Q1 2026
Time is moving both fast and slow. This quarter had a big life milestone and a lot of me telling myself I wasn’t doing enough at home and at work. Writing this, I still feel this way but that’s part of the fun of wanting more out of life, right?
January
The first two weeks of the month were predominantly spent in deep research mode while we were prepping to close on our house. Leveraging AI to help comb through documents that I was going to read anyway to make sure there wasn’t anything that I was missing.
I have no complaints about the move. This has increased our quality of life significantly by moving us closer to everything that we do. I am very grateful.
I switched my approach and stopped working with my dietitian and instead began to rely on myself. This has had ups and downs but I did get my weight up to 238, did a DEXA scan where I weighed 236 at 15% body fat, and have now transitioned into a cut. Admittedly, I am not doing great at the cut with the travel to Missouri and our anniversary but I prefer not to mentally exhaust myself worrying about what I can and can’t eat for times with family. I have enjoyed the workouts that I have been doing and like the shorter mesocycle approach as it helps keep me engaged a bit more.
It’s humorous looking back on inconsistencies in my approach to formatting. I very much like to approach life day by day and that’s evident in what I produce. Sometimes having weigh-ins and averages, other times having Japanese summaries, sometimes having rambling thoughts. While I recognize consistency drives expectations and I find myself wanting to be more consistent in my approach to attract an audience, I also find that I don’t care all that much. If I create too stringent of guides and expectations, I become bored and don’t want to do much of anything.
I still very much feel like I am not doing enough but I feel that I have made progress on taking action when something is causing me anxiety. No point in suffering when you can fix the problem yourself, right?
My wifi still isn’t perfect but I think I have a solution… For next quarter.
Also, most of the problem was me. I had a wifi router that had the same network name for ease of use and for some reason, we were being throttled down to 50 mbps when we pay for gig speed. Glad I unplugged it after weeks of suffering.
February
While it wasn’t my favorite dining table in the world, it has grown on me and I eat at that table every day. Thanks, Syd.
We didn’t get charged for the lack of me wiping drool off the walls (moving out of the old townhouse into our house). I am assuming we had to pay for the fan and for some reason, they only accepted checks… Who, in this modern era that prefers to be paid in a timely manner, prefers checks to electronic payment? That took me longer than I’d like to admit to get out but I did it.
The move out of the townhouse took embarrassingly long but we really just didn’t want to go over there and I still can’t blame us for that.
Reflecting on visiting my Granny and Grandad has become a running joke to us about self and situational awareness. Good times.
I established baselines that I haven’t done a great job of holding. Mainly with Japanese, sometimes with dog training. I walk the dogs daily and take them to the park where we do some training but I could be doing more. I had a consistent streak in February and into March where I was crushing my Wanikani but I let the trip to Missouri derail me and I have to get back on track.
Ellie laying in the grass still fills my soul with joy every time it happens. Tru isn’t much for laying in the grass (I’m not a fan of laying down on my toilet either), but he has laid on the porch a couple of times. There’s just a piece of me that feels complete and so filled with so much joy and a little sorrow for my dogs that didn’t get to experience that.
It’s genuinely interesting getting to read my weekly reflections. I am not reading them like a book but am combing them for details as I review this and man, I have just not felt like I am doing much of anything lately. It echoes throughout the whole quarter and is persistent to even the moment that I write this. I am getting recognition for the work I do at work but feel like I suck at my job, I continually feel like I don’t do enough at home… I just want the world for my family and I and I don’t feel like I am getting us there. I know I can do more but feel behind even when I know I am ahead.
As I wrote that, I think at work I am actually in the sweet spot for major growth. At home… Not as much, that anxiety feels a bit more justified. At work, I think I am just getting the right levels of stimulus to push me into a zone of discomfort and that is where I feel like I am not good enough. In my current state, I’m not, but I will get better.
March
I started going to the gym in the morning instead of at night. While getting out of bed in the morning felt like it would be the bane of my existence, it sure as hell beats waiting for people to get off of the equipment and I am almost to the point where I can consistently wake up at 4:30 AM without an alarm.
I think I just threw up in my mouth a bit writing that last sentence
While I increased my intentionality with Japanese, I didn’t increase my intentionality with timely reflection here. I did learn that I can’t do things in the evening like I normally would, otherwise, I will simply want to go to bed. I still need to find ways to better integrate my personal goals into my day.
Big notables: another trip to MO, car broke down, heavy vehicle analysis to determine what my next car will be and when I will get it. Also, our second anniversary. Woot woot!
A lot can happen in three months. This was a very self-critical few months for me but it seems like that is more of a norm lately than it is a brief period. I don’t like feeling like my own biggest obstacle but also recognize that most of the time, I am exactly that.
If I can figure out how to fix that problem with the snap of my fingers…. I think I might just give Elon a run for his money.
Unfortunately, I think that’s a problem that we all face and will all face for most of our lives-in one capacity or another.
