This is post #31 of my #365 day series.I don’t know about you, but when I was a kid, I used to think about how much I wished I was older. The weeks of summer seemed to never end, which I suppose was good, but during the school year I dreaded every minute. That probably explains why I ditched school so much. These days, however, I feel like I’m grasping for every hour and every minute. I keep waking up earlier and earlier and staying awake later and later, and yet I can’t seem to make a dent in terms of how much time I have. I’m hungry for every minute to fit into my day. Perhaps now is a good time to think about how I prioritize my activities during the day:
- Sleep — I don’t prioritize this enough, but ever since getting an apple watch, I have a better appreciation for how badly I handle my sleep schedule. My average for the first few weeks of tracking my sleep was 4–5 hrs. Absolutely horrendous. Now my average is floating around 6.5 hrs and I’m trying to get that up to 7 / 7.5. Sleep feels like death for me, but it’s absolutely critical for my health, so I’m making a point to prioritize it.
- Work — I’m a workaholic so this makes sense. Work can probably be broken down into many different smaller items, so I won’t go into in detail here. I also won’t go into detail because the only thing predictable about how I allocate work during my day is that every day is a bit unpredictable.
- Coding — I love coding. There’s really very few things in life I enjoy more than getting some logic down into a code editor. I’d say that 70–80% of the code I put down isn’t tough, it’s just executing on the plan and architecture I’ve already designed. The remainder of the time I spend coding is filled with bug fixing and coming up with novel solutions for problems. I’ve coded pretty much every day since I was 11/12 (sans those days where I was grounded and wasn’t permitted to use the family computer). I try to pick up a new language or framework every month. Since there aren’t a ton of new languages that are useful (or fun) to learn, I find myself picking up all of the new frameworks. Also, despite popular belief, I don’t just code for work, I also code for fun. I build a lot of hobby projects and a lot of the time I learn a new method or design pattern that I can bring to my coding for work.
- Working Out — I try to walk at least 4–5 miles a day and get a 2–3 mile run in plus some weight lifting. If I’m being honest, this is the first activity that goes when I get too busy.
- Reading — As an attorney and a coder, it’s probably no surprise that I read all the time and every day, but the reading I try to prioritize is more of the leisure-based reading. I like to read non-technical books to help break things up so I’m not just consuming raw amounts of data all day. Sometimes it’s just nice to watch (read?) the sunset.
