Logging real life
For a long time, I haven't really written down books that I have read, movies that I have seen, or little events that have happened in my life. Today I think this was a mistake and if I could go back in time, this would be one of the few things that I'd change.
I think the reason why I didn't do this boils down to two factors: first, I, to this day, don't really like to sign up to various websites, and second, I had this little contempt, or rather envy, for achievement-oriented attitude of people. I was also probably afraid that it wouldn't be perfect, which could be a story (or a blog post) for another time.
I have this little quirk in me, that when someone mentions a year, I often think about what happened in my life in that year or near that time. So for example, when someone says "I started this project back in 2022", my mind thinks "Oh yeah, the year I moved to X".
This isn't a strong reason to log various things, but since I've started doing that, I feel better. I know when I started with a given author. I know more or less when something happened. I even started to see patterns in my feeling up or down, or what might have caused that. It also could help to sum up the previous month, year, or anything in the past.
I haven't signed to any website to do this. I've just opened a text file and dumped my memory about books and movies. I also started to log things like "05 Started playing chess again" (05 meaning May). Nothing big, nothing time consuming, nothing Cal Newport or some Huberman-like figure would get wet about. But it doesn't really matter.
I'm still dumbfounded why I haven't thought about this earlier. If someone would come to me and tell me they work in software department and they don't use version control, I would think they lost their marbles. This might not be the sharpest metaphor, but I hope it makes a point.
So, if you're like me from the past, consider starting to do this. It doesn't have to be public, it could be just a present from your past self to your future self.
And if you don't already, start journaling today.