Weeks go faster than days

It’s only been a few days since my last post, ut it seems like ages. Since I last checked in, highlights include:

• My first headhunter call in this job search, and my second scheduled for next week
• An okay intro call with what may be an immediate and fruitful consulting gig
• My first foray back onto LinkedIn

At the same time, it’s already been 2.5 weeks since I got let go and I still haven’t:

• Followed up with a consulting proposal, or even updated my resume
• Done any unemployment paperwork
• Improved a single unhealthy lifestyle choice in spite of an obvious wakeup call
• Got past the denial stage?

The burden of the reality countdown clock continues to grow.

Fuck “Succesful People”

Every few weeks I come across the same infographic – the one that shows the difference between successful and unsuccessful people:

I don’t know if it’s because the graphic is baselessly false – or precisely because it’s true – but I hate it. It makes me pay little attention to the things I’m doing right, and feel like shit for the things I’m so obviously doing wrong.  

Give Credit Where Credit’s Due

To be fair, I think much of what bugs me about this graphic is how it fits with my own self-criticism:

• I drink a lot
• I watch TV every day
• I don’t know what I want to be
• Say I keep a journal (this blog) but I don’t 
• I fly by the seat of my pants…and more. 

But Let’s be Real

This is a highly over simplified graphic. Yes I fit many of the criteria for an unsuccessful person, but at the same time:

• I do eventually journal (this post a case in point)
• What I watch on TV is news or news related
• When I do drink (current post a case in point) I’m almost always reading articles or responding to emails
• I fly by the seat of my pants because I work for a high growth tech firm
• I do keep a to-do list…but I’m used to having only a handful checked off by the end of the day (workday or weekend, work or family)

What’s the Lesson (Hint: Booze)

Most of this categorization is subjective bullshit, in my humble opinion, but one thing stands out from the rest. 

I’m an alcoholic, and I still can’t admit it. 

From my “let’s be real” comments, I think almost anyone – successful too! – can relate to 4/5 of my situation. Among successful people I know, almost all have to fly by the seat of their pants to a degree, and they all leave work with tasks undone. 

What they don’t do is drink…or at least not like I do. Consider that, on an average work day, I do at least 2-3 of the following:

• Fighting a daily hangover to get to work some time between 9:30 and 11:00 each day
• If I stretch my work arrival to noon, trying to get 2-3 drinks in me to get my workday started 
• If not, taking the first opportunity to get 3-5 drinks in me so I can “work at 100%”
• Take at least one break in the afternoon to “go for a walk” when in fact I’m back at the bar keeping my buzz on
• End up getting home to my family anywhere from 8:00 to 11:30 because I had to catch up on what I didn’t do for the day 

All told, I estimate I spend 3-5 hours (don’t ask how much money I spend) at a bar of some kind every day of the week. That’s:

• 3-5 hours a day
• 21-35 hours a week
• 82-150 hours a month

If that’s not enough reason to give up drinking, I don’t know what is. If that’s not enough, I’ve given up alcohol for months and years at a time. 

All which begs the question…what will it finally take for me to give up a habit I know is so self-destructive?

I’ve pulled myself out of this before; I just  can’t find the way out now. Life’s too busy – or just busy enough a to do it. 

Still time to salvage the week?

I can’t say much now; I’m running late to pick up the boy but I wanted to check in quickly, if only so I can fill in one more check box on my to-do list for today. So far the fate of the day is still up in the air as, is my habit in recent weeks, I kept myself busy with minor housekeeping and chores…at the expense of the single job application I’ve been kicking down the road for two weeks now. In the small victories department:

• Today I actually opened the laptop and Word AND my cover letter for the job.  I got to the application, just too late in the day.
• Compared to where I was in December, I’m miles ahead in the amount of daily time I spend being productive, and not in the viscous cycle of beating myself up to the point of all-day inaction.

Still, the smallness of these victories screams loudly to me.  How much longer am I going to keep putting this thing off? Am in in denial about my true capabilities? Am I really ready for full time work, or even the task of finding it?  I’m terrified of the alternative.

You’ll know I salvaged the week if:

• I finish this post in under the 5 minutes I set aside for it.
• I start my next one by reporting the job application submitted.

Fuck Albert Einstein…Tomorrow Will Be Different

Say what you will about his brilliance and changes to the way we understand the universe, but I have two little words for Albert Einstein: Fuck You.

Why? Because of his (or Ben Franklin’s, or author Rita Mae Brown’s, depending on whom you ask) simple definition of insanity:

“Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.”

By this definition, I crossed the certifiably insane line long ago.  And there isn’t a day that goes by that I’m not reminded of it.

In recent weeks, I have awoken every day to face myself in the mirror and pledge, “Today I will not drink.  Today I will make music.”

What I mean music is some form of art or accomplishment; learning new chords on the guitar, writing a paragraph or page for the book I’ve been thinking about for 3 years, fine tuning my resume to apply to a job posting, and more.

What I mean by drinking is…drinking.  I’ve beaten several addictions, ones I think are much worse and certainly more costly, but I still struggle with the obvious need to part with a substance that has taken so much from my passion, ambition, family and pocketbook. I know how alcohol is a silent killer of a substance, one made easy to abuse by its wide availability and societal acceptance.  I know when I was abstinent or only an occasional drinker, I was a better person; a better father and husband; a productive and proud provider.  I know that while posing as a useful resource or even a “friend” alcohol has robbed me of all these things.

And yet…even as I make my daily pledge, there is a point in each day – usually just after noon – when I find a way to convince myself that, just this last time, alcohol will be my friend again; that just 1-2 drinks will give me the one-time boost I need to rise to the mounting tasks in front of me.  Just one drink inevitably turns into 3-4, cutting deeper into my growing debts and draining me of what little motivation I had before first putting a glass to my mouth.  I end the day with a further motivation-draining joint, fading into sleep with the voice of an alcohol-fueled rage ringing in my head for letting such a familiar pattern repeat itself.

Tomorrow will be different.

Today is no exception.