Image generated with the prompt: An abstract art for the wall using the colors of the flags of Bangladesh, Canada, and USA. And using the symbols for Cowboys, pacific north west, and Bangladeshi rickshaws and Bangladeshi boats. Oil paint. Vibrant. Great attention to detail. Ideal for the wall.
I generally consider myself to be an optimistic person. When I look back, I naturally only remember the good things. Even if I try to remember the difficult parts, most of the time I’m unable to feel the hardships from a past event. When it comes to the present and future, I think my mind mostly stays in a neutral state, neither pessimistic nor optimistic. In 2024, my goal is to practice more optimism about the present and future. The plan revolves around a few ideas…
The first idea is to chain vacations throughout the year so that at any given time there’s something to look forward to. These vacations need not be to exotic destinations. It helps that we’re new to the USA and there are so many things to see just within the USA. Right now, we’re looking forward to a short vacation to Austin, TX, to meet some friends for a weekend and hopefully a bit of a sunny break from the darker PNW season.
The second idea is to build some daily habits to feel more optimistic about myself. I started the year well… got rid of screens from my meal time and I’m drinking 12 glasses of water everyday. The list of habits to build is long, with a couple of new habits to build for each of the next 3 months. Then, I’ll reflect and repeat this process for the remainder of the year.
The third idea is to more actively celebrate the different events with my family and friends. I’ve never really taken any social or life events sincerely. For example, I hardly ever celebrate a birthday or anniversary. For the last few years, I’ve also somewhat ignored Eid and other celebrations where we typically used to host large house parties. In 2024, I’m going to change this. I feel like looking forward to the next event to celebrate keeps my optimism going. Also, it’s a fun brain exercise to think about a thoughtful gift for the loved ones.
The fourth idea is to write more code. I’m going to block four hours each week to write some code to use our own products and tinker with things. In engineering management, it can get quite hectic with whatever the seasonal activity is such as performance management, planning, hiring and other duties. I used to block off a week each quarter to work on a small issue and those weeks easily became my fond memories at work. Instead of it being concentrated for a week, in 2024, I’m going to do this weekly. Since I’ve just joined a new team (Google Cloud Run, amazing product btw), it’s also great to directly use our own product and experiment with the new features.
The fifth idea is to go to more live comedy shows. I’ve always loved storytelling, and stand-up comedians may well be the best at it. Last year I went to a few live shows and I had a blast. I can’t believe how they strike a chord with thousands of people from a diverse ethnic background and age groups and keep them hooked for hours. I’m already waiting for the Hasan Minhaj show in March, and will go to a few more shows throughout the year.
This year I really want to go and watch a pro tennis tournament. It’s been the miss of a lifetime to not see Roger Federer play live. This year, I want to see Alcaraz, Rafa, and Novak play live on court. I didn’t get the tickets yet, but I’m planning to go to the 2024 Indian Wells tournament.
The last idea is to keep doing things that I already find a lot of joy and fulfillment from. Going for walks with Shahana and Shopoth, being silly with Shera, problem solving with coworkers and coaching, reading books, and playing tennis. I feel like it’d help me to focus inward and seek spiritual clarity of the mind, but I’m yet to take an actual goal on this. As I’m writing this blog post that almost nobody reads, I feel like I could take the goal of reading some books related to religion and see how that makes me feel.