The world is closing in - journal

[AlmostFamous]

So here it is. My journal, and at the same time my first post on this forum. I should probably introduce myself before I go any further, so here we go; I'm AlmostFamous, 20 years old and attending college in Europe. So why start a journal then? I've noticed that a lot of succesful people on this forum have their own journal, not to impress people but simply to keep motivating themselves. That's my goal, to motivate myself.

About me; I'm a pretty tall guy, looks are a little above average and my wardrobe is really basic.
In a few years I would like to be an actor, but right now I'm attending the conservatory to become a music teacher and I also followed a few psychology courses at university.

One of the reasons to finally start posting on this forum is the moment I read the following quote: "You're the average of the five people you spend the most time with" - Jim Rohn. That got me thinking and I started to do the math:

Nerdy gamer roommate + little overweight stoner musician + alcoholic sportfriends (they're like one person, no real identity) + acting friend with his own business + little musician from my band = not that positive.​

I had to work really hard to think of five people; I might say I'm a bit of a loner.

So area 1 of my path is going to be changing the people I'm surrounded with.

• First thing is finding a new place. My current roommates are nerds or arrogant pricks (they owe me money, make lots of noice in the middle of the night and never clean). Friday I'm invited for "selections" for a room in a flat with 9 other students. A bit crowdy, but it might be good for my social circle.
• Second thing is going to school more often. There are lot of great musicians there, I just don't know them.
• The acting friend is a good lead to increase my network, I should see him more often.

Another important thing to mention is girls. I attract medium girls, I make out with them and then it's over. That's all attention I want to spend on this subject right now. Need to improve other aspects of life first.

Feeling great about myself is one of the best feelings there is; however I'm great at sabotaging myself in that aspect. Physically the summer has been really bad for me; I've developed bad habbits and gained a lot of weight. Things I do that make me unhappy are:

• Staying in bed after the alarm clock
• Making a mess of my place
• Postponing work
• Drinking alcohol
• Not working out

Area 2 of my journey will consist of things I will do to make myself feel better.
Area 3 will be about improving my skills.

20-10-2015: The first day of my journey
This day started off by me, lying in my bed for two hours after the alarm clock went off. Not that much of a great start. I decided to do eight sets of 1-minute abs-exercises. Started a new thread on this forum after that, used "Wind Of Change" by the Scorpions to find a title and kept on typing ever after while drinking a cup of coffee.

Plans for today:
- Eat breakfast (probably oats with cinnamon and water, maybe with a clementine for taste)
- Study the piece I have to conduct next week
- Have coffee with my mom (improving my social life also means spending more time with family in my opinion)
- Clean my room (again)
- Eat with my rowing friends (no color on this one, they're nice guys but it's mostly drinking. I'll do the cooking because I always do)
- Go out with my school "friends" (haven't been out with them in two years, but it's a good step to get back with them.

That was it for now, here's the song that I mentioned earlier.

- AF(C?)

 

[Aspiring Don Juan]

Hey man, glad you decided to start a path to turn your life around. Just remember to stay motivated and push through tough times. Good luck!

 

[AlmostFamous]

About yesterday
The second time I'm writing this journal in the morning; some may find it weird but for me it's a good way to look back on my goals and plan the rest of the day.

So yesterday I didn't clean my room, nor did I study the choir piece. I did go out and that escalated completely. I'm trying to diminish my alcohol consumption, but that didn't work out yesterday. Started at dinner (had about 4 beers while cooking and watching TV after), then went to another party where I had about 3 beers and 2 shots and then in the club (2 beers). I was with my school people who were kinda boring in the club, so I started walking around to see if I knew anyone. Did that about three times, saw the clock (2:17), remembered "Nothing good ever happens after 2 A.M." - Ted Mosby and decided to go home.

21-10-2015: Trying to get this engine started
Woke up with a small hangover at 10:00. Right now it's 13:44. I just wasted 4 hours of my life in bed watching a movie and listening to music. Still need to grab breakfast.
On the plus side; I got an invite for a casting today, short movie which I applied for earlier this week. Need to plan it between my lessons on friday though, so that will be a challenge.

For today:
- Gonna work out
- Eat healthy AF again (at least I hope oats and fruit and stuff are healthy)
- Going out tonight and limiting my beverages to 3 max
- Complete yesterdays goals

 

[AlmostFamous]

21-10-2015: Lazy, crappy, blah.
About my goals that day; worked out for five minutes, so that doesn't count. My breakfast was pretty healthy, though I believe my dinner wasn't that great. Had a pizza, was still hungry, called a (female) friend of mine, had burgers. After that I went to have a drink. Limiting my beverages worked out... Kinda. Had 4,5 beers, not that bad, considering we were playing drinking games. After that I went home early, because the next day I would have to go working out with a friend.

22-10-2015: Workoutday
Woke up early, made myself some eggs and white beans in tomato sauce and got ready to go train. My buddy was hungover and didn't come. I was kinda pissed, but decided to go anyway. I'm glad I went, I had a real nice cardio training:
- 5 minutes warmup on the rowing machine
- 19 minutes pyramid on the rowing machine (4 minutes 20m/s, 3 minutes 22m/s till 28 and after that back)
- 20 minutes of spinning
Finally got a hot shower (mine didn't work all week) and went home to... don't remember. I didn't have to work, but what díd I do? Ah yes, a girl came over, friendzone girl (she's kinda pretty but has really cute friends). We made pancakes together, massaged eachother, watched movies in bed. Was pretty proud that I didn't kiss her. After that I went to practice for some acting thing at my rowing club, and when I got home I had a crappy dinner with my roommates (they really can't cook).

23-10-2015: NEW ROOM!!!!!
Bam! Got up early to go to school (last conducting lesson till next week, when I'll be conducting all week) so had to go. Tested my new arrangement, sounded pretty dope. After that I had a casting for a short movie, which went pretty good. They were really enthousiastic, like "Let's see... Do we have other people coming for this role today? 'Cause we're all really enthousiastic, ah see, here this guy, hmm no I think he's not the type. You'll hear from us!" Got home, ate with my roommates I believe. After that I visited the "new house" I wanted to join. Was 15 minutes late, but I charmed my way in and got the room!
While I was waiting for that call I went up two stories in the same building and got into a nice house party.

There was this girl, I shall call her Lucy for now, and she lived there. I was early so I helped with the last decoration things and sat at the door with her. Teased her a bit, decided we should keep our distance. Was the live of the party, danced, talked a lot, played beer pong (for the first time in my life) and everytime we had our running gag of staying as far as we could from eachother. After a while I just broke it and we got pretty close. But then my a few of my new roommates (2 girls, 1 guy) came in. They were nice but totally ****blocked me; that 1 guy even tried to get with Lucy. I just let him for a while and had fun with the girls, and after a while I stole Lucy back and took her to her room. We made out.
Fun times, but there was also another friend of hers "sleeping" in the bed. Her friends kept coming in, kinda annoying. And she kept wanting to go back to the party. Sure. We went back, my new roommates were already gone but called if I was in for a snack. Went down, ate some, drank some wine, and then I saw Lucy in front of the window. Got out, got back with her to the party, walked around for a bit and took her down to her room. Bits of making out, fingering, all fun and games but still her friend in the bed.

24-10-2015: Hangoverday
After two hours of sleep (it was 9:00 now) I got so freaking cold (we were sleeping under a really thin blanket because her friend stole the good one) I said bye and cycled home. Slept till 15:00, then got up, watched some movies, ordered a pizza, did some more nothingness and texted a bit with one of my new roommates. Got to sleep early because I wanted to be fit for sunday.

25-10-2015: Showtime
Had to be in the theater today again, to play in a musical. When I was in the dressing room I suddenly spotted some hickeys in my neck; woops. Good luck make-up department. Show went pretty good although I had some troubles with my fellow actors; I got pretty annoyed by the way they acted around me. Still feels like they don't really like me most of the time. Got home, had really bad shoarma (again, roommates can't be trusted cooking) and spent an hour working on the final version of my sheet music for this week of conducting. Gotta get up early tomorrow to make sure I'm finished copying in time.

 

[AlmostFamous]

26-10-2015: Choirday
Had a pretty bad night of sleep. Was so nervous for monday that I just couldn't sleep well. I had to conduct a pretty hard piece with a group of kids that didn't sing that often so it was kind of hard, but I was glad I did it.
Got home, was really tired, had a few beers (alcoholic) and went to sleep.

27-10-2015: Choirday 2
Another night of bad sleep. Prepared to conduct again, talked to a real cute girl about getting fit and she showed me her before picture. She will be hot again, so I promised her that I would work out with her and that we would keep track of eachothers progress. Practiced with the choir, went pretty well. Went home but couldn't really sleep.

28-10-2015: Rest
Wednesday aren't my best days. Stayed in bed for quite a long time, after that I watched a few movies and had dinner with some Olympic rowers (that was pretty awesome, we won that with our team at an auction). After that had a few beers, suddenly got wasted and slept pretty late again.

29-10-2015: Teaching again?
Wow, I felt like a great teacher today. Gave a great lesson, knew a lot about the subject, the students seemed to be enjoying it. Ate pretty healthy, worked out in the morning, walked a long way to the train station because the weather was awesome and had an amazing dinner (without beers, woohoo). Also watched the movie where my choir piece is from, an eye opener!

Workout:
- 3x1 minute crunches (straight, left, right)
- 1 minute alternating ankle tipping
- 1 minute leg raises
- 1 minute pushups
- 3x1 minute burpees

- 30 minutes of walking. Not that much of a workout but felt pretty great.

Tomorrow is the performance with the choir. I'm kinda stressed out because I only have 20 minutes to practice tomorrow and there's a part in the middle that doesn't go that well, but hey. I've done all I can. Now to bed and early, even though I just had an espresso.

 

[AlmostFamous]

Reset

Quite a boring story above. Wouldn't pay to read it. But what if your life was like a movie, one that people wanted to be in? So let's see how I'm doing on all the area's I mentioned in my first post, when I was still motivated.

Area 1 (social circle): Still working with the actor friend. Lately I've had a lot of contact with a guy who is in the management of my "fraternity" (it's a sports club with a lot of fraternitylike aspects, mostly used by me to improve my social circle). My new roommates are a lot nicer than the ones I had before, still not that motivating though. Slowly working my way more in the acting world.
Area 2 (feeling better): Still getting fatter. I'm not consistent in eating and working out. My mind is also one big mess.
Area 3 (becoming better): Acting is improving, but my music skills are not getting better.
kisscount: 74

Why not? Two months have passed; more than 60 days. The only thing that has increased is my number of matches on Tinder.
How have I spent my time lately:

• Sleeping (staying up late, waking up late)
• Watching television and hanging on the couch (defenitely the best way to become awesome)
• Drinking with buddies
• Getting to work unprepared

But if you were bored enough to click on this journal, and you're still reading you wanna be encouraged. "How are you going to improve yourself, what the **** are you going to do with all this stuff you already knew for the last few years?".

Probably not much. I'm still sitting here typing while I should be working on something. And that's the exact problem; there's so much to do that I never know where to start. So here's my planning for tomorrow; for every task I don't complete I will do pushups until I fall on my nose and start bleeding like the ***** I am.

1. Make music (useful for getting a better musician and feeling good about self)
2. Make a sheet for every big project I have to finish with small subgoals on it
3. Complete one of them ****ing projects for 30%
4. Read a book on acting
5. Practice choir music
6. Ear training
7. Make a visual planner for next week
8. Write in this journal and DON'T DO IT DIARY-STYLE 'CAUSE IT'S BORING DUMB **** <3

 

[mrgoodstuff]

Try not to verbally complain, to yourself or others and instead take action on your area of complaints. It will require some planning but people have gotten much worse under complete control. You can too.

 

[AlmostFamous]

This "planning" stuff works. Finished all my work today.

Took a little time to reflect on my progress in my job field, and saw that I keep doing better and better (according to mentors). Speaking of which; finding a mentor is something high on my list.

I've been listening quite a bit to Eric Thomas (ETtheHipHopPreacher) lately, and although I'm not completely following his advices yet, he did say some interesting things. One thing that I would like to share with you is in the area of intellectual development.

As I remember correctly, he said "If you just reading the book she told you to read, you getting beat! You read what she told you to read and then you ask her what she reading, cause if you don't get what she's reading, she's gonna always be the teacher, and you're always gonna be the student! "

Just a quote I wanted to share with you, for those of you who also struggle with begin mediocre.

 

[AlmostFamous]

New year; what has changed?

So here's what I did; I made three New Years resolutions:
- No alcohol in January
- Get up early every day
- Run or work out every day

The first one was because I lost a bet, but it's actually helping me follow my other goals. Getting up early is hard and sometimes I fall right back asleep after I turn off my alarm, but it's improving. And the workout thing is going pretty well.

How are these goals helping me?
- I'm being more productive. If I do lots of work in the morning I have the evening (when I'm usually not that motivated) all for fun things
- Scored two more roles, one in a musical and a lead in a television pilot. Not sure if it was just luck, but being more productive helped me in putting effort in the auditions
- I fall asleep way more easy. I'm just tired in the afternoon and when I lay in bed it takes me so much less time than before
- I run every other day, and work on abs three days in a row. Slowly I see my little beerbelly disappearing and my sixpack coming back.

I need rolemodels for my tv character.
He's a charming charismatic guy on the outside, real alpha. His home situation sucks, so when he's frustrated he works out or plays videogames. When he's out he's always being the adventurous guy (sounds quite like a DJ, right?) but at home with his parents he's a calm young man.

Any movie/book characters you think I should definitely study before starting this project?

 

[AlmostFamous]

I think I really like this girl. It's getting bad.

Short backgroundstory; usually I don't get the really hot chicks. I land with the medium ones.
But on this party I made out with a really hot girl! I went home with her, she invited me for tea and we had tea. After that we started making out and she literally started shaking and moaning, just by the way I touched her. It was insane, she was sweet.
She said I could sleep at her place, so I did. She was holding back a little than.
The next day she said she really wanted to see me again, so I went on a date with her today. We had lots of fun but not the sexual tension of the last time.
After the date she called me to confirm out next date, but also to tell me she just came out of a big relationship and didn't want anything really serious right now. Damn. How to deal with this; date her and make sure she sees value in me?