Infinite State Automaton

So, recovery.

I lost sight of my goal and so I was wandering randomly. Because of this, I did not follow the steps that I had laid out for myself to follow to reach the result. My motivation was gone. I didn't see any reason to try anymore.

I read a really interesting book and had a few very interesting conversations. Then anonymous said below,

"everything is a riddle

the answer to getting out of a circle is to start moving in straight lines..find a starting point and an ending point."

Actually I was going to write something like this, so it's really a great cooincidence that this person would say such a thing.

Well, what do I want? There are some different spheres to move in.

Friendships: I am not talking very much with the two people who I hope to be my close friends. I want to recover these friendships.

Relationships: I have a lot of work to do. I can't write about it here. My new motivation is from here. I said it before; now I am sure of it - I am not good boyfriend material. "If she is worth it, she will wait for you." I shouldn't keep her waiting for so long. We don't live forever, after all. This leads me to...

Finances and food: I have been unable to save any money. Up until now I had only been looking at the big things and not understanding that the little things added up. After tracking it for a while, I learned I was wasting between $150-$200 a week on food. Every morning at work I am buying food from the shops, then for lunch, then for dinner. Often I also buy dinner for my brother.

Breaking out of this habit will be very hard but I have to do it to escape.
The first thing I did was take a bowl and spoon to work. Then I bought some breakfast cereal and milk, and I will eat this very cheap food for breakfast from now. I don't have breakfast at home, I am not hungry when I first wake up so I don't want to eat. I also use the bowl to eat soup and noodles at work for lunch, instead of buying the expensive canteen lunch.

This is only half of the problem. The other half is to get in to the habit of planning meals and cooking them at night. I have a good friend who has promised to help me do this since I have been unsuccessful so far on my own to learn it.

Food and finances are the foundation that I need to build on. I am currently semi-tidy; I threw out my old bed and got a new one, there is no junk on the floor (still some on my desk though) and no glasses or food or yuk in here. When I was cleaning up I threw out a lot of old things that I did not look at for ten years, but had just been keeping "Just in case I wanted to look again."

So I looked at them one more time then got rid of them. Things from ten years ago...well, some was painful. I had written many promises and lofty goals and dreams that I did not meet. But carrying around all this junk in my life was just weighing me down and holding me back from going to a better place.

And well, some of it was just junk. Now that I have graduated, there is no reason to keep my old assignments around to copy from >.>;;

It seems I am in the same position I was at the start of the year. Wanting to improve my finances, my health, my fitness, my career. Actually, really I am. I made some small progress in all of these areas, but I am not satisfied.

So, the start point is 'here'. First is, fix up eating and spending. Next is fix up cleaning and shopping and being tidy in all areas.

The end point is, move to USA 2009 and take up the job I always wanted to do.

I am not going to do Masters at UniSA. In June they will re-evaluate my contract. I will ask to be put on as academic staff (rather than professional staff). The difference is, I will be expected to produce research papers for the company. I have two very good and experienced researchers who wish to support me in this. The proviso is, I have to finish the SRET kit prototype before my contract runs out. They want some proof that I will finish what I have begun before they will invest in me.

I think that's a very fair thing. When I look back, I can see many times where I have said "I will do xxx" and then did not actually achieve it. So I can respect that people might be dubious of my ability or intentions.

So my short term goals are:
Recover my friendships, if those people want to be my friend still
Sort out my home life: cooking, cleaning, shopping
Get down and dirty with my job and finish with style, not sliding in to the end like my final assignment

So, now you know my hopes. Later if these things work out, I can say more about my dream. But after having so many failures, I feel too embarassed to say about something in great detail.