What I have accomplished in 2016

2016 is a year that I feel overall has been a huge struggle, much like 2004, 2008 and 2011.  The problem is I never focus on the good things that happen in these years, and in this past year and those three years I mentioned, I have accomplished quite a bit.  Now I will take some time to discuss what I have accomplished this year:

1) I moved to South Tampa, something I was trying to do for the last 4 years or so.

2) I became more active and was more focused on exercise this year than in years past.

3) I finally got the chance to visit St. Augustine

4) I finally got to take a trip up to the mountains of North Carolina after not being able to do so in the past due to financial reasons

5) I got to visit New York again, this time on my own terms

6) I helped Donald Trump get elected president, making it the first time in 20 years that the person I wanted to win the presidential election actually won.  

7) I became a concealed carry gun owner

8) I picked up fencing again, this time in the form of historical european martial arts

9) I didn't struggle financially nearly as much as I have in years past

10) I got promoted to supervisor at work

11) I signed up for my first marathon, which I will be running this weekend

So why do I think 2016 has been a huge struggle?  As I have written before, it's because of the social aspect.  I went into the year thinking it was going to finally be the year where I get over my problem with meeting/attracting/dating women by starting off the year pretty strong and thinking I was going to springboard myself after the week-long RSD bootcamp in Miami this past February.  What happened was the exact opposite.  What happened instead was that I gave up pickup altogether, I stopped going out to the venues I was practicing pickup except on rare occasion, and when I did go I did little to no approaching of women.  I felt like instead of getting better I got worse, and I felt like I lost any source of motivation that I had as well as any form of parachute.  To make matters worse it I have a roommate who won't shut up about things like "sarging" and obsesses over pickup, even though he's just mocking it.  I get extremely irritated when he asks me if I went out sarging or some stupid shit like that.

So with that said, will I finally climb out of this rut?  Hopefully now that I'm focused on it, things can turn for the better.  After all, I'm pinpointing what my biggest issues are, and the biggest one I have is I don't handle rejection well at all.  

I will write more about this later, but I just wanted to share these thoughts, and I want to blog more often.