Every good day, every bad day; complex and simple at the same time - that's very me, that's PeterOBrien.me.
Considering that my last blog post was posted towards the beginning of August, I felt it was time to provide a brief update in regards to my ongoing studies or postgraduate 2.0 studies, as I have now come to call them.
This new title for the combined online learnng via MOOCs that I have enrolled myself in, since graduating from my BA (Hons) in the summer of 2013, has come about as a result of finally getting my personal website, PeterOBrien.me, of the ground.
It is still being constructed, but it is now live.
The primary purpose of my personal website was to establish a personal brand identity under which I could bring together and unify all of my other focuses and online endeavours.
One key aim of the purpose behind PeterOBrien.me was to create a space where I could showcase my online learning achievements which is how the Postgraduate 2.0 Studies page on PeterOBrien.me came about.
It's really strange seeing yourself objectified into a website!
I figure that Postgraduate 2.0 Studies is a good name, my studies are postgraduate and they are online.
As a result, I have shifted my focus away from Ways 2 Interface while I have been building PeterOBrien.me and organising everything that I have going on. One key implication that has now become clear as a result of this organisation is that PeterOBrien.me will unload the burden of my Postgraduate 2.0 Studies on this Ways 2 Interface blog.
As I continued to study new MOOCs (now over eighty) and add them to my portfolio, the study page on this site was getting ridiculously out of hand. It was a problem I had previously encountered on my LinkedIn profile where I would add each new MOOC to my education section and watch my profile struggle to load as a result.
Unfortunately, this is the reality of Big Data that human beings are now having to face.
"Big data is a broad term for data sets so large or complex that traditional data processing applications are inadequate. Challenges include analysis, capture, data curation, search, sharing, storage, transfer, visualization, and information privacy."
However, the configuration of PeterOBrien.me has now solved this problem, as I believe the layout of the Postgraduate 2.0 Studies page is much better suited to present a vast array of information in a concise form.
It has two slideshows...
A slideshow for the courses I have enrolled myself in.
And a slideshow for the courses for which I was awarded a certificate.
There is also a traditional list at the bottom of the page numbering all of the MOOC I have enrolled in with hyperlinks to their respective course pages.
Therefore the Studies page on Ways 2 Interface will soon be disappearing.
Make the most of it while it is still here.
Additionally, while I will still continue to blog about my studies on this site, the content of those posts will be focused more towards being in relation to my larger transdisciplinary research project, for which the Ways 2 Interface website was originally established.
For more general MOOC reviews, reflections, recommendations, insights, etc., the blog of PeterOBrien.me will take of these.
As PeterOBrien.me will demonstrate, the only way in which I can organise my life and my focuses, while retaining my sanity, is by compartmentalising everything; this is why I have various different online platforms (or filling cabinets) for different purposes...
... and PeterOBrien.me is the main hub (or office) that brings them all together into a unified overview.
Crucially, as the name of my personal website should indicate, they are all me, everything that I have created online is me, so I am going to insure that I keep a firm grasp on it all.
Another key aspect of myself, or the digital extension of myself IS all of the MOOCs I have enrolled myself in, these are parts of myself as well, and, in particular, clusters of related MOOCs naturally come together to represent specific focuses of my career focus and wider interests.
It is for this reason that if you examine PeterOBrien.me you will note that in addition to my Postgraduate 2.0 Studies page, there are additional pages devoted to specific MOOC and study focuses.
and I am probably going to add another one based around Digital Making, that may just be combined with the Filmmaking one, because the fact that I am a filmmaker kind of speaks for itself. I have not decided yet.
It is should be noted that one of my focuses is Digital Marketing and this is not accidental.
Digital Marketing is something I wanted to get to grips with ever since graduating from my BA (Hons) and it is not accidental that I have spent the last two years exploring and defining myself in order to construct an appropriate unified brand to encapsulate it all.
A value driven brand is essential for success in entrepreneurship and entrepreneurship is the primary objective of my postgraduate 2.0 studies, everything is working for everything else, that is the point.
"Entrepreneurs are competing for resources and opportunities that enable them to tell their story and build their reputation. If you’re an entrepreneur who isn’t actively branding himself, rest assured that your competitors will waste no time in branding you, which may hurt your image, company valuation and bottom line."
PeterOBrien.me is a fusion of personal and professional and my key driving impulse in making it was to produce 'an online portfolio to end all online portfolios'.
If you do not know what you are, then how will you know what to do with yourself?
With the design of PeterOBrien.me, the idea is that you click on what appeals to you and within that page there will be details and links to other relevant and related components of my overall portfolio.
Or you can just have the brief visual-centric storyboard overview of my overall portfolio on PeterOBrien.me's main page.
Every good day, every bad day; complex and simple at the same time - that's very me, that's PeterOBrien.me.
However, going back to my Postgraduate 2.0 Studies and as they are now organised and collected on PeterOBrien.me, I am no longer going to be providing periodic progress updates or MOOC by MOOC reflections on Ways 2 Interface.
There are two reasons for this...
I do not need to provide periodic progress updates because the MOOCs as arranged and detailed on PeterOBrien.me speak for themselves. If I do provide a periodic update I will do it on the blog of PeterOBrien.me and I will only do it on Ways 2 Interface if that progress update is immediately applicable to the research concerns of this platform.
It is becoming impossible to provide periodic updates and reflections on each MOOC because I study so many! I rarely find the time to provide updates or to author reflections; unless, of course, those reflections are required exercises of the MOOC I am studying, such as is currently the case with the DigitalMarketing.me blog I had to create for my Digital and Social Media Marketing MOOC. I do not underestimate the power of reflection and of getting your head in order by objectifying it, but I also always respect the concept of time and realise that I only have so much of it! However, I have now started to produce video reflections and reviews of my MOOCs as evidenced within my 365 FRAMES 2015 project, which is a quick, easy and spontaneous way of generating reflection material. As a result of this, I will continue to produce these videos instead of lengthy, time-consuming written reflections, such as I am doing now!
However, I will provide one final and very brief MOOC progress report right now.
I am currently enrolled in...
Priority:
Digital and Social Media Marketing - as part of the iversity Marketing Toolkit
Logical and Critical Thinking
Understanding Video Games
Secondary
The Importance of Money in Business
What is a Mind?
Tertiary
Mindfulness for Wellbeing and Peak Performance
Introduction to Big Data - as part of the Coursera Big Data Specialization
Quantitative Methods - as part of the Coursera Solid Science Specialization
Marketing in a Digital World - as part of the Coursera Digital Marketing Specialization
Fundamentals of Neuroscience, Part 1: Electrical Properties of the Neuron
The Mind is Flat: The Shocking Shallowness of Human Psychology
Finally, I will very shortly be reconfiguring the Ways 2 Interface website to be bring it into line with the changes I have cited in this blog post and some additional ones I have not detailed.
In particular specific changes concerned with the transdisciplinary research of Ways 2 Interface and how that will play into the content of Breaking Cinema, the podcast I have been developing.
I have previously described this self-directed study as being equivalent to undertaking a traditional masters course and I certainly see my current learning program as fulfilling the function of the MSc in Creative Technologies and Enterprise I had initially planned to undertake (before coming to my logical senses).
However, being an online entity that is constantly growing and something that I can very freely mix and match, my online studies are never a fixed and pre-determined course of study, as the ongoing evolution of the research and study blog over the past two year-and-a-half has shown.
Certainly, this is one of the great redeeming features about online learning - the student can take a much or as little time they feel is necessary in order to come to terms with as many or as few disciplines they feel the success of their end goal(s) requires. To this end, I have added to two further Coursera Specialization course sequences to my self-directed study portfolio:
Emerging Technologies: From Smartphone to IOT to Big Data As offered by Yonsei University and composed of the following courses:
Smartphone Emerging Technologies - done
Big Data, Cloud Computing & CND Emerging Technologies - done
Internet Emerging Technologies - doing
Internet of Things & Augment Reality Emerging Technologies - to-do
Wireless Communication Emerging Technologies - to-do
I have decided to commit to completing these two further specializations, because:
They further adhere my self-directed program of study closer to the one I would have undertaken in my MSc in Creative Technologies and Enterprise, emerging Technologies was a major component of the MSc.
Emerging Technologies in relation to the skill-centric focus of the Career Success specialization greatly enriches my overall program of study to the point where it is actually become a superior program of study to the one offered in the MSc in Creative Technologies and Enterprise.
The courses within each specialization are self-paced, so I can very easily spread the workload around my other commitments.
The courses within each specialization are incredibly short, so I can very easily complete each course component in a relatively short space of time (I am already well over half through both specializations), which is useful considering I want to get the specializations done by the end of September.
Exploitation of emerging technologies and updated career success skills are essential for future success in entrepreneurship. The business idea I am developing within my entrepreneurship specialization also relies very heavily on the focuses of emerging technologies and career success skills.
Between them, they will cost just over £600 but I am thinking of the long-term value the successful completion of these specializations will bring to my larger postgraduate portfolio.
Furthermore, there is an additional self-paced and incredibly thorough Digital Marketing specialization (that is itself one module of a larger online MBA) I have been seduced by and plan to undertake once I have my Emerging Technologies and Career Success specializations out of the way. As with emerging technology and career success skills, competitive exploitation and implementation of digital marketing practice is absolutely essential for entrepreneurial success! I have been looking for a decent and thorough online digital marketing course for over a year now (I was always confident a new one would pop up at some point) and FINALLY I have found it. But digital marketing is not the current focus, emerging technologies and career success with entrepreneurship is. Ultimately, when all is said and done, I can see now that all of my self-directed postgraduate study will be collected together on this Ways 2 Interface website as one cohesive portfolio with various specializations and discipline concerns outlined and detailed within, opposed to just one very expensive single piece of paper that students typically like to think proves they are fully capable and competent in their respected studied disciplines. However, as our changing times are increasingly showing, this is proving to be more and more not the case.
Embrace the maze and mess and multifaceted realm of online study that WILL continue to change and that WILL continue to be recognised by employers, educators and new students. I have been studying online since October, 2013 and after taking part in close to fifty MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) and various other online resources I can safely say that the best place to dive into this realm of collected knowledge is...
.. anywhere.
That is the simple answer.
There is no point even attempting to provide yourself with an overview before embracing the online learning arena because new MOOCs are being launched weekly and the parameters of this revolution (and it really is a revolution) continue to expand and change. Therefore, this blog post is not an overview, it is an approach to getting started.
In a nutshell - just dive in and find your way as you go.
The importance of nurturing proactive adaptability through your studies in order to attain career fulfilment
The first MOOC I undertook was The Future of Storytelling which was recommended to me by one of my tutors shortly after I graduated from university. An online course that dealt with how storytelling is changing in relation to the introduction of new technologies in many ways picked up where my studies at university in Creative Writing with Film and Screen Studies had left off and, therefore, was a very good place for me to begin my online learning odyssey.
My very first Statement of Accomplishment.
However, even if I was familiar with some of the foundation knowledge, the actual experience of sitting in front of my computer, taking notes from video lectures, participating in discussion forums and submitting electronic exams was a completely new experience for me.
And it took a great deal of adjustment, but the best way to become accustomed to this type of experience is to just stick with it, which is exactly what I did. I just stuck with it, completed The Future of Storytelling, undertook another MOOC, completed it, undertook another, so on and so forth... Now learning online is just the norm for me.
Moreover, through the course of this persistence, I have acquired an invaluable skill that a structured course of study would be hard pressed to teach and install within its students.
This skill I refer to as proactive adaptability.
The ability to positively embrace change and quickly re-adjust yourself to the introduction of new parameters and processes.
If you are studying for career advancement with the aim of gaining job security then I promise you that proactive adaptability is a skill that will serve you very well in the long run.
Those safe little careers of yesteryear that would hold your hand until you were 65 are all going to a land far, far away to live happily ever after... without you.
Job-hopping is becoming the new career norm simply because it is more cost effective to hire short-term and acquire expertise on an assignment-by-assignment basis.
And successful job-hopping requires proactive adaptability.
Job-hopping is the new career security and proactive adaptability will ensure that you always have more jobs to hop to.
Therefore, embrace the maze and mess and multifaceted realm of online study that WILL continue to change and that WILL continue to be more and more so recognised by employers, educators and new students.
It's still early days for online education, but, be under no illusion, it is not going anywhere and it is a disruption that enables anyone with an internet connection to gain entry to knowledge and expertise that would have once cost them thousands and thousands of pounds.
I gave up undertaking a £6000 masters course simply because I had covered the masters' curriculum within many of the MOOCs I had undertaken.
I do not have a masters degree, but I have the knowledge and a proactive adaptability that only cost be some time and persistence.
And considering how much undervalued degrees have become with employers and in general, possessing the knowledge and proactive adaptability in regards to my career focus (in my case entrepreneurship) is worth much more than possessing a masters degree that would have just put me into additional debt.
Do not write off online learning, because it really is worth it!
Anywhere is too much - My advice on where to start
In short this course will benefit you even outside of online learning as it teaches you various invaluable techniques on how to break down vast arrays of knowledge as well as how to ensure that you retain that information.
Learning how to Learn - trailer
You know all those supposed techniques of learning you had hammered into you at school - delete them!
Learning how to Learn teaches you how to learn the smart way and it is all drawn from the latest neuroscience research being conducted into learning and memory, so you will be in the hands of educators who know what they are talking about.
Therefore buy yourself a notebook and take plenty of notes, but rewrite the lecture points out in your own words, as your brain will much more likely to retain the information - this was a tip I acquired from the course, so it obviously works!
I only wish I had undertaken this course BEFORE I undertook the many other courses I have undertaken. Oh, well, you live and learn - that is the point of proactive adaptability. Secondly...
Find your own way, sign up to MOOCs based on what your projected career focus is or just what are your general interests.
MOOCs Addicts is a good facebook group to join if you have question, want some guidance or need some MOOC suggestions. Or just type "your interests/focus MOOC" into google and see what comes up.
Finally... While they are not the only MOOC hosting platforms out there, the following list indicates some very good platforms to begin with...
Offers free and signature track paid courses with Statement of Accomplishments issued on the successful completion of most free courses and Verified Certificates issued on the successful completion of all paid signature track courses.
Offers free courses that issue Statements of Participation on the successful completion of a course; with the option to pay for a verified route of study that will issue you a verified Statement of Accomplishment on the successful completion of a course.
One of the first online learning platforms. This platform has all of the earning materials for its paid degree courses freely available to access, but no statements of completion. This platform relies much more on a proactive learning habit, as there is less direction in regards to how to absorb all of the materials; it really is just a case of getting stuck in and finding your own way.
No idea, as I have not used them yet, but I keep reading good things about them, so what I would say is exercise a bit of proactive adaptability and find out for yourself.
Podcasts + YouTube
Do not underestimate these platforms, as they give you access to ever expanding knowledge.
Listening to over one hundred different podcast shows and well over four thousand hours of content has completely reconfigured my world-job-personal-everything-view... but that is a whole other blog post. My approach Start with Learning how to Learn. Really invest your time and attention to gaining the most out of completing it. Then sign up to another MOOC that is concerned with your area(s) of interest or career focus(es) and then just take things from there. If it does not quite work, just try something else. That's the great thing about online content, there's always additional stuff out there.
Ultimately, all of this ever expanding and (mostly) free education content - you would have to be stark raving mad not to exploit it.
While I have undertaken somewhere in the region of fifty online courses, I am not suggesting that you do the same, unless you want to.
Only study as much or as little as you think is necessary and/or your MOOCs/studies indicate you should, but this is where online learning really comes into its own, because it offers you the opportunity to build your own program of study... a program that others can guide you on, but ultimately only you can figure out how much or little you need to cover.
The reason I have undertaken so many is because I have been pro-actively building my own program of study to satisfy the areas of knowledge I know I need to acquire if I want to achieve success as an entrepreneur - as my current specialization in entrepreneurship should demonstrate - based around the business practice of my multi-faceted focus.
Creative Writing with Film and Screen Studies was the degree I studied at university and while it served as a hugely invaluable exploration of two areas I feel very passionate about - writing and film - there other areas of fascination it could not cover.
If you look at my list of studies on this blog and the various MOOCs I have undertaken, you will begin to see that my focus stretches far beyond film and writing into areas as diverse as neuroscience, entrepreneurship, anthropology, web science, big data, negotiation, conflict resolution, branding, e-learning, psychology, language learning, research methods, human nutrition, leadership, human rights, cyber security, management practice, health and wellbeing.
I have a transdisciplinary focus which is to say that I have my feet in many different waters of knowledge, precisely because they fascinate and precisely because I know somewhere in all of oceans of knowledge there is a business idea for my entrepreneurial focus.
A business idea I have been developing directly as a result of having undertaking all of these MOOCs that have been exercising my understanding in all these diverse areas.
For me, this is why MOOCs and online learning are so invaluable; a taught degree program I have always found to be way too constrictive (and very much out of date), so it was only logical after graduating from my degree I would build my own program of study to expand its focus even more so.
This is also why I want to work for myself, because I have yet to find a job that would allow me to satisfy all of these areas. Therefore, like my education, I have to build my own one.
Admittedly, it grew far beyond what I initially anticipated, but that growth was just a natural part of the proactive adaptability have been refining.
The point is, going into it with my first MOOC The Future of Storytelling, I did not know what was going to follow after it, I just completed it moved onto the next MOOC E-Learning and Digital Cultures
There is still plenty more I would like to study, but for the time being my actual entrepreneurial practice is the focus; as it is being nurtured in my ongoing entrepreneurship specialization, something that is finally acknowledging all of the studying I have done for the past year-and-a-half.
On crediting...
What's the difference between a taught degree and a MOOC?
Credit.
When you undertake a degree or any university course on the successful completion of the courses various modules you acquire credits points. Basically, you need to acquire enough credit in order to actually be awarded your degree.
With MOOCs they do not (yet) award credit, so all of the MOOCs I have undertaken have not been building towards being awarded a master's degree; in fact, if they had I would probably already be well past a master's degree.
Anyhow, that is the major difference between the two: with one you accumulate credit that demonstrates you did all of the studies and with the other (if you successfully complete the course and if it awards one) you receive a statement of accomplishment that demonstrates you did all of the studies.
Basically, credit costs a lot more than knowledge, you now, that silly little thing you can actually do something with - I know which one I would rather have!
What's more employers more and more so really do not care about the credit side of things; all they want is someone who knows the knowledge and can put that knowledge into successful action.
Therefore, a Statement of Accomplishment can easily hold just as much weight; a collection of them can really put a credited degree in its place!
Everyone else keeps telling me how it will not work, but that's okay, they can worry for me. I do not have time to worry, I have work to do.
A
However, if you do complete an online course while you will have the knowledge, you may not necessarily attain a completion certificate: either because you did not finish the course in time or because the course does not actually award them
A record of your accomplishments
and this platform is one way in which I am utilizing my online learning.
On utilising...
A little and very annoyingly common story in today's world...
Not long after gradating I sat for an interview at a creative agency, I told the interviewer all about my First-Class degree and the fact that BOTH of my final dissertations had received the highest marks of their modules.
The interviewer did not care.
It was only when I explained that my high marks should demonstrate to him just how much time, hard work and persistence I had put into my creative endeavours that he started to show a real interest in me.
The moral of the story: degrees count for very little today, employers want proactive, adaptive, hard workers who can demonstrate all of that knowledge and experience in a portfolio of work, either generated from previous work experience or from within an education environment.
I am cutting back, because I have had a solid year of studying and I am having a year of putting those studies into action.
That need is reflected in my choice of MOOCs
Not only could I use MOOCs for my professional career focused development, but I could also utilise them for my personal development as an individual (again something that a traditional degree course is hard press to teach).
Hopefully by now I have established the inherent need to be proactive when it comes to successful online learning.
That's the great thing about online learning it really is about building your own program of study and taking charge of your ideal career.
And it's (mostly) free - you would have to be a stark raving mad not to exploit it. So get proactive and adapt!
This first achievement in my Entrepreneurship Specialisation goes some way in bringing together all of the other studies and research in entrepreneurship I have been undertaking since mid-2013. It's been a long road - with still more to go - but I am finally starting to reap the rewards of my persistence. Coursera have now issued my certificate for Developing Innovative Ideas for New Companies: The First Step in Entrepreneurship, a MOOC that I started studying in December, 2014 and then officially completed last month.
My First Step in Entrepreneurship signature track certificate and course participation details can viewed by clicking on this link.
This specialisation is one component of a number of self-directed pursuits that are making up for the masters degree in Creative Technologies and Enterprise I ultimately decided not to undertake, for a number of reasons.
For more on my transdisciplinary creative enterprising focus and/or my reasons for not undertaking my master degree...
Ultimately, this first achievement in my Entrepreneurship Specialisation goes some way in bringing together all of the other studies and research in entrepreneurshipI have been undertaking since mid-2013. It's been a long road - with still more to go - but I am finally starting to reap the rewards of my persistence.
A very insightful free online course that uses some less known film examples to explore the evolving aesthetics and technologies of hollywood filmmaking. Ultimately, the entire course acts as a widely accessible overview and introduction to the study of hollywood cinema.
Overall, a very insightful free online course that uses some less known film examples to explore the evolving aesthetics and technologies of hollywood filmmaking. Ultimately, the entire course acts as a widely accessible overview and introduction to the study of hollywood cinema.
I can clearly see the filmmaking entrepreneurship outcome at the end of all my research, studying, practice and endurance. Additionally, the fact that this blog post is still a bit rough-and-ready does not matter (this is the result of my daily mindfulness talking), I am restarting my entrepreneurial filmmaking endeavour by breaking cinema...
In this (mostly) stream-of-consciousness blog post (I apologise if its a bit rough around the edges) I go about reconfiguring my cluttered state of mind back into to a focused and goal-orientated healthy headspace.
Therefore, I discuss:
I start by detailing my recent case of burnout as caused by my cluttered transdisciplinary focus in regards to everything I have been studying and working towards.
I detail my engagement with daily mindfulness meditation, my holistic reasons for undertaking it and my experience with undertaking it.
I transition into my reasoning behind dropping the Creative Technologies and Enterprise masters degree I had been accepted on by exploring my fascination with the human brain as whole, my engagement with the discipline of neuroscience and my aspirations to develop this academically further in regards to my film and media research focuses.
However, this line of thought brings me back to my original primary focus of entrepreneurial filmmaking and, as a result, I conclude that I must drop my engagement with neuroscience, at least until I have my entrepreneurial filmmaking practice breaking its own ground.
Then, using my own case, I consider and reply to the query of another young student filmmaker in regards to the merits of a Mass Communication degree he is considering undertaking and his own aspirations to go on to become a professional filmmaker.
In conclusion, utilising everything that has been set forth, I set down my reconfigured mindset in regards as to what I regard as my current primary focuses and how this will naturally lead towards my entrepreneurial filmmaking outcome.
Let's start... State of a Cluttered Transdisciplinary Mind
"Evolution designed the human brain not to accurately understand itself but to help us survive. We observe ourselves and the world and make sense of things to get along. Some of us, interested in knowing ourselves more deeply - perhaps to make better decisions, perhaps to live a richer life, perhaps out of curiosity - seek to get past our intuitive ideas of us. We can. We can use our conscious minds to study, to identify, and to pierce our cognitive illusions. By broadening our perspective to take into account how our minds operate, we can achieve a more enlightened view of who we are. But even as we grow to better understand ourselves, we should maintain our appreciation of the fact that, if our mind's natural view of the world is skewed, it is skewed for a reason."
For some time now, I have been finding it increasing difficult to coherently organise in mind, or even to explain out loud, all of the focuses, projects and interests I am currently enrolled within.
Why is this so?
Because there are too many different focuses occupying my time and energy!
To name just a few of my current focuses...
Constructing my personal website
Bringing my podcast project, Breaking Cinema, together for launch
Reconfiguring my financial plan and mindset
Writing a self-help study guide
Sifting through and reconfiguring a crowdfunding project I filmed last summer
Studying Funding for Entrepreneurs
Completing the assignments for The First Step in Entrepreneurship
Studying The Body Matters
Studying Neurobiology: The Everyday Neuroscience of the Brain
Reconfiguring my diet, as indicated by The All-Day Energy Diet
Practising and developing my daily meditation aptitude
Reading well over 10 books
Working a part-time job (with plenty of full-time overtime) to take care of the bills while accumulating a bit of wealth on the side.
These are only the 'primary' focuses, they do not include updating this blog or 365 FRAMES 2015: my video a day project which always takes up a sizeable amount of time. There are also plenty of additional secondary and tertiary focuses.
The problem is my transdisciplinary inclination - I have always found it incredibly difficult and pointless to study one subject in isolation. I do not see the world like that, I see it as one mass-interconnect-thing. It's all connected. Every effect has its cause and everything effect stimulates further effects.
Therefore, it is only logical that I would reconfigure my financial plan and mindset while studying Funding for Entrepreneurs and it is equally logical that I would reconfigure my diet while also practising (and refining) daily meditation; in addition to studying the workings of body in The Body Matters.
Holistic and trasndisciplinary - that is how the world works for me.
However, the result of this multi-faceted focus is that it is now completely zapping all of my energy and causing me to be increasingly bogged down, which is exactly why I have been gradually descending into full-blown burnout over the last three weeks.
Burnout is detrimental not only because it makes you stone dead miserable, but because it causes you to completely lose your edge.
The last three weeks, as chronicled in my 365 FRAMES 2015 project.
And I do like my edge. Burning out my Headspace
"Burnout is a psychological term that refers to long-term exhaustion and diminished interest in work. Burnout has been assumed to result from chronic occupational stress (e.g., work overload). However, there is growing evidence that its etiology is multifactorial in nature, with dispositional factors playing an important role."
On the upside, though, this onslaught of burnout is something that I have been expecting and actively engineering myself towards... so that I can actively avoid it in future.
Burnout is not something new to me, as I experienced it many times during my time at university and each time I did encounter it, I learned from the experience and enacted lifestyle changes that would insure each new bout of burnout would be less severe than the last.
This is precisely why after three weeks of going downhill, I am still managing to get by, but it I do not enact further changes soon, things will only get worse.
I am completely committed to working for myself and creating my own opportunities, but I know the only way I am going to successfully sustain this in the long-run is to positively manage stress and my workload.
In the same way that I have been gradually revamping my diet since 2011, I have also been readjusting my mindset and natural responses towards stress and exhaustion.
And the same is true of my current burnout.
However, there is one key difference this time.
Previously when I had burnout it was always because I had overworked myself by focusing on too many focuses at the same time. While this is certainly true of my current burnout, there is an additional factor that I have been aware of for some time now.
Information overload. I am experiencing Information overload as the result of having my head plugged into so many different focus streams of information.
“Think of the brain as a giant board with lights. Each light represents a concept. When a concept is brought to your attention, that area lights up. With so much information reaching you, many areas are lit up at once. To handle this, your brain uses a controller that focuses attention on the most important area. It also keeps scanning other areas in case they become important. With so much brain activity, keeping your attention focused becomes very difficult. The result is wandering attention, inability to stick to one task and frustration at the constant interruptions from new areas being lit up. At night, while you’re asleep, the controller is still sorting out information, often waking you with ideas buzzing in your head.”
I have been forcing my brain to turn over too much information, that is precisely why I find it impossible to recall everything I am currently working on - there is too much information knocking around my head on a daily basis.
Ultimately, in today's internet-centric world and my unquenchable appetite for knowledge who can blame me?
But is something is not working, I adjust my approach. Enter My Headspace
"Mindfulness is the willingness to the rest in that natural state of awareness, resisting the temptation to judge whatever emotion comes up, and therefore neither opposing or getting carried away with a feeling. Meditation is simply the exercise that is going to give you the best conditions to practise being mindful of these emotions. And headspace is the result of applying this approach. Headspace does not mean being free from emotions, but rather existing in a place where you are at ease with whatever emotion is present"
Mindfulness is something that I started to dabble with during my time at university, but it was never something that I made stick on a daily basis, until now.
The neuroscience behind meditation.
Having read about the many empirically proven benefits of practising mindfulness, implementing it into my life on a daily basis has been on my agenda ever since first dabbling with it.
Suspecting that 2015 was going to be an especially busy year, I decided that it was now or never, so I have been using the Headspace Meditation app introduction course as well as the companion book Get Some Headspaceas guidance. Already, even with my current burnout, I have experienced various calming and positive benefits.
"sitting quietly and meditating is a much more effective way of calming yourself down than attempting to let off steam through another aggressive act. Countless studies have shown the benefits of meditation on stress and anxiety as well as on reducing the risk of heart disease"
The most primary being that I now look at each new problem without an irrational and immediate response of fear, problems are just puzzles now - fascinating puzzles!
Acquiring daily headspace has the resulting experience of a calm walk in the park, but in practice it is anything but a walk in the park. Like physical exercise or adapting to a new diet, practising daily mindfulness requires a great deal of willpower - it is about developing a whole new aptitude in regards to taking charge of the various streams of information flowing and coalescing throughout your mind.
Basically, it involves sitting still while focusing on the present moment and it's great deal harder than it sounds.
Could you sit still for 10 minutes a day?
So, yeah, I do it on a daily basis and already missed a considerable number of days, but that's okay because you will only ever identify your weak points (for improvement) by failing in the first place. But is it enough to counter my current burnout? No, it's not.
Hence, why I still feel burnout.
Just practising mindful meditation each day is not enough, If I am still overworking my body (and the mind is the brain which is a energy sapping component of the body), then I am still overworking my body and experiencing all of the negatives that come with that overtaxed state of being.
In the video below (you don't have to watch it) it takes me fifteen minutes with the help of a written list to outline all my current focuses!
State of a Cluttered Life - 365 FRAMES 2015: Day 068 - 09/03/2015
Therefore, I have come to a decision, a decision that my information hungry mind finds very painful and difficult to make, but I am making it regardless. I have decided to cut back on my focuses. And I will continue to cut back until I reach a state of information simplification. This is to say that I can transition all of my focuses into a state of harmony where I can succinctly recall them all in my head at the same time without the aid of a written list. When I can perform that simple act and keep performing this simple act, burnout will have a hard time finding its way back into my life. It's about being disciplined
As with my transitioning diet and adoption of mindfulness it is going to take great deal of experiential time to get intuitively accustomed to, but I have no doubt that this simplification technique will pay off in the long.
But for the time being, the removal of one quite considerable focus is obvious.
This focus is an obvious candidate because it is a focus that I really should not be worrying about at the moment. This focus is my fascination with neuroscience. Mastering Neuroscience and Entrepreneurship
However, there was an additional reason for dropping this masters option, which I did not discuss in my previous blog post - my fascination with the potential of neuroscience.
"The science of the mind has been remade by one new technology in particular. Functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI, emerged in the 1990s. It is related to the ordinary MRI that you doctor employs, except fMRI maps the activity of the brain's different structures by detecting blood flow that waxes and wanes, just slightly, as the activity varies. In this way fMRI offers three-dimensional pictures of the working brain, inside and out, mapping to a resolution of about a millimetre, the level of activity throughout the organ... This revolution has a name, or at least the new field it spawned has one. It is called... neuroscience."
Aside from always being hugely fascinated by the mind and the tantalising possibility of uncovering its true workings in order to better all of our lives, the study of the human neurological system holds huge implications for the field of film and media studies and the practice of future filmmaking. This area of interest also happens to be one of my main areas of research; as I detailed in Ways of Being: The Spectator and the Spectacle, my award-winning theoretical dissertation:
"the human body as a complex organic whole comprises a major variable that has been missing from all film theories’ understandings of the spectator and spectacle relationship... Perhaps the reason previous film theories have been unable to adequately factor actual audience members into their paradigms is precisely because they have deprived their ideal spectators of a physical presence and a body that can influence the filmic experience! Cognitive theory only incorporates the body as far as being an experience simulator driven by perceptual data sourced via the eyes and ears. However, what if the body was actively influencing the filmic experience as a perceptual membrane on a basis equivalent to the eyes and ears?"
The issue of the human body as a larger neurobiological stimiulator and influencer in the creation of an individual's filmic experience was one of the primary focuses of my dissertation and it is a focus I carried over into the creation of this blog's exploration of my larger transdisciplinary research focus - transdisciplinary because when dealing with human cognition in relation to film and media many different topics and focuses need to be touched upon.
"The fundamental focus of the project is the idea of an interfacing process - the introspective and expressive capacity inherent to us all - that we have always interwoven throughout our day-to-day existences and that we continue to do so at a formidably greater capacity in our contemporary digital realities. By examining the habits and manifestations of our cognitive, corporeal, cultural and connected ways to interface, 'Ways 2 Interface' will aim to build a unified understanding of this interfacing process - the brand at the heart of all our stories."
Hence why I have been studying so many different online courses, I have been acquiring all of the necessary ammunition I need to tackle this bold new subject of empirical film research that very naturally extends into other areas of human existence.
How neuroscience, a.k.a. neurocinematics, is changing the way we view film.
As I have already commented in previous posts on this blog, this empirical area of research in regards to film and media is a hugely under-explored and underexploited area. Although, the rise of neurocinematics looks very promising and is definitely one I want to get my teeth into, as it is a research area that I feel hugely passionate about. The Creative Technologies and Enterprise MSc did comprise a research project component which I could have utilised in regards to exploring something within the are of film and neuroscience; while also studying the entrepreneurship components of the course alongside it. But why? Now that I have become well-and-truly acquainted with entrepreneurship, why waste additional time covering the same ground in a costly masters degree, when I could just undertake an alternative masters degree centred around neuroscience and experience a much more cost effective return on all the time and money I would be investing in it? Therefore, gradually, I have been making the transition away from undertaking my original degree in Creative Technologies and Enterprise and have been looking more towards all the neuroscience degrees out there. At the conclusion of my undergraduate degree in Creative Writing with Film and Screen Studies, my progression onto a masters or even a PhD was strongly encouraged; particularly based on the ideas of what I had explored in my award-winning theoretical dissertation. I was flattered, but only half keen to continue down the academic route, as I commented to my course leader, based on my desire to make films and my inclination for entrepreneurship, I wanted to get my hands dirty, I did not want to waste away in some quiet corner of a university.
This is why the Creative Technologies and Enterprise MSc degree was offered up by my university, because it is a heavily practical course, the enterprise aspect would have satisfied my entrepreneurial inclination and the research component would have allowed me to empirically continue the research I had started in my theoretical dissertation. Even so, though, it still did not feel like the best option for me to undertake; hence, why I have put off undertaking for over a year-and-a-half. I am SO pleased I did, because that year-and-a-half has given me time to explore and expand my focus further; more-and-more so I have found myself being brought back to the unknowns and potentials of neuroscience. However, it is not just a case of applying to any masters degree, because, as I did not study a science/empirical research degree at undergraduate level there's quite a bit of foundational knowledge I need to acquire before any university would take my application seriously
The fast growing field of neuroscience might be crying out for practitioners from all the other areas of study and industry, but if you can not get your head around the basics of empirical variable research practice, then neuroscience is not for you. This is why, when you look at the list of online courses/MOOCs I have undertaken over the last year-and-a-half there are a number that deal with acquiring the necessary pre-requisites for undertaking neuroscience as a masters proper, such as:
And the latest one... Understanding the Brain: The Neuroscience of Everyday Life is a 10 week course and I can already see that it is a minutely accessible course for someone who does not understand neuroscience but wishes to gain a foundational knowledge. It is also a course I have been thoroughly enjoying undertaking, but I started this course three weeks ago right when my burnout really started to kick in. Therefore, I have now discontinued undertaking this course. I did not want to, but I did. Here's why:
1. A number of filmmaking projects occupied a huge part of my final year of my undergraduate degree and many people were surprised that I did not continue my filmmaking after I graduated.
2. The decision not to enrol in any further filmmaking was very intentional because - like my begrudging decisions to cut back on my focuses now - I decided to stay away from film in order to accustom myself with the practice of entrepreneurship. I did not want to do it - it absolutely perplexed and terrified me - but it was necessary for my ongoing growth, so I grit my teeth and got on with it.
3. I focused on entrepreneurship because the ability to create your own opportunities and generate income streams from those ventures is the only ongoing career security you can guarantee yourself in today's digitised and increasingly outsourcing world. Additionally, a growing means through which to produce your own filmmaking output is by combining your practice with an entrepreneurial mindest in order to manipulated the mass-interconnected world of Video on Demand and consumer generated content - this is where the filmmakers (should we even still call them that?) of the future can be found.
4. While undertaking my studies in entrepreneurship, I have not only discovered that I fit the profile of an entrepreneur (I am certainly slightly delusional), but the actual practice of entrepreneurship is something I can see I would enjoy undertaking, as it shares many parallels with film-making practice and distribution.
Before this year is out, I will hold a specialisation (a mini-degree) in entrepreneurship.
5. The realisation that if the entire process of filmmaking and entrepreneurship are so similar and if I have a natural inclination in both fields, then I would be an idiot not to combine them.
Therefore, the logical conclusion at the end of these points is that my current primary focuses should be:
engaging further filmmaking
while putting my entrepreneurial mindset into action, in co-operation with my further filmmaking.
Simple. I need to focus purely on these two without any other substantial focus (distraction) , such as neuroscience, sapping me of my energy and attention towards the first primary two, I just do not have the headspace for it. There is great potential for neuroscience as a discipline and I believe there is a great deal I could bring to the film and media fields. My education has instilled inclinations in both film practice, that I am now continuing in my further filmmaking, and in film theory, that a degree in neuroscience would greatly allow me to expand. It is safe to say that, in order to be taken seriously and if I am serious about pursuing neuroscience, then neuroscience is one field in which I would absolutely need to possess a masters degree. However, this academic route is just going to have to wait and who knows, if I ever do get round to undertaking it, neurocinematics may even be a masters degree in its own right. But for the time being, it is all about my entrepreneurial filmmaking practice, how ever long the realisation of this may take.
This is the inclination that felt right when I graduated from my undergraduate degree and I am not going to undertake anything else until I have become an entrepreneurial filmmaker. No excuses and no distractions.
"My attitude is that now that I have done my degree, I am going to keep working towards what I was working towards - I am going to carry that on..."
- Me, 17/08/2013, one month after graduating.
It's that simple.
Focusing on Film(making) and its Inherent Entrepreneurial Practice
While I have been experiencing my burnout and toying with the idea of writing this post, but dreading it because I was so burnt out, I received this query from Anurag Singh Bohra, a young filmmaker in his own right...
Dear Peter,
This year I am planning to do a course on mass communication as apart from writing stories I have a passion for article writing as well. Moreover I see as an alternate option to earn a living as film making is a risky profession. I am also thinking of starting my film by 2016 as soon as I am done with my course. Since you are an experienced film maker I need your advice whether a course in mass communication is enough to get started as a film director. Do producers find it suitable to sign a person with mass communication degree as a film director?
When I read Anurag's query, I knew that I had to write this post, because his dilemma shared so many parallels with my own situation and it was only through presenting my situation that I would be able to adequately answer his reply.
"everyone's got potential - everyone should be allowed to achieve their potential. That is what I am doing myself and it is only fair I help other people to do it as well."
- Me, 17/08/2013, one month after graduating.
Therefore, Anurag, in reply and in addition to what I have already said, the simplest answer I can provide you with is...
... no.
No, you do not have to have a degree in Mass Communication in order to be a filmmaker or even be recruited as a filmmaker.
If I wanted to become a neuroscientist then I would absolutely have to possess a degree, because a science discipline always requires previous academic weight. However, with the arts and humanities, which a Mass Communication degree would fall under, possessing a degree, especially where film and media is concerned, is rarely ever a required pre-requisite.
In fact, while a degree can be used as a sign of your interest in the field, more often than not, it can be seen as a detriment to your case. Just because you possess a degree in Mass Communication does not mean you actually know how to make a film or understanding the larger logistics of filmmaking practice.
Possessing a degree means you understand theory and are hopefully a critical thinker - that's the established preconception.
It is a truly irritating preconception and especially if you do also possess a portfolio of work that does demonstrate you do know how to get your hands dirty as a filmmaker.
And this is the key to becoming a filmmaker or being recruited as one - practice.
If your Mass Communications degree does offer up the education of the practical elements of filmmaking and provides opportunities within its program of study then you may be on to something.
However, as I discovered with my degree, be very wary of degree courses that claim to teach filmmaking, because more often than not, they will just teach you the basics - basics you can easily teach yourself with all the materials that are now available on the web.
And quite frankly, if you want to understand the craft of filmmaking, get together with some other like-minded individuals and teach yourself. Two books I would highly recommend as introduction/overviews are:
There are so many useful resources out there for teaching the art and business of filmmaking.
Maybe your degree can give access to resources that will assist with this, but at any rate teach yourself and get used to undertaking consistent filmmaking.
You could even do this alongside the degree in various filmmaking projects, how ever big or small your time will allow. The technology is not a problem, everyone has a smart phone, start small and work your way up.
Do not underestimate the potential or influence of micro-filmmaking. Micro-filmmaking is very easy way to build up a large portfolio of work and outreach.
Just start assembling a portfolio of work. I can not tell you the amount of people, and in particular students, I have talked to who say, "Yeah, I would love to make a film..." ... and that's it, that's all it will ever be, the dream of an idea that will one day evaporate into just another piece of forgotten potential. Unless they take action, action that becomes consistent action... I have been there, I struggled and I still struggle.
A portfolio is what other people are going to want to see when they are considering working with you, they are much more likely to work with someone who has already actively done something, than someone who has just done a lot of passive studying.
So this is certainly worth considering in regards to whether you undertake this Mass Communications degree.
However, if are considering a hybrid career, as I am undertaking and which is fast becoming the standard and healthiest career option, then a degree in Mass Communication might just add additional weight to your filmmaking practice.
You mentioned writing as another passion and alternative income stream.
Certainly, a degree would assist you in this respect and the fact that it is a degree based around Mass Communications, opposed to something more specific, such as Film Studies, means that you would possess a wider-ranging knowledge more able to dissect and comment on the mass-connected-media-centric world we now occupy.
I have said it before, the problem with Film Studies is that it is an isolated discipline concerned with a medium that is no longer isolated, like every other form of media, film is now inter-connected with everything else.
Basically, a Mass Communications degree would be more to the world today if you really wanted to apply some theory.
What I am getting at here is if you wished to progress further down the academic route, then a discipline in Mass Communications would provide you with a firm and relevant footing from which to progress.
In terms of writing: fiction, non-fiction, essay, article, review, a degree would help slightly, but it is by no means essential.
As with filmmaking, different writing aptitudes are something you can teach yourself. Starting a blog is a really great way of doing this.
Do not underestimate the potential or influence of blogging (of vlogging). By the way, the Cameo app is a free and easy way to produce micro-films. If you can tell a story in under two minutes with an engaging style and pace, you're already on your way to being an effective long-form filmmaker.
It pains me to admit this, but I spent four years studying Creative Writing with Film and Screen Studies and the majority of my writing style and aptitudes I developed on my own - by reading and writing. I read some really great written material and then wrote some pretty terrible originals.
I do not know how much this degree would cost in terms of time and money, but is it worth the cost?
My original masters was not worth the cost.
Why?
It just did not feel right.
"The truth is that our unconscious minds are active, purposeful, and independent. Hidden they may be, but their effects are anything but, for they play a critical role in shaping the way our conscious minds experience and respond to the world."
- Leonard Mlodinov, Subliminal, 2014:29.
Neuroscience is telling us that the unconscious mind is a very formidable piece of software and, more than likely, your unconscious mind has already figured out what you want to do... or maybe it has not yet, but in either case - do what feels right.
If it feels right to go for the degree, go for it.
If you are still not sure, then do what I did and put it off, until you are sure what it is you want to do.
But, if you want to be a proper professional filmmaker in the future then absolutely start filmmaking now, regardless of whether you undertake your degree. Knowing lots about film and media is great, but it means nothing if you do nothing with it.
Start filmmaking now. No excuses.
365 FRAMES 2015 - the video a day project I am currently undertaking - is a perfect excuse for me to exercise my filmmaking skills every single day for a whole year.
One of my better 365 videos, it only took 48 days.
Not every video is brilliant, but that's okay, not every workout session I have produces the best results, but each session, good or bad, does produce results - even if those results are failures that are indicators on how to improve my technique for the next time.
I knew that I was going to do some more filmmaking in 2015 and I wanted to get back in shape AND improve upon my previous filmmaking experience. Making a short video each and everyday, some more ambitious than others, is a perfect way to do this.
Filmmaking is hard - even making a video a day is hard - it is something that really will test your resolve. It is an aptitude that does not jump out of thin air fully formed, it requires an ongoing commitment and engagement. Like my mindfulness exercises, I do them everyday because I know eventually that daily practice will become second nature and, as neuroscience has already generated, this practice will greatly benefit my mind and body.
Likewise, making a video every day will greatly benefit my filmmaking aptitude.
Filmmaking requires a great deal of hard work and many more mistakes besides before you will be at a level where your filmmaking work is off a 'pristine' quality that you will be happy showing to people. But even if it is not that great at first, you can still show it to people, because it's testament of your ongoing commitment to the medium.
And through the process of all this hard filmmaking you will acquire the single most important skill to have as a filmmaker, a skill that no degree course on the planet can teach you - perseverance.
Filmmaking is fraught with obstacles and if you can not persevere through all of these obstacles, forget it.
The secret?
Just make something. And then make something else. And keep making stuff, keep developing your craft, building a portfolio, spreading your name, networking, collaborating, succeeding, failing, burning out, persevering, filmmaking.
Just keep focusing your headspace on becoming a smarter filmmaker and, by smarter, I mean thinking outside of the traditional filmmaking box. The entire medium of film and the business surrounding it is changing, change and grow with it. Embrace the inherent entrepreneurship of filmmaking and being a successful filmmaker involves coming to terms with the financing, distribution and marketing aspects of the craft. However, the ability to find/build/inspire your audience is the key component that will ensure success in the whole venture. You might have the best crafted film ever made, but without an audience there is nothing you can do with it or get in return for it. Anurag, the reason why I have include your query in this blog post is to convey you to you that fact that filmmaking, especially today, is hard work, it can be incredibly draining and it is a holistic practice that is inherently transdisciplinary. Today, successful filmmaking requires more that just a technical and theoretical understanding of the pre-production, production and postproduction of filmmaking. Your degree may offer you a technical and theoretical understanding, but I doubt that it will provide much more besides - the financing, distribution, marketing, networking and endurance skills that are essential to being a successful filmmaker. Although, I could be wrong, because I have not seen the course syllabus or the professional criterias of the practitioners who teach the degree. It could turn out to be quite a radically new type of degree. However, one thing I am certain off is that filmmaking is a very risky profession and so is any form of interestingly fulfilling life.
Filmmaking is an odyssey into the unknown and If what I have said does not feel right, do not be a filmmaker.
Ultimately, at the end of all this, the questions you should be asking yourself are:
what do you want your focus to be?
how multifaceted do you want it to be?
how much headspace are you willing to devote to your focus(es)?
Focusing my Healthy Headspace on Breaking Cinema with Entrepreneurship
I writing this post last week, but gave up after only partially writing it, because I was still exhausted from my burnout and my brain just did not want to have to confront it, so instead I focused on working some overtime and doing quite a bit of read.
However, now that I have a bit of time away from it and a week without any overtime, I came back to this post and what you have read in this is very stream-of-conciousness record of how my unconscious mind - a formidable piece of software when given a bit of time - has quite naturally sorted out and simplified my focus over the last week.
At the beginning of this post I noted that my current focuses were:
constructing my personal website.
bringing my podcast project, Breaking Cinema, together for launch.
reconfiguring my financial plan and mindset.
writing a self-help study guide.
sifting through and reconfiguring a crowdfunding project I filmed last summer.
studying Funding for Entrepreneurs.
completing the assignments for The First Step in Entrepreneurship.
studying The Body Matters.
studying Neurobiology: The Everyday Neuroscience of the Brain.
reconfiguring my diet, as indicated by The All-Day Energy Diet.
practising and developing my daily meditation aptitude.
reading 14 books:
The All-Day Energy Diet (now completed)
Odd John
Amortality: The Pleasures and Perils of Living Agelessly
The Big Screen: The Story of the Movies and What They Did to Us
APE: How to Publish a Book
Technologies of Seeing: Photography, Cinematography and Television
The Rules of Wealth: A Personal Code for Prosperity
The Opportunity Analysis Canvas
The Business Book
The Queen's English and How to Use it
The Suitcase Entepreneur
Think Outside the Box Office: The Ultimate Guide to Film Distribution in the Digital Era
Economics: The User's Guide
On the Origins of Stories: Evolution, Cognition and Fiction
working a part-time job (with plenty of full-time overtime) to take care of the bills. while accumulating a bit of wealth on the side.
In addition to:
networking online.
studying The Language of Hollywood (now completed)
studying Documentary: New Trends, New Formats
studying Scandinavian Film and Television (already discontinued)
studying and reviewing Explore Filmmaking: From Script to Screen (already discontinued)
studying My Copyblogger copywriting course
updating my daily 365 FRAMES 2015 project.
updating this blog, Ways 2 Interface
updating Something to do with Film
keeping on top of the story construction for my web series project.
Researching an additional documentary idea I have had in pipeline.
ENOUGH!
This is too much, way to much. No more burnout, I like my headspace focused and, with the invaluable help of writing this blog post, this is how I have now reconfigured my current focuses:
Wellbeing
Entrepreneurship
Filmmaking.
Study Guide.
Relaxation.
Temporary Inconvenience.
And more specifically...
Wellbeing - the foundation on which everything else is built - without optimum wellbeing you might as well be burnout all of the time - I intend to live a long, healthy and prosperous life.
daily mindfulness for optimum headspace
weekly physical exercise, as ever
continue to adjust my diet one day and item at a time.
study and complete The Body Matters in relation to the above.
Entrepreneurship - essential for future properity
complete my specialisation in entrepreneurship
continue to network and gaining an understanding of building an audience.
continue to brainstorm entrepreneurial ideas
read and complete The Suitcase Entrepreneur
continue to reconfigure financial mindset with the assistance of The Rules of Wealth, but this will naturally happen as my knowledge of business finance increases.
update Ways 2 Interface where necessary.
Filmmaking - essential for a fulfilling life
continue my daily video a day with 365 FRAMES 2015 and occasional other micro films to keep building my portfolio.
complete development and launch of my podcast Breaking Cinema - the completion of this one in the next couple of weeks is essential as this will assist with audience building. When this is launched move on to finishing and launching your personal website.
read and complete The Big Screen.
occasionally update Something to do with Film where necessary.
study and reference Documentary: New Trends, New Formats.
continue to brainstorm ideas forthe crowdfunding documentary project and it's second round of filming later this year (365 FRAMES 2015 is preparation and practice for this).
read and complete Think Outside the Box Office: The Ultimate Guide to Film Distribution in the Digital Era
Study guide - essential in order to help other achieve their potential, but this one receives barely an hour of daily time, until I can devote more time to it. For the time being, this one could be considered the hobby in relation to my other focuses listed here, aside from relaxation.
continue to write self-help study guide one small piece at a time
read and reference APE: How to Publish a Book
Relaxation - essential for the unconscious mind
read Odd John
read Amortality: The Pleasures and Perils of Living Agelessly
do not read more than two forms of light reading, one fiction and one non-fiction is a good balance.
watch films - MUBI and YouTube, sorted.
find ways to make socialising (with friends and family) interesting in order for it to actually be consistently bearable, the podcast will help with this.
Temporary inconvenience a.k.a. part-time job
keep doing it until you are able to kill this idiotic way of earning an income.
only do as much overtime as is necessary.
devote as little of your attention towards it as possible, your mind has better things to be thinking about.
That's it. I have tested what I can handle over the last two weeks and this is it (remember the questions I left for Anurag at the end of his section):
this is what I want my current focuses to be.
this how multi-faceted I want them to be - you will note that ultimately it does not extend too far outside of entrepreneurial filmmaking.
this is as much headspace that I am willing to devote to my focuses.
My human brain is too skewed to handle anything else.
Therefore, everything else - including my beloved neuroscience - is put on the shelf for the time being!
Naturally, this list will change as some focuses are completed and new one's take priority.
As ever, life is a work in progress, but for now the above items are my priorities, these are essential for my future success.
If I am serious about becoming an entrepreneur, then this is what I have to do.
The best part?
In the time it has taken me to write this blog post, I have already put this ordered reconfiguration into practice and, low-and-behold, my burnout is gone.
Now that I find myself organised in my burnout free healthy headspace, I can clearly see the filmmaking entrepreneurship outcome at the end of all my research, studying, practice and endurance.
Additionally, the fact that this blog post is still a bit rough-and-ready does not matter (this is the result of my daily mindfulness talking), I am restarting my entrepreneurial filmmaking endeavour by breaking cinema...
, 2014:194.
by Mike Figgis