I have to admit that the Commonwealth Games had me sucked in. I swore when they started that I would give my full an undying attention to my studies but being the sports crazed person that I am I just couldn't turn down watching some (okay way too much!) of the competition.
I have to admit from what I did see India put on a much better showing than anyone could possibly admit to believing that they could put on. What with all of the talks about security issues, the athlete's village being untenable, the complexes not being ready on time, etc, etc. If there was an issue that could be there it was criticized before the games even started.
Now, I'm not going to come out and say that they were perfect by any means. The Indian Prime Minister came out and admitted that the Games probably weren't going to look glowing for his own country. However, I do agree with what he said in that his country had very little idea of how other countries were managed, how they behaved, how they operated, all of the little things. Having such a massive sporting competition (for the number of events and sports with the number of countries and territories competing it is second in the world to the Olympic Games) it will give India such immense opportunity to build and to develop as a country. In the long run these Commonwealth Games could very well be the beginning rather than an end to something very special for India. Being the world's second most populated city in the world it would be of tremendous global benefit if India were to improve from this position.
Congratulations to all of the athletes who performed at their best and congratulations to India for surpassing most expectations on your Commonwealth Games. Good luck in using it to develop as a nation. India has earned my respect as a nation far more than what they had previously (not that I was one of those Australians who would label Indians or verbally/physically abuse them nor am I for that).
What a miracle in Chile. To get each of those miners out safely is nothing short of that, a miracle. My country, Australia, does me proud once again by being there when another nation needs our help. To know that the drill that successfully completed the job was both an Australian invention being used by an expert Australian team makes me more proud to be Australian than even the gold medal winners in the Commonwealth Games.
Athletes almost always get the credit when it is due to them. However, this Australian team who took their drill to Chile and helped save those miners will not become household names. They wont receive the recognition and the accolades that they deserve. However, I'm not sure that they mind that. To them they were normal Australians doing something that many of us would dream of having the opportunity to do - save innocent lives. To them they were doing their job. To me they are the real super heroes of our society.
I got to watch the foreman, the last Chilean miner who was pulled out talk to the President. Now, I don't speak Spanish at all. However, the tone of the conversation by both men left me in absolute awe of the Chilean President. What must be said is that he was present at the mine when the drilling began and he refused to leave until after it had been completed. Not only that but he treated the foreman as though it was his family who was in the mine. You didn't have to understand Spanish to understand that the foreman had a love and appreciation for his President and that the President held the same level of respect in return.
Now, to me that is amazing. You always see it around election time. You always see it when an athlete or a team wins something that the country's leader inserts himself into the situation. The athlete may suggest that it was great to meet the President that it meant a lot to them to speak to someone who was so important. However, it's always the leader who has the power position and a lot of the time it comes off as very fake or self serving. This was different. This was one human being caring about another human being. There was nothing at all fake about it. I wish that all leaders held an aura and respect as Mr Pinera does. The world needs more leaders of nations who are like that.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Self confidence (and a lack thereof)
So the past week has taught me some invaluable lessons about myself.
1. That I care perhaps more than I should about my studies when compared to other people.
2. That I need to relax more and let it come to me.
3. That I need to live my life for me rather than living as though I'm on camera for the world to see.
4. That I need to have more confidence in my abilities.
So what do I mean by the above four lessons?
1. There seem to be a majority of people in the course studies that I am a part of who simply don't care or are so relaxed about their studies that at times it can become inspiring rather than striking me as being lazy. Sure, it's important that I get my studies done to the best of my abilities but at what cost? That in other areas of my life I am so uptight and stressed that I become unable to perform at a peak level? That when I lay down to go to rest I am so worked up about work that has to be done that rather than getting much needed sleep that I get up and do said work? It's a balance that I need to find and I'm working on that.
2. I suppose this works itself into number one. I've been so up tight for the past few months with so much on my plate. I look in the mirror and I see an overweight, out of shape thirty year old who because of events from the past has to forge a new career. I haven't got the educational background necessary and the types of industry (business, marketing, etc.) that I can become outstanding in require a piece of paper to get to that level. So I believed it was a race against time to get said pieces of paper rather than fully enjoying the learning process - which I have been but not to the full extent that I could have been.
3. I went outside for a bit of fresh air last night and it struck me - I'm not living with the freedom that I should be enjoying. Subconsciously I feel convicted to do what somebody else (God knows who, my mother, my ex, etc.) expect of me and their rules of society and of daily life. I don't really know why this is so (giving care to my mother around the clock for several years in her dying years, losing two years of my life elsewhere, being on the clock and always on the road for my former employer among so many other potential reasons) . It's taken me a long time to realize and appreciate that I am living my own life. I can do what I like (within the law) and I have to make myself happy.
4. So this morning I decided that it was time, a full week and a half before it was due, to do my CPT120 (programming) assessment project. I'd done okay in that class until then. I got the parameters of what we had to design and program. I sat down in front of the programming software and worked for about an hour on trying to find the solution so that I would be graded well. I went blank. I had no idea what I was doing. My self confidence was so low that I posted on our discussion forum for advice. My heading "I feel like a dummy..." - I went back at it right after posting and programmed the first thing right. "That wasn't so difficult, was it?" and then the whole thing slowly came together. I built off doing one thing right to get the next one and so on. Ultimately it worked out - I didn't require any help, it was all there inside of me but I didn't have the confidence to believe in my own abilities.
So that's really been the past week. It's been very character building. I'm growing as a person, slowly does it, and ultimately I believe that I will get to where I want to be. Hard work never killed anyone and it will not kill me!
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
Challenges - Never Give Up
My latest assessment (after doing four last week) calls for me to design a web site. I'm finding that this is going to be a very good challenge for me. It's not that I haven't designed web pages before - I have - it's that I haven't designed one in about a decade and the web has changed a helluva lot since then.
So here I am designing this web site for my IT degree. A few people who are in the same study group that I am in have messaged me and claimed that it's impossible for them to do this one assessment. It's an important assessment but impossible? Nothing is impossible unless you make it so.
Let me clarify that statement. Sure, I'm never going to be the President of the United States of America, it's not a realistic goal. However, successful completion of everything that I need to do to gain my three degrees absolutely is possible - if it weren't then they wouldn't be asking me to do things like that.
Getting into shape as I've already mentioned is another thing that I can do that is definitely possible. I can eat healthy, I can work out - to think of getting into shape as an impossibility is something that even the most overweight person would laugh at.
Over the past two or so years I've really come to embrace challenges. There are a great number of people who run from any challenge that comes their way. I used to be one of those people. I look back now and I have to ask where did it get me? I lost two years of my life for something that I should never have allowed to happen. It would be so easy to play the naive side of things but there were things that were within my control that I let slip to get into that position. Perhaps I shouldn't have paid the price that I did for it but that's done and dusted.
The point is - you need to take challenges head on. You need to embrace them. You need to defeat them. Nobody said life was meant to be easy. You endure hardships along the way. Even the wealthiest and richest people in this world have had to overcome some sort of adversity. People such as Donald Trump and Bill Gates go out of their way to find new challenges - new adversities that they can overcome so that they can grow and become even better than what they already are. It is what shapes us as human beings.
When my class mates tell me that designing a website is impossible it is only because they have chosen to give up. In life you can't afford to give up. EVER.
So here I am designing this web site for my IT degree. A few people who are in the same study group that I am in have messaged me and claimed that it's impossible for them to do this one assessment. It's an important assessment but impossible? Nothing is impossible unless you make it so.
Let me clarify that statement. Sure, I'm never going to be the President of the United States of America, it's not a realistic goal. However, successful completion of everything that I need to do to gain my three degrees absolutely is possible - if it weren't then they wouldn't be asking me to do things like that.
Getting into shape as I've already mentioned is another thing that I can do that is definitely possible. I can eat healthy, I can work out - to think of getting into shape as an impossibility is something that even the most overweight person would laugh at.
Over the past two or so years I've really come to embrace challenges. There are a great number of people who run from any challenge that comes their way. I used to be one of those people. I look back now and I have to ask where did it get me? I lost two years of my life for something that I should never have allowed to happen. It would be so easy to play the naive side of things but there were things that were within my control that I let slip to get into that position. Perhaps I shouldn't have paid the price that I did for it but that's done and dusted.
The point is - you need to take challenges head on. You need to embrace them. You need to defeat them. Nobody said life was meant to be easy. You endure hardships along the way. Even the wealthiest and richest people in this world have had to overcome some sort of adversity. People such as Donald Trump and Bill Gates go out of their way to find new challenges - new adversities that they can overcome so that they can grow and become even better than what they already are. It is what shapes us as human beings.
When my class mates tell me that designing a website is impossible it is only because they have chosen to give up. In life you can't afford to give up. EVER.
Monday, October 4, 2010
Hard Work
So in the past week I've joined Feenix. It's the gym at Watergardens shopping centre in Sydenham (outer western suburb of Melbourne, Australia). As I mentioned I've never been as heavy as I am right now. Most of my life has been spent playing sports of some sort and being involved at the professional level so it's very difficult for me to accept that I allowed myself to get this heavy.
I've battled weight issues before - don't get me wrong - but I've never been this out of shape. People say that half of the battle is recognizing that you have a problem and deciding to do something about it. So I joined the gym and I plan on working hard at it - attending almost daily classes and personal work out sessions.
Of course attending the gym alone isn't enough. I've eaten way too much junk food. I'm not a picky eater and will eat whatever is available to me. In a way it's a good thing but it is also a bad thing. I'll eat anything and I have been eating anything. Most of it is really bad. In the past ten or so months I've stacked on about 17kg.
That takes hard work - chocolate, crisps, pizza, fish and chips, McDonalds, etc. Yum. Not anymore. I can't do that. I wont allow myself to go down that path again.
So at the gym this evening I worked out for about an hour. Got on the tread climber as my warm up, did some skipping and some lifting of the cow bell and medicine ball sitting up and getting down (who knew sitting down and getting back up could be such hard work!) and I got back on the treadmill to finish off with. By the end of my day I was coated in sweat - the t-shirt that I had on felt like it weighed a ton.
It feels like hard work and it is hard work. However, when you've done the hard work it is always very rewarding. I'm anal about how much I weigh when I work out. After finishing my work out I jumped on the scales and found that I'd already dropped 2kg. I'm now 109.5kg. My goal is to drop another 9.5kg by the end of the month. My PT says that I should be aiming to drop 2-3kg per week if I eat right and train right so 100kg by the end of the month is pretty accurate by that measure.
On an entirely different subject - the Commonwealth Games have started. While I'm not as interested in them as I probably would normally be I have to admit that I watched the opening ceremony. It was very well executed - vastly different to how the media was portraying them as being.
The highlight for me was the reception that the largely Indian crowd gave to the Pakistani athletes as they did their lap of honor at the start of the games. Everybody knows the history between the two countries and their bitterness towards one another politically so any time the two nations are represented in the others nation it is interesting. So for the Indians to give the Pakistanis such a warm reception was great to see. Very well done, India. Peace is possible!
I've battled weight issues before - don't get me wrong - but I've never been this out of shape. People say that half of the battle is recognizing that you have a problem and deciding to do something about it. So I joined the gym and I plan on working hard at it - attending almost daily classes and personal work out sessions.
Of course attending the gym alone isn't enough. I've eaten way too much junk food. I'm not a picky eater and will eat whatever is available to me. In a way it's a good thing but it is also a bad thing. I'll eat anything and I have been eating anything. Most of it is really bad. In the past ten or so months I've stacked on about 17kg.
That takes hard work - chocolate, crisps, pizza, fish and chips, McDonalds, etc. Yum. Not anymore. I can't do that. I wont allow myself to go down that path again.
So at the gym this evening I worked out for about an hour. Got on the tread climber as my warm up, did some skipping and some lifting of the cow bell and medicine ball sitting up and getting down (who knew sitting down and getting back up could be such hard work!) and I got back on the treadmill to finish off with. By the end of my day I was coated in sweat - the t-shirt that I had on felt like it weighed a ton.
It feels like hard work and it is hard work. However, when you've done the hard work it is always very rewarding. I'm anal about how much I weigh when I work out. After finishing my work out I jumped on the scales and found that I'd already dropped 2kg. I'm now 109.5kg. My goal is to drop another 9.5kg by the end of the month. My PT says that I should be aiming to drop 2-3kg per week if I eat right and train right so 100kg by the end of the month is pretty accurate by that measure.
On an entirely different subject - the Commonwealth Games have started. While I'm not as interested in them as I probably would normally be I have to admit that I watched the opening ceremony. It was very well executed - vastly different to how the media was portraying them as being.
The highlight for me was the reception that the largely Indian crowd gave to the Pakistani athletes as they did their lap of honor at the start of the games. Everybody knows the history between the two countries and their bitterness towards one another politically so any time the two nations are represented in the others nation it is interesting. So for the Indians to give the Pakistanis such a warm reception was great to see. Very well done, India. Peace is possible!
Sunday, October 3, 2010
Welcome
As the title says, welcome to the Wickzki Diaries. The Wickzki Diaries are going to be a blog in the form of a diary. I'll try and post something each day and give you the thoughts and opinions of me, Wickzki.
So who is this mysterious Wickzki? I'm a thirty year old male from Melbourne, Australia. I've led an interesting life thus far. I have worked in professional sports in the United States in my mid-twenties. Not as a player but rather in the off-court side of the game. The silent part that the fan never sees.
I've also been involved in things that I'm not so proud of. Hardships that I'd rather not have endured but that have been extremely character building and have shaped me into the person that I am proud of being today.
Presently, I'm studying for a triple degree in Arts (Internet Communication), Business (majoring in marketing and management) and IT (Computing Studies). All said and done I'm pretty proud of the fact that I'm going to have not one but three complete collegiate degrees behind me when I'm complete. Thus far it is proving to be the most challenging yet rewarding experience of my life.
I'm about to complete my first book - it's based on the greatest players in American professional basketball history. It's something that I've been working on for way too long now and I have a publisher lined up to take the project on and have it published. I'll be extremely proud when it's all said and done and I see my name in print.
My health isn't the greatest right now but I'm working on it. As I type this I weigh in at 111kg (249 lbs.) and it's the most I've ever been in my entire life. However, I am attending the local gym where I am going three or four times each week. I'm planning on really getting heavily into it. I was blown out of my mind when my PTs all said that they'd have me back in shape by the end of the year if I eat and work out right. No more crappy junk food! No sir!
I know you want the goss, so my love life? Yeah, let's not go there. I've been out of a relationship for a while now. I'm over it. I really don't have that much baggage. Nothing really serious. No children to my name (or at least that I've been made aware of *grins*) or any of that. Am I looking? Yeah. If the right gal came along and knocked my socks off and was willing to work on building a good life together. I wouldn't even mind if she had children already as I totally adore children.
I think that's enough for a welcome post. So please subscribe and come with me on this amazing journey!
Cheers-
Wickzki
So who is this mysterious Wickzki? I'm a thirty year old male from Melbourne, Australia. I've led an interesting life thus far. I have worked in professional sports in the United States in my mid-twenties. Not as a player but rather in the off-court side of the game. The silent part that the fan never sees.
I've also been involved in things that I'm not so proud of. Hardships that I'd rather not have endured but that have been extremely character building and have shaped me into the person that I am proud of being today.
Presently, I'm studying for a triple degree in Arts (Internet Communication), Business (majoring in marketing and management) and IT (Computing Studies). All said and done I'm pretty proud of the fact that I'm going to have not one but three complete collegiate degrees behind me when I'm complete. Thus far it is proving to be the most challenging yet rewarding experience of my life.
I'm about to complete my first book - it's based on the greatest players in American professional basketball history. It's something that I've been working on for way too long now and I have a publisher lined up to take the project on and have it published. I'll be extremely proud when it's all said and done and I see my name in print.
My health isn't the greatest right now but I'm working on it. As I type this I weigh in at 111kg (249 lbs.) and it's the most I've ever been in my entire life. However, I am attending the local gym where I am going three or four times each week. I'm planning on really getting heavily into it. I was blown out of my mind when my PTs all said that they'd have me back in shape by the end of the year if I eat and work out right. No more crappy junk food! No sir!
I know you want the goss, so my love life? Yeah, let's not go there. I've been out of a relationship for a while now. I'm over it. I really don't have that much baggage. Nothing really serious. No children to my name (or at least that I've been made aware of *grins*) or any of that. Am I looking? Yeah. If the right gal came along and knocked my socks off and was willing to work on building a good life together. I wouldn't even mind if she had children already as I totally adore children.
I think that's enough for a welcome post. So please subscribe and come with me on this amazing journey!
Cheers-
Wickzki
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