Reaching for new heights

At the end of 2007, I made a New Year's resolution of sorts. I decided that I would start getting up earlier to pursue my passions. On January 1st I got up at 6 AM, and continued to do so for a couple of months. Unfortunately, I found myself tired all the time, and wasn't getting enough rest.

At the time, I was teaching guitar 3 days a week. In my spare time, I would write new music, read self-development material, and wrote articles for my website. I made a point of reading Steve Pavlina material, as I had discovered his work in October 2007 and rather liked it.

I think it was Pavlina that inspired me to get up earlier in the first place. In hindsight, I had mistaken his calling as my own. I had thought it was my purpose to pursue writing and self-development as passionately as Pavlina had. Despite having spent the last 7 to 8 years pursuing a career in music, I got a little sidetracked. In retrospect I can see that I wanted what Pavlina had: a passion and purpose. However, I had mistaken his calling for mine.

I think what I related to most with Pavlina was the idea that we could make conscious decisions. Our life wasn't merely the meeting place for a random series of events, but rather a consequence of choices that we had made. It helped me to realize that I did had some control over my own life. For many years I did not believe that there was anything I could do to change or improve my life and here was someone telling me that I could.

In any case, it got me motivated. I wrote new articles for my website every weekday. However, I was beginning to find that my schedule was a little unrealistic. I was trying to juggle several projects at the same time, and I wasn't making progress where I thought it mattered. I started having migraines with increased frequency. Although I had experienced migraines in previous years, at various junctures, it was the first time I really started to fear them. They hurt so much, and there was usually very little I could do about them.

I was starting to get stressed. I was trying to do too much.