$40 set aside... done

[Tygerson]

Edit: new structure
I have $40 set aside to buy "How to draw" by Scott Robertson.

BUT to actually buy it, I need to do the following for 20 weeks (consecutive or not):

-SLEEP at least 7 hours/night, at least 6 nights/week
-EAT only three treats per week (the rest of my diet is fine if I just limit the chocolate)
-WORK OUT 5-6 days per week (I already do this, but it's nice to check off an easy one)
-DRAW at least 6 hours per week (quite a bit for my current life situation)

I'll mark each day's progress on my wall calendar.

Each full week (Sun-Sat) I meet those 4 goals counts as 1 week toward the 20. It's more days overall, but without the moral kick of starting all over if a week goes badly. I mark each days progress on the calendar, and then mark each good week with a 1, 2, 3,...20

Bonus: I'd like at least 1-2 hours of the drawing to be from life.
Last year I focused on figure drawing, this year I'd like to focus on color and work toward drawing from imagination. (And continue the figure/face work.)



Old structure:
I need to do the following for 100 consecutive days:

-SLEEP at least 7 hours/night, at least 6 nights/week
-EAT only three treats per week (the rest of my diet is fine if I just limit the chocolate)
-WORK OUT 5-6 days per week (I already do this, but it's nice to check off an easy one)
-DRAW at least 6 hours per week (quite a bit for my current life situation)

I'll mark each day's progress on my wall calendar. If I botch it, I start over.

[Swibble]

I don't really understand why you need to punish yourself in this way just for that book... especially over such a huge span of time. That thing is hard work in any case, but anyone could benefit from it almost immediately. Why don't you just get the book and then have to spend an hour with it every day for 100 days as punishment. Then just do all that other stuff at the same time anyway.

[Tygerson]

I don't really understand why you need to punish yourself in this way just for that book...

Well, it's not really punishment--I need to take care of myself! Sleeping enough, eating healthy foods, working out, and drawing is all stuff that makes me feel happier and healthier when I do it. Plus, I have other art books, like Gurney's color and light, so it's not like I'm delaying my progress.

This week has been good. I've gone to bed earlier and felt better, felt better working out, and was happier overall.

The sleep thing is the hardest to get--I only control when I crawl into bed. I can't control if children wake up in the night or early morning, or if I can fall back asleep when awoken, or if a rat decides to scratch around in my attic at 2 am... So I have to plan for 8 hours in order to get 7. My problem before was that I'd plan for 6-7 hr and only get 5-6 each night.

[Tygerson]

Darn it! I have to start over! I've done great on everything but missed another decent night of sleep this week. New start date: 1/13/14

The good news is that I've been feeling the benefits of taking better care of myself. :)

[Heliux]

Hell yeah! This is awesome. Way to hold yourself accountable! :D
I think it's easy to see dicipline as something that constrains you, rather than something that sets you free. (I call dibs as a study partner once you've got it on lock down!) ;D

[Tygerson]

Hell yeah! This is awesome. Way to hold yourself accountable! :D
I think it's easy to see dicipline as something that constrains you, rather than something that sets you free. (I call dibs as a study partner once you've got it on lock down!) ;D

Well, thank you!

So for this week, I got the sleep thing figured out but failed on the art time! I'm at three hours, and the rest just won't happen. I gave up my spare time for a good cause, and I don't regret it at all.

But I do regret eating half a pan of brownies today because I knew I was starting over anyway! Argh!

Still, a better week of health than I usually would have. So onward to next week. Hopefully everything falls into place at the same time.

New start date: 1/26/14

[Mayenla]

Hey Tygerson try not to beat yourself up too much about missing one of your goals. When you get started on something like this you start to build up momentum, the more you do it the more momentum you build and eventually it'll become a habit to just do it.

When you stop for more than 2-3 days all the momentum you've built up falls apart, it's why I'd suggest following a simple rule I read a while back; which I've stuck to and it's done me really well. It's called "Never Two in a Row" and it's basically saying that if you miss an exercises or a goal, to get straight back to it the very next day. Or if you eat something unhealthy, the next meal you have will be something healthy. It's by Steve Kamb of Nerd Fitness, he explains it better here: http://vimeo.com/53652759

[Tygerson]

Hey Tygerson try not to beat yourself up too much about missing one of your goals. When you get started on something like this you start to build up momentum, the more you do it the more momentum you build and eventually it'll become a habit to just do it.

Thanks Mayenla! That's the idea--to build up habits. It's slowly working.

I think I may restructure this thing so that I count each "all goals met" week as 7 days towards the 100. Or maybe 1 week towards 20 weeks. That way each good week adds to the measured progress and there's no feeling of "I lost all that work!"

So looking at the calendar, I've got two good weeks so far. :)

[Zesiul]

Back when I went to college one of my first classes was Psychology, something you had to take. Point being the teacher said if you wanted to change your life in any sort of way you have to do that change for about 7 weeks. If you work out once a day for 7 weeks it will mean that your brain has accepted it as routine and thus it won't be so hard. It's not easy, and it's not always true, but it's a goal to set.

I know how you feel, I love setting goals. Sucks when you fall short of them, but that's probably unavoidable every now and then. Just pace yourself, don't over do it. Goodluck, it's wonderful to see other accomplish great things. I hope you do it!

[Tygerson]

Currently at 11 "good" weeks. I am so ready for a new art book. One that isn't anatomy. It's the only thing holding me back from raiding the chocolate stash right now.

[Tygerson]

Done. Finally!

Confession, there were weeks where I counted "dance time" as part of "art time," because I needed to get exercise in and there just wasn't time for everything. It did seem valuable, though. I learned a lot about how the figure moves by actually moving the figure in front of a mirror.




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