Author: spidern

2020 Year-End Review

It’s May 2021, and for some reason I hadn’t been able to finish writing this review.

2020 was hard for everybody. I missed my family and friends. I missed traveling and going to events, but I want to focus on the things I learned and achieved during last year.

Books

I had planned to read 12 books, one per month, and I read 20.

  • The 5-Second Rule
  • Awareness
  • Letters from a Stoic
  • A Guide to the Good Life
  • Enchiridion – Epictetus
  • Principles – Ray Dalio
  • The Mask of Masculinity – Lewis Howes
  • Why do so Many Incompetent Men Become Leaders?: (And How to Fix It) – Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic (Harvard Business Review)
  • Never Split the Difference
  • Ego is the Enemy
  • Leadership Strategy and Tactics
  • Make Time
  • The Magic of Thinking Big
  • The Code. The Evaluation. The Protocols.
  • Never Eat Alone
  • The Ride of a Lifetime
  • The Almanack of Naval Ravikant
  • The Third Door
  • Can’t Hurt Me
  • Love Yourself Like Your Life Depends on It

Health

The plan for 2020 was to run a half marathon. I didn’t complete this goal, but I’m very proud that 2020 was the year I focused the most on exercise. I walked and run, and the last quarter of the year I started weight training at home, using Fitbod app. According to their website, “Fitbod’s training algorithm understands your strength-training ability, studies your past workouts and adapts to your available gym equipment.”

What I like the most about the app is how easy it is to use. It adapts and teaches me how to train. I don’t have to think about routines or how much to lift. As a beginner in weight lifting, this is very important to me.

Career

2020 I got the following certifications:

I still have pending the “Intro to Programming Nanodegree” course at Udacity.

In progress: Udacity programming course.

Courses – Online

Work:

Personal:

Courses – Other

Leather Crafting

At the beginning of 2020 I found on YouTube about Leather Crafting, and after watching a few videos I decided to try it.

I took two classes at Tandy Leather, one to build a wallet and another one to build a passport holder.

If you want to learn about Leather Crafting these YouTube channels are a good way to start:

2020 Favorite TV Shows

  • Outlander
  • The Crown

2020 Favorite Learning Resources

Websites

Book: The Third Door by Alex Banayan

Lessons Learned:

“Sure, there may be billions of frogs, but sometimes I’ll notice there are only ten different kinds of frogs. So that’s a good second tip: you should kiss one of these, one of those—but don’t try to kiss every possible frog. First figure out how many kinds of frogs there are and then see if you can kiss one of each kind.”

“Life will keep hitting you over the head with the same lesson until you listen.”

“There’s the First Door,” I told Matt, “the main entrance, where the line curves around the block. That’s where ninety-nine percent of people wait around, hoping to get in. “Then there’s the Second Door, the VIP entrance. That’s where the billionaires, celebrities, and the people born into it slip through.” Matt nodded. “School and society make you feel like those are the only two ways in. But over the past few years, I’ve realized there is always, always…the Third Door. It’s the entrance where you have to jump out of line, run down the alley, bang on the door a hundred times, crack open the window, sneak through the kitchen—there’s always a way. Whether it’s how Bill Gates sold his first piece of software or how Steven Spielberg became the youngest studio director in Hollywood history, they all took—” “—the Third Door,” Matt said, a smile spreading across his face. “That’s how I’ve lived my whole damn life.”

“I’d always seen success and failure as opposites, but now I could see they were just different results of the same thing—trying. I swore to myself that from now on I would be unattached to succeeding, and unattached to failing. Instead, I would be attached to trying, to growing.”

Action Items/To Think:

  • What is the Third Door to a challenge I currently have?
  • Who can I ask for help about this challenge?

Book: Never Eat Alone by Keith Ferrazzi

Lessons Learned:

“I learned that real networking was about finding ways to make other people more successful. It was about working hard to give more than you get.”

“In building a network, remember: Above all, never, ever disappear.”

“Like it or not, your success is determined as much by how well others know your work as by the quality of your work.”

Action Items/To Think:

  • Make a list of all the people I know, who can I help?
  • Contact friends/coworkers that I haven’t contacted in a while
  • How can I get other people to know about my work?

2019 Year-End Review

This year started with me moving to Tampa Bay due to work. When I move to a new city, I know that it will mean that the first month I’ll spend it getting used to the city, finding out where to live, identifying where are the stores, learning how to move around the city, how to get to work, etc. Even with such a big change in my life I managed to achieve some goals I defined at the beginning of the year. The rest, I will continue pursuing them in 2020. Overall, I managed to make progress in all of them.

Books

These are the books I read. The book that I liked the most is Meditations by Marcus Aurelius. I highlighted so many paragraphs of this book and I plan to read it again. This book taught me about Stoic philosophy.

Health

Moving to a new city means I get to experiment with habits and discover new hobbies. When I moved to Tampa I decided it was a good time to work on my healthy habits so I decided to start running again and the first thing I did was to sign up to a 5K race. I had so much fun at the 5K that I decided to sign up to a 10K and later to a half marathon. Disney organices super fun running events.

  • Ran a 5K
  • Ran a 10K for the first time

In progress: training for half marathon. I’m currently training for a half marathon. I have learned that, as with any other skill, consistency and repetition are very important.

Career

I got my certification as a Scrum Master and I took the course to get certified as a SAFe Scrum Master. I still have pending to take the exam.

I also started an online course “Intro to Programming Nanodegree” at Udacity. Every now and then I like going back to the basics and un-learn and re-learn again as technology changes so fast.

In progress: Udacity programming course.

Travel

This year I had the opportunity to visit the following places. I fell in love with London and I would love to go back again and explore more. Clearwater Beach is such a beautiful beach, the moment I arrived there I was amazed at how beautiful it is.

  • Atlanta, GA
  • Orlando, FL
  • Clearwater Beach, FL
  • Miami, FL
  • Chattanooga, TN
  • St. Augustine, FL
  • Jacksonville, FL
  • Sarasota, FL
  • Amsterdam, Netherlands
  • Athens, Greece
  • London, UK
  • Cambridge, UK

Cooking

I need to learn more recipes. This year I only experimented once in the kitchen new recipes and I learnt to cook “Tortitas de Atún” (tuna patties). What should have taken me half an hour took me 6 hours. I really need to improve my cooking skills.

Online Courses

This course is amazing. Aaron has so much passion for what he does and attention to detail. I don’t think I’ll be cooking Texas-Style BBQ any time soon, but if there is one thing I learnt from this class is to keep the seasoning simple and just use salt and pepper.

2019 Favorite Learning Resources

Websites

Podcasts

YouTube Channels

Plans for 2020

I have already started defining my goals for 2020 and started the breakdown by quarter. I can’t wait to see what 2020 will bring to my life.