This is my first blog post for 2011 and in a long time, so it's fitting that it's for an audience of about 2. Not my dear wife, nor my facebook friend / mother-in-law, but my IRL tweeps @amedmunds and @georgesmithjr who so thoughtfully wrote similar posts.

On with the TOP TRENDS TO WATCH IN 2011 (for Eric Hansen).

[drum roll...]

5. Free time

Hours are down at work (overlapping industry and economic cycles) and I have no teaching appointments this semester, so I have an abundance of time in need of structuring. WIth my applications to grad school only seeing fit to reveal their promise in March or April there will be about 3 months without a major tempo change. The implications of this are significant because I am a busy body. I thrive when my salad plate has a T-bone on it... so, right now April feels further away than next Christmas.

4. Personal data mining

This was almost a trend about "making good habits that stick! Yaaay!" but that's not as remotely interesting as the "how" question, to which the answer is "data". I want to build habits this year that stick because this year will have a cross country move and other major life changes/events so making new good habits stick in a year like is a unique opportunity. So I'm collecting data on my sleep patterns using my new WakeMate — a handy wristband bluetooth accelerometer + iPhone app — to have hard evidence of which factors lead to a good night's sleep and the ideal time to wake up for avoid grogginess.

Also, I'm keeping track of my exercise data and checking in each week to review contextual information about days I worked out to look for patterns that can help me avoid falling off the wagon. I'm not using a fancy iPhone app to track this, because I wanted to keep it simple. However I am phrasing my goals in terms of averages so that I can have better / worse weeks and still meet my goals.

Being a very self-reflective person, I can already tell you a lot about how to sleep better or exercise more; honestly the discipline of collecting data and analyzing it is more for the Hawthorne effect than any new insights — though I'm looking forward to those as well.

3. Finding new audiences

Of all the wonderful things I gained through teaching, the most selfish and simple one was having an "audience" for which to regularly "perform". Without that for this semester, and with leaving the jazz big band after we move in May, all year I'm going to be in search of new audiences with which to interact. I have some irons in the fire, but this is one of those oxygen-like needs in my life. (...Something I didn't realize until my mom pointed it out to me; I was discussing with her that something felt missing from my life after moving to Champaign.)

2. Fostering creativity through accountability and discipline

Regardless of what the future will hold, I realize that I need to flex my brain muscle more than devising the best gameplay strategy for Pirates Love Daises. This means writing more, reading/listening to more books, and synthesizing data into interesting content for others (beyond writing text: video, audio, infographics, pictures, etc.).

But the best way for me to do this is to make time for it on a disciplined basis. This may not mean daily (I might be more of a three-day guy), but at the very least it means scheduling time for these activities in ways that make me accountable to more people than just me. Scheduling these events will help me "act my way into better thinking" instead of the other way around. (Again, thanks mom for the insight.)

1. Handling the tomorrow's unknown by focusing on today

Will I get into grad school and have a nice roadmap for the next several years? If so, where? And will I survive? If not will I stay at my current job or have to look for a new one? Will the size of my family grow, contract, or break even? Will any of the stuff above be a game changer, or will I be making the same strides next year? Right now, I'm just glad to have the free time to write this. And it's Friday / date night — thank jeebus it's Friday.

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I just want to wish the best to @amedmunds and @georgesmithjr, as well as any family, friends, and strangers who may read this (you can never be sure with the online internet): I hope 2011 is a powerful and positive year for you all.