3 things about me

I need to be nice to myself

As a child, I was a dreamer (just ask my primary school teachers...), but I also have a practical problem solving mindset. Perhaps that’s something I learned as a boy scout when I was a teenager. Present me with a new problem and my first intuition is to try and think of solutions. This may sound obvious - if there’s a problem, you’ll want to solve it, right? But it’s my very first reaction, whereas some other people I’m close enough to to comment on are more likely to first analyse the new situation before trying to solve it. The funny consequence is that I occasionally end up suggesting four possible solutions to a new problem before realising that, all things considered, it doesn’t really need to be a problem in the first place.

I’m also an optimist with a very positive mindset. I’m happy with all these things. Yet together, they make me an ambitious person - which is also good, except that this causes me to be harsh on myself a lot. I know that I’m very lucky to be who I am, and to be in the position I’m in. If I’m really honest with myself I can’t think of anything I’d want to change about myself. Yet I always feel like I need to learn this and that and I should try such and such and I should do X and Y and Z more often. The stress this produces is counterproductive at best and toxic to my health and happiness at worst.

I don’t know how to relax

This is scary. This is a continuation of the above - I’m always busy and always feel I have something I need to do. But honestly, if there’s one thing I really need to do, it’s relaxing. I’ll be much healthier, happier, I’ll be able to work better as well. I just don’t really know how to. This is also because obligations and hobbies all live on the same laptop and there’s little separation between the two in time or place so I’m never really relaxing.

It’s different when I am with VelCake and spend a lot of time only having fun with her. But I’m often without her for many months at a time and I cannot go without relaxing for so long. Relaxing is definitely something I need to learn.

I have a pretty good feel for data analysis

Let’s end on a positive note, shall we? My job involves quite some data analysis, of A/B tests for example - these are experiments where we show 2 versions of the website to different people and measure what people do with them, so we can decide which is best. So I always join every “data meeting” and can’t help but notice how easy it is for me to intuitively decide what to do next. So far, my gut feeling has proven 100% accurate in immediately predicting the conclusion we will come to in the end. I guess I should speak up more and save them all some time!

I'm glad I put that all down in a journal! It sounds weird, but writing it all down truly feels good and made me understand myself better, too. I strongly encourage you, my dear reader, to think about it too - what have you learned about yourself recently?