting much better at this, although I’ve encountered two related problems. First, while I’ve often been going to bed by 12 p.m., even when I’m feeling tired, I’ve been finding that I haven’t been able to fall asleep for what feels like a long time. Despite being in bed by that 12 p.m. mark, I’ve seen my clock flash 1 a.m. way too often. I’m hoping that by simply keeping on, my body will learn, but that’s been a little slow going. Second, sometimes I find that having the 12 p.m. bedtime in my mind means I never think about going to bed any earlier than that… even when that’s probably what I really need. Bed by 12 doesn’t have to mean stay up until 12, but try telling my brain that some nights!

For September, I’m keeping that 12 p.m. bedtime front of mind, while also trying to adopt the habit/practice of schedule blocking as I try to figure out how to balance work, school, and life.

Even I’m looking forward to that update at the end of the month!

Goals

• I feel like my backlog of things I want to write is never-ending, and I never seem to find time to sit down and cross anything off. Finding time to sit down and write is always a challenge, and also an area where I’m really good at procrastination. In September, as I work on my habit of schedule blocking, I’m hoping some of those blocks can be writing time, and hoping that will help!
• I got through just over half of an online course on accessibility in August, and I’m quite confident I’ll finish the rest of the course in September!
• I read ferociously in August, finishing 8 novels over a 3 week time period. I’d honestly forgotten what it felt like to read so much, and this was also a reminder that when I insert reading into my bus rides and lunch breaks, I make so much more progress!
• I did some travel planning and have a fairly lengthy trip booked for the end of October that I’m really excited about- mountains and skating and babies, oh my!

While I did make some progress in August, I often feel like August goals that seem modest end up getting lost in the sea of pre-orientation tasks that need to be done, and I think that happened this year too. Making sure everything is set up for our orientation events takes a lot of time and mental energy, and it kind of leaves you wanting to do nothing once you get home.

As I mentioned above, I think September is going to an interesting month, especially the later half. I’ve filled my life with a lot of things, from soccer to school to more soccer. Finding ways to balance it all, while also finding time to work on other things of interest (i.e. my goals) is going to take a bit of time to figure out- and a bit of discipline that I’m going to have to summon up from somewhere!

Featured image by Isaac Smith on Unsplash