I finally got an opportunity to clean up the front office/packaging station today. What an amazing sensation to be able to work in a clean and organized environment! I absolutely love making things more efficient and cleaning!

I also made decent headway in the model truck, cleaning up more of the program and building systems to ensure everything will run smoothly on a production run. I accidentally used the wrong drill for boring out the threaded wheel locations, so I'll have to scrap this part once I am finished with the testing. Other than that, I'm spending extra time organizing all the toolpath files to make it easier for changes down the line. The biggest area I'm working on is ensuring that each toolpath has the correct tool settings and presets. So if I need to increase my speeds and feeds for one pocketing path, it does it to all the rest automatically. 

The cards for the rocket project also arrived today, and I love how they turned out! Canva is amazing for creating clean and professional-looking images without a lot of skill. Plus, they have a print shop connected directly with their services, so ordering a bunch of cards only takes a few extra clicks!

Through reading a lot of books and talking to mentors, I've come to find that there are three major skills you can pick up that will help you be in the right place at the right time more quickly. No matter what line of work you go into, knowing and doing these well will move you along much faster!

1) Writing - Learning how to write about what you're working on will help you get your ideas across more clearly, as well as persuasively. I've found that writing daily about what you learn gets you comfortable speaking your mind, and you can slowly increase your writing ability. You also show yourself as someone to be constantly learning. 

2) Speaking - Being able to get your point across verbally is huge; not only public speaking but between just a few people will make you sound more confident and clear. I'm unfortunately not great in this department, but I've found that just since I started challenging myself to work at it, I've found that I'm a lot more self-aware of the points at which I stumble and can catch myself.

3) Storytelling - I think that storytelling is greatly undervalued by many people and gets turned by the wayside. In reality, being able to relate to another person by telling a story will help you communicate your ideas easier. This is a huge skill that is becoming more prevalent in the business world, with people trying to create a "storyboard" that differentiates them from other companies even if you're in a line of work that doesn't see many people, being able to tell a good story will help you grow closer to your loved ones as well as potential opportunities. 

One of my favorite books is "how to fail at almost everything and still win bigly" by Scott Adams. It's basically an autobiography, and he shares a lot of valuable wisdom from his life experiences. 

The biggest thing I got out of that book was that of increasing your odds of luck. The basic idea is that for each skill you add to your arsenal, you increase your likelihood of being in the right place at the right time. He thinks that for each skill, you double your odds of being found, but I'm not so sure I would go that far. 

I know that picking up extra side projects where you can develop new skills related to the work you want to get into has been very valuable in reaching out to new people and was really how I got the job I am in now. Aside from trying to master a certain area, there are many others that you can work on to put yourself in a position to be able to use that master skill in an ideal work environment and show up on the radar of people who could put you there. 

Key takeaways:

1) You can increase your odds of luck by learning new skills

2) It can be as substantial as for every new skill you learn; your odds of "being found" double

3) Learn new skills aside from the ones you want to master

"It's not about the journey; it's about the destination" This is a quote I hear fairly often, and I think this is really important to understand fully. I know I sometimes get too caught up in the details and strategies and forget that the destination isn't the most important. It's more about the path that it takes to get there.

I've noticed, though, that a lot of times, our "final destination" never seems to come, goals are set and reached, and yet it seemed as if the goalpost was moved to be always just out of reach. This is a good and bad thing if we focus so much on getting to one particular location, when we arrive after a while it becomes common and boring. However, with a moving goalpost, there is always something higher to aim for. That's what brings spice to life!

Something I heard recently from a podcast was that you need to have some small celebration when you reach your goal or milestone. If not, it seems like an endless journey where there is no rest. I am very guilty of moving my goalpost and never seeming quite to reach it, which leads to a lot of my side projects to be left open-ended.

Key takeaways:

1) It's not about the journey

2) Goalposts are set and move over time

3) Celebrate your goal-reaching

I got to work on the little model car I've been programming and made really good progress on it!

I spent the extra time getting the program as clean as I could before running anything. This included sorting the tools and ensuring they all had the correct preset for the F&S according to the roughing vs. finishing pattern. 

I ran into a weird issue where the post-processor wouldn't work correctly, and I kept getting errors on one of my 5-axis moves. I eventually narrowed it down to one specific toolpath with an odd angle, but the axis orientation was correct. I played around a bit I figured out that I had to add the machine I was using in the initial operation setup, which I haven't had to do in the past. After selecting a Haas A+B machine, it posted fine.

My boss had me sit by the machine while running the new program with the rapid at 5% and reduced feedrate since I haven't done a ton of 5-axis work before. I'm very glad I did, too, because I was able to catch the machine before it plunged into the big 5-axis trunnion. 

I'm really glad I've been writing about my experience and troubles I've gone through in the past, and because of it, I was able to quickly fix the problem and get the show on the road (no pun intended). 

The process I'm going about milling this part out is slightly different from my previous method, and I'm taking some of the ideas afforded me by my boss and brother to put the programs in sections with their own tools. Basically, having a different endmill for a roughing operation vs. finishing. I'm also taking advantage of using a shell mill to rough out a good portion of the material before switching to a 1/2" endmill.

Overall everything has been working extraordinarily well and I'm really pleased with the outcome thus far!

I've found it fascinating that many of the ideas and insights that I can vividly remember being said with very few words but the powerful meaning behind them. Learning to be concise with what you're talking about is a massive skill you can develop that will help you reach more people and share information faster. 

I'm unfortunately awful at this skill. I find myself in many scenarios where my words keep trailing on while not providing more value. When speaking with mentors, I would repeat myself many times and dance around the point I'm trying to make. 

I need to do more research on this topic, but what I've found helpful in becoming more concise with your speech are these.

1) Be aware of origin - listen to yourself talk, either at the moment or record it, and identify where you start trailing off

2) Be intentional about getting to the point first, then add backstory if necessary

3) Don't be afraid to say little - I often think I'm not bringing enough value into what I'm saying, and so I find the need to emphasize what I'm talking about, which leads to empty words. 

I find I do get bored with what I am doing fairly often, which leads me to do some more research into overcoming that boredom and getting back into that mood of excitement!

Through this, I found one of Brendon Burchard's videos entitled "Beating Boredom," where he outlined 4 major points to overcome that feeling of going through the motions, and I thought they were fascinating and wanted to share them.

1) Challenge yourself - go the extra mile to be more present at the moment and bringing value. Intentionally seek out to do it just a little faster, or try out a new idea. We often feel like we are doing the same tasks repeatedly without change, so breaking it up a bit will help us get out of that and make progress on it. 

2) Talk to others - start asking other people about their goals and aspirations, what kind of problems they are facing, and turn it into a way of serving them. Start problem-solving with them and work to find solutions. This will get your mind working on new challenges to work through.

3) Re-engage your learning - seek out ways and methods you could go about increasing your knowledge on the subject you feel bored with. If you're regularly learning, and that's a boring task, then try something new, make it different and exciting!

4) Be a leader - become a role model to those around you; whatever you're working on, seek to become the person to imitate. Cause others to look up to you. Paint a bigger picture and strive to go for it. It doesn't matter if it's unrealistic.

I love learning, especially on reaching higher levels of performance, but other subjects as well. 

However, the problem is that I often find myself taking in too much information and inevitably forget a good chunk of it. This is made even worse when I listen to audiobooks (my primary learning source), where I am typically doing another task simultaneously, and my attention is sometimes divided. 

I haven't found a complete solution to this problem, but I've found it very helpful to write down key ideas or takeaways from what I'm learning. This can be just a phrase I heard or even a single word that could spark my memory on the topic. I'll often write these down in my default notes app on my phone, but I find myself never going back to read and review them just because it takes so much time to scroll back. 

This is where the whole idea of mind mapping comes in. I'll be honest and admit that I haven't really used the mind mapping technique very much in the past due to how hard it is to get it started. However, as I'm finding my ideas and notes increasing, I want to take advantage of connecting the dots to new ideas. 

My current source of building a mindmap is using Evernote's app, a fairly basic note-taking app that syncs across devices and allows you to add tags to the notes. I prefer to use a bigger visual mindmap, but I haven't yet found a good app for that. In the time being, Evernote works really well for writing down my ideas as they come up and quickly tagging them with the corresponding name for future review. 

Key takeaways:

1) A lot of what I learn I forget due to the method

2) I can often remember ideas and insights if I only have a few keywords related to it

3) Using a mindmap technique, I can quickly review all related topics and make connections faster

I spent most of the day working on programming the car, mostly cleaning up and proof checking my work.

I did have another design project where I got to make the postcards included in these model rocket kits! I absolutely love Canva, and it only took a few minutes to put together a clean and professional pamphlet! Because of the icons in Canva, I didn't have to worry about trying to get accurate images of the added tools included in the box. 

Plus, using Canva has the added benefit of already being hooked up to a supplier to get the cards made, and it only took a couple of extra minutes to order a stack of the cards, which should arrive early next week! Overall I love this project, and it's been exciting to see all the work that goes behind putting something like this together.

I haven't had too much client work in the shop recently, which has been kind of nice not to worry about rushing to get things done. I've got some ideas on better optimizing some of the rest of the shop, and I think my boss may go for it. I talked with the owner of a company that improves systems and processes this evening (unrelated to machining). He suggested I go right out and ask about making improvements where I normally would be afraid to, and that's got some of my gears turning to do that more in the shop!

I just finished reading the book "The Art of Learning" by Josh Waitzkins, a former chess master turned martial arts champion.

The main point I got out of this book is taking the long road when it comes to mastering a skill. It models many the 10,000-hour rule, with focused and long-term work to become great at something. When it came to chess, he had an innate ability to play it, but just having that wasn't enough to go up against people who've played for years. So he had to realize that to build that skill, it needed time and intentional learning.

It becomes an art in and of itself, learning, waiting, practicing, slowly but surely increasing that skill to a master level. When he became a Tai Chi world champion, he had an exciting experience that really caught my attention. In the dojo where he trained, another student was there whose skill was years above his own, and this guy was especially aggressive. He wouldn't stop when you tapped out, but wait until you slammed into the floor. 

Josh saw this as an opportunity to learn and intentionally went to this guy every time for months, getting tossed around every time. But through this process, he started seeing things that he formerly didn't catch. He described it as a feeling of moving in slow motion. Shortly after this, he started beating this student; he found the weaknesses, figured out the tricks, and used them against him. The student eventually stopped wanting to spar with him as he would keep losing. 

This story really illustrates two amazing things in my mind. One that to master something that you've never done before, or that's taken others years to perform if you intentionally seek out that learning opportunity. And the second is, the other student missed out on huge growth; he could have stepped up his game and gotten better. But he decided to give up and didn't want to spend the effort to take things to the next level.