Another year and it is time to reflect back if I have grown one year wise or just one year old. Pretty difficult question, I should say. I am not going to try and fool myself answering this question one way or other, instead let me try to list down some of things that come to my mind as to how 2010 progressed.
The three marathons that I ran this year should definitely qualify as one the highlights of this year, with each race being a challenge in itself. Mumbai 2010 was my first marathon in two years and I need to overcome the mental demons as much as the physical challenges. SFO in July 2010 was an unexpected marathon and so I was not clearly as prepared as I would have liked to. Also, this was marathon was after a long layoff due to the shoulder surgery and given the course, this was a difficult race to run. Finally my first 50K race at Ultra in November. Needless to say, any distance after 42.2K is challenging and 50K was a real challenge. That I did them, though not necessarily with exceptional timings, but without any injury was real satisfaction.
On the work front, this was a reasonable year -- Could certainly have been better, but it was not too bad either. We had one aborted release and one release hitting production. Though the reasons for the postponement of our first release were beyond our control, it was pretty disappointing. Glad that we were able to put that behind and actually get our stuff into production in the next release. Also, this was my first ever year as a "Manager". Though I had only two people reporting to me and these were smart people (luckily) who did not need much management, it was definitely a new experience. I think, looking back, I did enjoy this position, though I am not sure if I am cut out to being a manager for a much larger team.
If there is one clear area that I would clearly like to improve upon next year, that must be to improve my self-discipline. Identifying what needs to be done has not been as difficult as actually going ahead and executing them. As a result, some of the stuff that I earnestly wanted to do in 2010 -- reading (both technical and non-technical stuff), writing, or gymming (to name a few, there are many many more) -- all suffered. It was clearly a lack of discipline and laziness.
At the end of the day (or should I just say year), I think the only one resolution for me would be is to be self-disciplined, sacrificing the immediate pleasure for the long-time needs. It is obvious that if I can get this done, I should be able to define and achieve all I set out to this year, professionally and personally, without much ado. As with any other self development trait, this is much easier said than done. Only time will tell and I really hope it tells good news :)
P.S. I have started a new blog to keep track of the books that I read this year and sort of take notes on them. That should give my grades at the end of the year of how well I have kept up my resolution.
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