It has been a while since my last post, even though writing provides me with numerous benefits I prioritized other activities. Let's talk about my priorities and give reason to this lull.
As you might have made up from other posts, I have a strong yearning to learn new things and writing partly provides me in this. However, there are a lot of other things I find very interesting...to many things. In the past this multitude of things distracted me from which was important to me more than once, so I choose to set some clear priorities.
My family takes up precedence above anything else. Even though this sounds obvious I, as well as others, tend to spend time on things unrelated to the ones we love. This in a sense is weird as other things will be around for quite some time while time with our loved ones is limited. Therefore, I concluded that time with the ones I love is valuable and I needed to be more mindful of this time. This instantly leads me to a paradoxical priority above family, myself.
Probably the most important priority is taking care of myself which might sounds selfish but, in my eyes, is quite self-explanatory. How can I care for my family if I am not well myself? There is a fine balance here, the point is not to escape any hardship, the point is to take care of it. Watching a movie or reading a book will most likely distract me and won’t solve anything.
You might have noticed that my role as a lecturer doesn’t seem to appear in these priorities, it is however placed in the first category. As I described earlier, there is a fine line between personal and professional and therefore takes up its position in these priorities. My role as a lecturer provides me with a lot of thing to learn about myself, others and the world. Therefore, I´m happy to say that this is not my job because I need to, but because I want to.
Others might not need to prioritise this way; however, it has given me an enormous boost in wellbeing. This means I can take care of my family which in turn provides me with the peace of mind to put my heart and soul into my job. If you choose to set some personal priorities, please note that my priorities shouldn't necessarily be yours. Don't let me, or others, tell you what your priorities should be, choose yourself.
I am off course forced to point out that there are bad days on which I simply can´t think about myself or my family first, such is life, don´t dwell on it. However, given a chance, I prioritise.
So, what have I chosen to prioritize about the last couple of months? I took a deep dive into data science and picked up some certificates along the way. This amazingly interesting field has provided me with a lot of new insights which I am integrating into my role as a lecturer.