Agile Evenings

Isn't it fascinating how time can be fast and slow at the same time?

Last week felt VERY long, yet not long enough. In preparation for a move to a shared space, I started thinking about focused time outside of work.

I have A LOT of time in the evenings, especially between now and end of February. I started to think how can I make use of that time to learn new skills that will benefit me both at the Data Center and on my current career path.

I recently signed up for a personal Atlassian account. Managing all the things I wanted to learn in a list wasn't working. I needed a way to prioritize learning activities (Jira), capture notes (Confluence) and report to myself (for now) in ONE place (Atlas). I'm working on creating a roadmap for the next 10 years so I can visualize the big picture.

But, I know myself well. If I don't break these tasks down into blocks of time, I'll start a bunch of learning paths and certifications and never finish because something new and shiny will pop up. My next step is scheduling after-work hours to make forward progress. I'm going to enlist ChatGPT to help me figure out the best way to plan my evenings (I'm getting much better at prompting) that creates a good personal and professional life balance.

I hope to start 2025 with a solid plan for the first half of the year, including checkpoints to determine if anything needs to be tweaked or I need to pivot completely. And hopefully time starts to feel like it's moving at a normal pace again.