The Month of Beginnings & Lessons

Dear Diary,

(You don't know how good writing "Dear Diary," after a long time of not writing it makes me feel..)

The month of January has been.. A lifetime.
I've been through so many things this past month, I officially feel like it's been a lifetime.

I completed one month and ten days as an HR Learning & Development Associate in Gulf International Bank.

I even have my own desk now!

We've been having different courses for the first month in GIB, going from Communication Skills and Team Building to Banking and Finance. And so much more.

I've had a number of life lessons in the past month as well, here are the most important ones (In that prioritized order):

Dear Lulu,

1. Be Assertive.
   Being strong-willed and assertive does not necessarily mean unkindness; it does not have to have a negative meaning.
   Being that means being confident.
   
2. Don't Over-Analyze Things,
   When you're an analyzer by nature–like me–and you become too aware of the people around you, it becomes something like a curse. It'll be exactly like this: you're a computer and you're functioning automatically. And you're switched ON. All the time.
   
   What I learned from this is that it's true. I am an analyzer and I am the type of person that pays extra attention to details. But that doesn't necessarily mean that I have to analyze everything about everyone.
   
   And, something valuable to help me stop my automatic analysis, STOP VOICING YOUR ANALYSIS. [and that is step one]
   
3. Find Yourself–create yourself–Be yourself and Be Confident About It,
   Some people tell you to be yourself, but once they get a chance, they start trying to change some things about you to fit their standards and their criteria of how a person should be. Tailored to their specific liking.
   
   I learned to see myself through my eyes and not through the eyes of others. (no matter how much I like/love them).
   
   Being yourself could be hard sometimes. Especially if you are different and are in a society with cultural fundamentals that doesn't really accept anything out of the ordinary. And that is one more reason for you to be yourself. "Satisfying people is not even an aim to be reached."
   
4. Be Present,
   I read a book called 'The Present' by Dr. Spencer Johnson.
   This book is 103 pages long–yes, it's a very short one. But in those 103 pages, you find the lessons of a lifetime.
   This page could summarize the lessons in it:
   
   
   * That doesn't mean that I am actually "Present". It means that I'm enlightened and that I'm working on it.


5. "There Are No Bad Days, There Are Challenging Days." –DadI learned that a bad day is a day wasted.
   But a challenging day is a day that left you with important lessons.
   
6. Manage Your Anger, (Be calm and calculated)
   I don't have anger issues. But I discovered that when it's the wrong person at exactly the wrong time, mind you, I will snap and it won't look beautiful. And, for me, the most important thing I've learned from this is that, mostly, I'm the only one that'll actually be affected by my anger. Others would be affected, but not as badly as I would.
   
   * The way I've come to learn this lesson is that I had to be stuck with an inconsiderate and mean instructor that fails to do his job well AND he raised his voice at me in front of my colleagues. Needless to say, my reaction wasn't very "calm and calculated".

–

This past month, I read two books, went back to learning French in my Duolingo app, I read two pages of Qur'an daily, most of the days, I preceded my prayers over all my usual mundane interests and fixed my sleeping hours (mostly).

I also kept going back to my "before I go to sleep, I just want to say" Diary post. And, surprisingly and satisfyingly so, it helped me a lot.

So, for me, that was a great and a promising beginning, because I didn't do everything. Just like I predicted. And that gives me the ability to check myself and see where my weaknesses lie and try to strengthen them. Because, then, I'll see progress.

But, I think that the most important thing that I have learned is this:

In order for you to be who you're meant to be in the future, you have to go through what you're going through in the present. At this very moment. No matter how bad and frustrating it feels.

But the secret key to this is LEARNING from it. Learning from every single second of it.

2017

Dear Diary,

It's 2017.

No, this is not the new year's resolutions. (Well, if you must name it, it could be that).

Anyway, there are certain things in my life and about myself that I'd like to enhance. They're not necessarily bad or unacceptable things. They're simply things that I would like to change/improve.

It is known that giving yourself a long to-do list or a big number of things to do will bore you and/or will seem hard to accomplish and you'll mostly end up not doing it. So, what I'm doing is that I'm giving myself a small list–but with specific criterias–of the things that I want to focus on.

Let's put it that way: in general, I want to get to know/create myself, and I want to be the better version of what I already know.

Therefore, by the end of the year 2017, I want to have achieved all the objectives listed below.

1. Reading–
   I want to read 10 more books than the books I read in 2016:
   Last year, I read 27 books. This year I want to read 37 books.
    
2. Family–
   More family time. (Especially being with my family when they're all sitting together).
   Specify the time for my little sister; whether it's to read her bedtime stories or to take her out.
    
3. Write/Blog–
   I learned that by writing, I am learning so much about myself and about some of the things around me. And that's why: I want to blog, at least, once a month to talk briefly about what happened in the month and what new things I learned in that month.
    
4. Listening–
   I recently found out, after taking a test in a 'Successful Communication' course, that I have "Excellent Communication Skills" but I'm "Above Average" in the Listening Skills–(A few points below excellence). So, I want to work on my Listening Skills to reach Excellence.
    
5. Job–
   Excel in my field of work: Always be on time. Go The Extra Mile. Work hard. Learn. Utilize what I know.
    
6. Calligraphy–
   Devote, at least, three hours a week to practice what I learned and learn new things.
    
7. Health–
   Since I know for a fact that I won't cut chocolates and fast-food, I want to do the things that are achievable and I know I can do without breaking.
   
   • I'm not that much of a soft-drinks person, so I'll cut them completely this year, in sha'Allah.
   • Drink no less than one liter of water daily.
   • Fruits and vegetables: snack on fruits instead of unhealthy foods. And add more vegetables, and less rice, to my meals.
   • Selecting specific days of the week to go to the Gym doesn't work for me, so my goal is to go to the Gym whenever I have the time and a car ride is available.
   • Take Zumba/Pilates classes if any of them are available.
    
8. Spiritually–
   Prayers on time (precedence it over everything else), commit to the Sunna prayers and read two pages of Qur'an every day.
    
9. Language–
   I'm currently on 7% of fluency in the French language in my Duolingo app; My aim is to reach 100% of the French lessons by the end of the year and to be able to start reading the French book that I bought a couple of years ago.
    
10. SLEEP EARLY AND WAKE UP EARLY!–
    I love mornings but it's hard for me to wake up early if I don't have anything to do. So, I want to wake up no later than 9 am on the weekends and wake up a full hour and a half before work on working days.

Looking back at myself a few years ago, I see how much I've grown and how much I've changed. Without actually meaning to, I've come a long way.


Knowing that it's possible to change and be better is the motivation that'll push me to work on my list.

–

"The Jump is so frightening between where I am and where I want to be. Because of all I may become, I will close my eyes and leap!"

–Mary Anne Radmacher