Levelling up
Feb. 13th, 2014 12:00 amI feel like over the last year I've levelled up in competence, in that, given a medium size project, I can now routinely complete most of them, including loose ends (be it purely logistical, or something at work needing experience too) with a reasonably sensible schedule. And a year ago, that just didn't happen -- I could get things done, but only in fits and starts, and everything had to be a crisis: even things I enjoyed doing, I found it impossible to start and impossible to finish.
(I put it down to a combination of: better organising of TODO lists; better background skills; and learning to maintain a slow momentum of success every day, rather than every time something breaks getting knocked back to zero, and killing the following week for productivity through being completely dispirited.)
That's really, really good. I often feel satisfied every night, rather than constantly reeling from one thing to another.
But I also feel frustrated, that it feels that's so basic everyone else mastered it before age 20, and it took me to now to get it.
Further
And, as always when getting better, you peek over the foothill and get depressed again when you see how many more hills there are to go before the main peak. I feel like I'm never able to enjoy where I am now because I'm falling short of where I should be.
I'm getting slightly better at seeing the next level. In level 1, everything is a crisis. In level 3, you've go the idea that once you've faced half a dozen encounters, you're probably on track for level 4. But I can't predict I'll get *enough* better at that before I die.
Now I'm looking around, and seeing that if I can get some idea of requirements, and of necessary background knowledge, then I can make a fairly reliable stab at producing a good solution. But (a) I'm not able to find solutions where my skills are actually useful and (b) at home, I can use my own judgement for priorities and prerequisites, but professionally, those are often all in someone else's head, and I'm only now getting to the point of recognising that as a problem and not knowing how to get them *out*.
(I put it down to a combination of: better organising of TODO lists; better background skills; and learning to maintain a slow momentum of success every day, rather than every time something breaks getting knocked back to zero, and killing the following week for productivity through being completely dispirited.)
That's really, really good. I often feel satisfied every night, rather than constantly reeling from one thing to another.
But I also feel frustrated, that it feels that's so basic everyone else mastered it before age 20, and it took me to now to get it.
Further
And, as always when getting better, you peek over the foothill and get depressed again when you see how many more hills there are to go before the main peak. I feel like I'm never able to enjoy where I am now because I'm falling short of where I should be.
I'm getting slightly better at seeing the next level. In level 1, everything is a crisis. In level 3, you've go the idea that once you've faced half a dozen encounters, you're probably on track for level 4. But I can't predict I'll get *enough* better at that before I die.
Now I'm looking around, and seeing that if I can get some idea of requirements, and of necessary background knowledge, then I can make a fairly reliable stab at producing a good solution. But (a) I'm not able to find solutions where my skills are actually useful and (b) at home, I can use my own judgement for priorities and prerequisites, but professionally, those are often all in someone else's head, and I'm only now getting to the point of recognising that as a problem and not knowing how to get them *out*.