It's the end of the decade and as always it's the perfect time to reflect upon my own life and determine how things are really going as well as committing to make the necessary course corrections.

As such as I've spent of lot of time lately contemplating to see if deep down I'm actually happy with the direction that my life and career are heading. Unfortunately for me - I'm not sure that they are.

That's not to say that the last year has been a failure. There have been quite a number of positive changes that I've made in the last year. I’ve received a fair share of extremely positive feedback and recognition both professionally and personally this year. I was able to successfully end some professional and personal relationships that were draining me.  I was able to take the family on another vacation enjoying both Disney World and our first cruise together. I’ve learned that I really like mixed drinks with Patron in them. I was also able to find and begin work on learning a new hobby (but more on that in some future post).

Now I'm not a big believer in New Years Resolutions, preferring instead to focus on goals (1 year, 5 year, etc), but when life itself needs some radical changes it requires going beyond just simple goal setting. As such - I present below (for accountability) some of the ideals and goals for the next year that I will be using to make a life course correction.

Make Myself Happy
I am going to continue focusing on doing things that make me happy regardless of what anyone else thinks or says about them. Anyone that knows me personally can vouch for the fact that I'm not exactly “Mr. Politically Correct” to begin with and I have no issues with declaring that my musical tastes are not exactly "cool".  So it’s not like this should be a huge challenge for me but there’s always the risk of allowing my own happiness to fall victim to keeping other people happy.  So what does this mean in practical terms? I’m not sure yet but in essence - I’m acknowledging that I will be making some people unhappy this year by choosing to pursue my passions and finding things and activities that bring joy and laughter to my life.

Is the Juice Worth the Squeeze?
I’m going to weigh every opportunity that I have this year with the question "Is the juice worth the squeeze?".  The movie buffs reading this might recognize this is a quote from a fairly dumb movie – but regardless there’s something about the philosophy that appeals to me. It’s too easy (for me at least) to be seduced by certain types of opportunities that end up costing me too much in time, money, happiness, etc. So I am pledging to myself to honestly ask this question over every decision that I can this year. This includes career choices I need to make, choosing which conferences (if any) to attend, what relationships I’m going to allow into my life, how I will invest my time, and what changes I will fight for (or against) in the code that I write.

Actually write on this blog
I had to renew the domain name for this site last week – which in addition to the changing of the years was a nice reminder of how little I actually used this blog in 2009 (only 4 posts!). My main problem is that I'm too much of a perfectionist and only want to post when what I'm writing is significant. However looking over the four posts that I did make this year, none of them were profound nor significant. So for 2010, I'm committing to write at least one blog post a week. Granted they may not as interesting as I would prefer but anything is better than silence.

Stop wasting time
Going along with the above question, I am also going to use more wisdom in how I invest my time. Without a doubt my daughter has to come first in how I invest my free time, but beyond her there are a number of things that I need to invest more time into as well (Personal health, working on hobbies, studying, etc, etc.)  Currently I push myself past the point of exhaustion each week (mostly from lack of sleep) and am still unable to spend time on all of the things that are critical to my long term happiness. Obviously some activities are going to get cut this year in order.

Write what I want to write
I’m going to begin work on a new book this year however I'm not sure what that book will be about at this time. I’ve already had a couple of offers extended to me to write another Ruby book. But the problem with dealing with technical book publishers is that they tend to stifle creativity. So I’m going to do a bit of exploratory writing this year and determine exactly what I want to write before I begin any conversations with a publisher again. I'm not even sure that my next book will be a technical book (always thought it would be fun to write a screenplay), but I am committed to the ideal that my third book will satisfy my personal standards for what I envision it to be.

Keep my promise
I'm going to fulfill the goal/promise that I have made with my best friend and take a trip to Vegas with him this year to catch up on our lives, blow off some steam and basically do all the things that Vegas has to offer to have a good time (perhaps even sky-dive). It'd be nice if my stock options were able to cash in so we could get a "Hangover" style suite for the trip as well – but I'm not going to delay the trip another year in the hopes of that lottery ticket ever being worth anything.

Live Better
And of course - no new years goals/resolutions/whatever list would be complete without the requisite promise to do things to improve my health. I spent some time this last year setting up a decent exercise area in my basement but now it's just the matter of spending the required time each week down there. In addition I've been reading a book recommend by several other Rubyists named Eat to Live - it makes sense so far but reading ahead it's basically promoting a vegetarian lifestyle. Not sure if I could commit to that but I'm willing to let the idea grow on me.

Cheers and Happy New Year!

Eldon