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Day 497 of 1827: 2014 Goals

Day 497 of 1827: 2014 Goals

I just got back from the US embassy after getting pages added to my passport.

This thing looks ridiculous.  Moreso than usual, I mean.

And no, visiting the US embassy doesn’t count as “setting foot in the US” during my Five Years Abroad.  That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.

So January’s past, 2014 is in full swing (except here in Chile where everybody takes February off), and it’s time for me to unveil my goals for the year.

I am really excited for 2014; this year is going to be huge for me.  Of course, you know about Thailand, but we’re just getting started here!

So, without further adon’t, let’s get down to business.

  1. This will be the year that I break the cycle.  I hate to start off the list with a downer, but this will be the single biggest make-or-break accomplishment ever in my quest for personal growth, and everything that I want to accomplish this year is designed to support it.

    So, when I was in Peru, I started noticing a pattern in my emotions.

    Every 1-4 months, I seem to go through a cycle of depression.

    Most of the time, I go about my life as normal, until…

    … one day, I get a massive emotional high.  I’m super productive, super social and super happy with my life.  I’ll get more done in one of these days than in an entire “normal” week.

    And then, over the course of the following week, I’ll start to slip.  I won’t be able to work more than a few hours without feeling exhausted, I’ll start to miss my social commitments, and I’ll begin to disconnect from the world.

    The cycle finally culminates with a pretty deep depression that lasts anywhere from 4-7 days, and during that time I am pretty much useless.  I don’t respond to emails / texts / search parties, I can’t motivate myself to do any work, and sometimes I can’t even get out of bed in the morning.

    And then one day, I wake up, and I’m back to normal… and so the cycle begins again.

    Looking back, I’ve actually been battling this for a long time – it’s got to have been at least 3 or 4 years, maybe even longer.

    I’ve tried lots of strategies to work through this problem over the years.  I’ve focused on extending that “high” for as long as possible, I’ve worked on staying “normal” for longer and longer periods, I’ve tried integrating more self-care activities into my life, I’ve tried different ways of dealing with the depression to see if I can shorten it.

    But there’s one thing I haven’t tried yet.

    See, pain from the past can’t be managed.  It can’t be ignored.  It can’t be reasoned out.

    There’s a word for those behaviors; it’s called “coping”.  And coping isn’t the same thing as healing.

    To heal from repressed trauma, you have to re-experience it… and process it.

    And when I considered that, another thought popped into my head.

    I spent all this time focusing on the “comfortable” aspects of my depressive cycles, and I consistently avoided focusing on the “uncomfortable” parts.  But the only way I’m going to beat this is if I tackle the “uncomfortable” parts head-on.

    These depressions are my childhood abuses resurfacing, and the “highs” that I’ve been experiencing are actually my mind gathering up its strength to face them.  If I want to move past this, I can’t focus on the “highs”; I have to embrace the “lows”

    Well.  I’ve felt for some time now that I’m close to something big; I know now that I am finally ready to make peace with my past.

    2014 is the year that I break the cycle.

    Of course, I’m not going into this blind.  I’ve been working with an excellent therapist, and I’ve gone through my friend Hannah’s book, The Ultimate Guide to Journaling several times (incidentally, I’ve found journaling to be an incredibly useful self-knowledge skill to develop, and I will likely continue journaling long after I’ve healed from my past traumas).

    And, as I mentioned at the beginning of the list, my other 2014 goals have been selected to support this project.

    Speaking of which….

  2. For 2 months, I’m going to live without portable electronics.  Wiiiiiiiith 2 exceptions:  I will have a camera, and I’m also going to keep an Android handy for emergencies… and because I may have to pay for stuff with Bitcoin from time to time.

    But everything else is going away!  Before I leave for Thailand, I’m selling my laptop, my iPhone, my Bose headphones, and… well, that’s it, actually.  I really do pack light.

    (incidentally, if you live in Santiago or are willing to pay for shipping, my laptop and headphones are still unsold and available for purchase at pretty awesome prices; check out the Five Years Abroad Facebook page for details!)

    And when I get to Thailand…… I’m going to pick up a tablet.  I’m not ready to transition to an electronics-free lifestyle just yet!

    But within a few months of arriving in Asia, I’m going on a soul-searching journey (and I do mean “journey”… more on that coming soon!), and I will be dropping off my electronic devices at the starting gate.

    See, when I started my Five Years Abroad, I left my culture of origin behind, and it’s led to incredible growth and discovery.

    So now, I’m doing the same thing, but this time with my “lifestyle of origin”.

    Do I really need to lug around a laptop everywhere I go?  How would I spend my time differently if I couldn’t access Facebook?  What emotions have I been unconsciously distracting myself from by pulling out the ol’ smartphone?

    I intend to find out.

  3. I will work no more than 50 billable hours this year.  That’s right; I’m setting a maximum, not a minimum.

    As I mentioned in my 2013 review, I can’t stand hourly work.  It’s not personally rewarding for me, and I can’t get rich doing it, anyway.  Plus, it’s far too easy for me to get addicted to workaholism as a coping strategy.

    So this year, I’m going to start phasing it out of my life.

    And if I need cash, then I’ll just have to get creative.

    I’ve already started working with a few friends to set up opportunities for passive income, and I’m investing aggressively in emerging technologies (especially 2nd-gen cryptos).

    Honestly, I would have liked to set my billable hours limit much lower — to zero, even!  But I’ve already done some consulting this year, and thanks to US taxes, I have a bit of… let’s call it “an immediate need for some liquid capital”.

    As of this post, I have logged just shy of 12 billable hours this year.  I’ll need another 10-15 to get me through US tax season, and with a little luck, I won’t need to work a single hour beyond that this year!

    Oh, and I should also mention that I’m going to have a lot more time to take FiveYearsAbroad.com and FiveYearsAbroadCAST.com (and soon FiveYearsAbroad.tv!) to the next level (:

  4. I will be an honest-to-goodness tourist in at least 6 countries.  By golly, I am going to do some actual traveling this year!

    As I mentioned in my 2013 retrospective, one thing about my Five Years Abroad that I am disappointed by is how little time I’ve actually spent traveling.  Most of my time abroad has been spent… well, living abroad.  And that’s not the same thing as traveling.

    So, this year, I will travel in at least 6 countries.

    I will dedicate at least 1 week per country to tourism, and I will be reaching out to my hardcore permanent traveler friends for advice and recommendations to make the most of it!

    I will also find at least 6 locally- and/or internationally-famous landmarks (one per country) and take a photo of me standing/sitting/cartwheeling/fornicating in front of each one.

    I’m not saying which action I’ll be doing in the photos… but I’m not denying anything, either.  Although, Five Years Abroad doesn’t have a members-only section (yet), so it’s probably not the latter.

    Probably.

    Incidentally, the list of countries is currently TBD.  I have a rough list in mind, but I’m still working out a few details before I formally announce which countries I’ll be visiting during 2014.

And that’s it!  Those are my goals for 2014.  It has fewer items on it than last year’s list, but the scope is just as big, if not bigger, and I’m focusing exclusively on the accomplishments that will be the most meaningful to me.

By the end of 2014, if all goes well, I will have shed the final emotional weight that has been holding me back (for as long as I can remember!), built a foundation for my future financial independence and gone on the most ambitious travel adventures of my entire life (up till now, anyway).

Hmm, about now I really wish I could fast-forward to December 31, 2014 and ask my future self how things turned out!

Well, in the meantime, my flight to Bangkok is booked, and I leave in just a couple of weeks!  I’ve already started building my network in Thailand, and I’m making plans to meet up with a few friends over the course of the year in various places across Asia.

See you on the other side!

… of the world, that is (:

top-down photo of my passport, showing additional pages added haphazardly
Seriously, this thing looks so silly.
I can’t wait for the day that these things finally go away!

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