didn't try hard enough

I didn't take it seriously enough, even though I lied to myself into thinking I was. I didn't do what needed to be done, at least, not always. I'm not talking about the missed posts, although that was a result of it. What lacked this year was the effort I put in.

I thought I was the kind of person who could think "I could choose to do this thing that I want, or that thing I need to do", and then chose the thing I needed to do. After looking back it is clear that I was not that person, and while the quality of the blog posts were a proof of that, were not the only ones. It's also something I felt internally whenever I thought to myself - I feel like I could've done better today. And 99% of the time, I think I could've.

I got too comfortable, somewhere in the back of my head I knew something was wrong, but proceded to turn a blind eye by thinking I was doing fine, without any grounded reasoning or measuring to support it. I should've kept track of my progress, should've kept track of my hours put in, should've kept pushing myself. So I could measure myself against my past-self, "am I doing better than I was yesterday?"

I don't want to disregard the effort I put in, I did more than I ever had, but it wasn't 100% - and for what I'm going for, I think I need something pretty close to that, and what I did was not near it. I've been thinking about this for a while now, not knowing how to explain it, keeping it in the back of my head. But after a few months of dwelling on it, I think I'm being honest with myself now.

I was on the right path, but didn't do enough to keep me on it, straying away for too long at a time. Video game binge here, anime and YouTube binge there, an annoying amount of hours just lost to vices. Not saying these things weren't ok, they're great and even good for you in moderation, but that would be the last word to describe what I was doing.

No more reminiscing, nothing's going to change what I did, or rather, did not do. Instead, I want to share something that I think might be interesting if anyone reading this feels the same, if they feel that they aren't trying hard enough.

I have an idea, if someone were to sacrifice things that were important to them, such as their usual time spent on friends, hobbies, relationships, all in the pursuit of something the cared deeply about, wouldn't it show compared to those who did not make those sacrifices? If you were to give up luxuries that stood between you and your goal, would you not be closer to it than the you before?

 I want to find out if that's the meaning of true effort, and I want next year's blog to be about that. Nothing too extreme of course, I'm going to keep in touch with friends and watch a couple anime episodes here and there, but I won't spend the same time I did on those things like I did before, especially games, those can actually go for good.

That's my new years resolution, also, thanks to everyone who kept their eyes on my blog. I see the amount of people who visit each post so you have not gone unnoticed.