My blogging joints have all just cracked from lack of use, but lets get this going.

All my life, I’ve always been attracted to structure. Granted, this doesn’t mean I’ve always been the most structured person. On the contrary – my adult life has been rattled from dives into absolute chaos more times than I’d like to think about. Anyone who knows me will tell you that I’m prone to being all over the place, and that if there was one word I didn’t know the definition to it’s “agenda,” and they would be right. Not going to lie. Life’s all about fessin’ up sooner or later.

But as chaotic as my priorities are known for being, I still insist that I’m attracted to structure. The problem is, as I have known for a while now, that it just isn’t structure that I create for myself that I love so much.  Let me explain (not that I don’t think you’ve followed me up to this point, but I tend to explain my own language a lot when I’ve been drinking. An endearing or annoying trait depending on how you look at it): I was successful all throughout my youthful years because the structure within which I lived was set for me.  Legally, I had to go to school, and all I had to do there was give my guidance counselor a general idea of where my academic passions lay and I had a customized schedule set for me. I had 7-8 classes a semester that I was expected to attend, with assignments that I was expected to complete. These assignments came with instruction and tangible goals (this is what you need to do, and this is the date by which you need to have it done, or you fail). I had nutrition and field trips and school dances for recreation, all outlined. And thus, I did very well in school.

At home, I had a no-nonsense mother who made sure that I respected my house by keeping it clean, and that I respected my elders by obeying them. The rewards here were also very obvious: if I was obedient I was rewarded with privileges and trust. I obeyed my parents to a T and was the most well-behaved kid in my generation. And I had good grades. The result of that was, by the time I was 16, I could literally walk out the door and not come back for two days without fear of punishment. I had so earned my parents’ trust that they knew, without a doubt, that I wasn’t doing anything irresponsible (and it’s the truth. The one time this happened, I had gone over to a friend’s house to study for final exams, and I ended up staying the night because it was so late, and spent the entirety of the next day playing Dreamcast. Oh what a rebel I was). My sister, on the other hand, couldn’t leave the house for five minutes without our parents breathing down her neck.

Coming from a childhood that was so structured, where my goals and priorities were laid out so neatly, it was a shock when I thrust myself into the adult world, on the opposite end of the country, by myself. From the point on, it was my responsibility to create my own structure. I was solely responsible for organizing my goals and priorities, and I didn’t do so well at that. I did horrible, actually. College didn’t go so great, and my adult life has been one orgy of moving from place to place, trying to find myself and that one scenario that would just fit and make everything work out for me. And it’s a failing that has sort of continued on with my life. I excel in areas that are well laid out for me – I’ve always done well at the various jobs I’ve held, or things that I’ve volunteered for. Anything that came with a rigid set of requirements and expectations, I’ve met without fail.  Anything that has required me to limit and police myself? Not so much.

But that is something that I desperately want to change.

Enter Google Calendar.

If the first half of 2010 has been about getting myself grounded and stable, the latter half will definitely be about moving forward. It’s time for me to stop thinking about simply working a job and spending my money wisely.  It is now time to start thinking about the future.  The ways that I want to revise my life and how I’m going to make that happen.  This, of course, requires a lot of planning. It requires a lot of goal setting and providing structure for my own life. These are precisely the things that I’ve never been good at.

So what have I been doing to change this? Why, the oldest trick in the book: taking it one day at a time.

And that’s where my Google Calendar comes in.

I’ve always been a fan of technology, for some reason, I’ve always been able to relate to it more than something analog. I attempted keeping a physical journal several times throughout my life, but it wasn’t until I discovered livejournal that I was able to do chronicle my life with any consistency. I’ve always been bad with budgeting, until I discovered www.mint.com.

The same goes with scheduling. Until I discovered Google Calendar. The fact that it already interacts with my email, social networking outlets, and (most importantly) my Blackberry, makes it so much easier to consistently stick with. Last week I started off slowly; I only filled in my work schedule. This week, I entered in my work schedule and, besides that, started every day with a particular activity outside of work that I wanted to accomplish. And I’ve been surprising myself with how closely I’ve been sticking to it. I made an appointment to visit a doctor for a long-overdue checkup. I scheduled in time to read and exercise. I even scheduled time to blog. And, obviously, so far so good.  It’s so easy to follow along with my schedule when it’s kept so neat and organized. And, when I plot my week in my Calendar, I can then tackle every day and every task as it comes to me, instead of having a jumble of things I have to get done swirling through my head untamed. Google Calendar has enabled me to keep track of these things in a way that allows me to get over this hang-up I’ve had about structuring my own life. It’s refreshing.

Eventually, I would like to add more things to my Calendar. Like searching for a counselor/therapist, volunteering more, keeping in touch with old friends, and tackling financial hurdles that keep me from going back to school.  I know it’s not going to be easy. Part of the reason I was so good at following structure that was imposed on me over structure that was self-influenced was because I didn’t really have a choice. Having a choice allows for procrastination and broadens my margin of error, and keeping my Calendar updated is definitely something I’m going to have to enforce on myself. But, part of the reason I’ve been able to do it is that I’ve finally started looking at the things I’ve wanted for so long as non-negotiable. And, because of that, taking the necessary steps to get those things is not so much a choice anymore. These are the things I want out of life, this is what I have to do to achieve them, or I fail.