Geekflex

I’m going to let you in on a secret: I think better inside the box. When faced with limitless possibilities and endless choices I get overwhelmed and don’t know where to start. I’m pretty good at getting from point A to point B, but I need to know is where point B is. I can figure out where point A is by analysing the current situation, whatever that may be.

When it comes to programming, point B is usually a working program that performs a given feature set. Point A is me with my set of tools. Those tools include programming languages, problem solving experience, Google-fu and whatever I have installed on my computer. These are among the items I have in my box. There are lots of things I can do inside my box, and the better I understand these tools the more I can do with them.

In life, my box contains all the people I’ve encountered, everything I’ve ever learned and all the experiences I’ve ever had. The universe according to me is everything that I can see from within my box. The skills I’ve developed, from professional to social, are also tools in my box. When graduating from university was my point B, it was these tools that I relied on to make it there. I honed and sharpened them and got used to them. My box was geared entirely towards achieving my goal. Once I graduated — my point B reached — I was left with a box of tools, and the feeling that most of them were no longer relevant. I found myself wondering now what?

I’m stuck in a box.

The lesson I’ve been slowly coming to terms with is that the universe doesn’t fit in a box. This box wasn’t always closed. The goals and tools that were there had to come from somewhere. I’m the one that limited my vision and focused too closely on a particularly moment. The box needs to open up again and let new goals find their way in. I can learn new skills and new tools and sharpen them as necessary. I’ll meet new people and let them help shape part of my universe. I just don’t know how I’m going to do it yet.

But I do know that I’m getting out of my box.

See you on the flip side. ;-)

Why am I starting a new blog?

Because I finally feel like I have something to say. My personal blog in the past was just that — personal. It was more like an online, public diary than anything else. I never had any ideas about what direction I wanted to take it in, and what I should say on it. It existed for the sake of existing. Then Twitter came along and provided an outlet for all those little personal-things-I-wanted-to-say and effectively ate my blog. In the meantime a lot of things have changed — I’ve changed, too — and now I know what I want to talk about.

Graduating from university brought about many changes in my life. It was a complete 180-degree turn. When I was in school I always felt like I was going forward, and now I feel like I’m looking back more than ever. All the goals I had set for myself as a student, I’ve achieved. Following graduation, those goals are in the past. For a while I felt like my best years were behind me, and what a bummer that was. I thought “Is this it? Is this what I spent all that time in school for? Well this sucks.” And I longed to go back. If I could do it all over again I think I’d take one course per semester and stretch the fun out for as long as possible.

Then it happened. I became inspired. It hit me that growing up doesn’t have to suck so much. If I can’t find the things in life that make me happy, then I can invent them. Instead of whining about life, I’m going on a mission. I’m on a mission to make growing up suck less. My mission will be documented here, on Geekflex.

Here are just some of the topics I have bouncing around in my head even now:

• What was missing in my university education
• How the “professional” life contrasts with the student life
• What makes being a new grad suck, and how it could be made better
• Life, the Universe, and Everything

I’m going to make life awesome again.