Goals + motivation

Last week, I indicated that this semester was the worst one ever and I said it wasn't about the grades. I saw my grades yesterday and they weren't my worst ever: I had a worse GPA my first semester of freshman year. I am not sure how I feel about my grades based on how the semester was. I did worse than I expected in a class that I didn't think was on the border line but the class was weird. We had one group report and a final. I guess I failed the final.

Back to the reason for writing this, let me explain what happened this semester to you. Before I can do that, I have to tell you a story.

I never really cared about my grades before I came to Howard. Seriously. They had never really mattered. I did as well as I could without stressing myself and that meant doing well in classes I was “naturally good” at and “failing” the others. That worked for me throughout high school as I was the goto guy in these few classes and for everything else, you had to seek help elsewhere.

At Howard, things changed. Everybody emphasized a high GPA so it was something I had to consider. I also had a cutoff to meet to keep my scholarship. At the end of the first semester of my freshman year, I messed up in two classes: Freshman Composition and Calculus I. This really pissed me off for a variety of reasons:

• Of all the classes I was taking that semester, those were the two classes I had prior experience so I might have had underrated them
• One of those naturally good classes I mentioned above was Math yet I was faltering.
• Almost everybody around me got a 4.0 that semester except me
• The main reason: I didn't think it was my fault that I didn't do well in these classes. In Calculus, I was always making mistakes and my teacher penalized mistakes really hard so it affected my grades a lot. And in English, the professor was one of those professors you warn people about. Nobody in my section of the class got an A although I know someone else who got an A in another section of the class. What used to piss me off the most was when he used to give us a status of where we were in the class, he would say: “You have a very strong B.” A strong B? What's a strong B? Nobody wanted a strong B. I wanted an A in the class and this guy was telling me about a strong B. wtf?

So, at the end of my first semester, my GPA wasn't that bad but it could have been so much better so I set a goal that I wasn't aware of until now. It's one of those goals you set unconsciously that you are not aware of yet they keep on driving you. My goal was to increase my cumulative GPA every semester the highest possible it could increase based on the classes I was taking. This affected me in more ways than I could realize.

I stopped making mistakes in classes and always did whatever it took to get the best grades possible in class. This “whatever it takes” mentality was evident in classes in which I felt I was wasting my time and not learning anything yet I did the work it took to pass the class because I had a goal in mind. Have you had homework which took so long to complete yet was worth such a small percent of the grade? I have. And I did this homework judiciously so I could get the best grades possible from my classes.

So, with this mentality and this drive, I was able to get through the 5 semesters between my first semester and this one, learning as much as I could and succeeding with my plan. I hit a snag this semester.

At the beginning of each semester, I used to calculate the GPA I could attain at the end of the semester if everything went according to plan. I knew how much my cumulative GPA could increase and what my new GPA could be at the end of the semester. Although, the increments became obviously smaller with each semester, there were still improvements and something to look forward to.

This semester when I calculated my possible GPA at the end of the semester, I realized that my GPA could not increase. Well, there was a possiblity that it could go up by 0.01 if it was rounded up. I think it had always been rounded down so I wasn't optimistic.

I think I became disoriented. I had lost all my reasons for wanting as high a GPA as possible (remember, I didn't really care before college):

• The GPA couldn't go higher
• I knew it couldn't go that much lower
• High GPAs were good before prospective employers for internships. As I already had internships which carried more weight than the GPA, and it wasn't like it would suck now

So losing my main goal along with senioritis along with pure laziness and tiredness meant I had the horrible semester I had. Apart from school work, I was a slacker in almost everything else. I just didn't do much. I have caught up on the work missed for the most part of the semester in the last one week.

So, why did I tell you all this? Well, because I realized the importance of goals. One more story, a shorter one, I promise.

At MSFT and GOOG, you have to write goals at the beginning of the internship about what you are trying to accomplish and what you plan to have delivered at the end of the internship. I believe I pretty much met the goals I set for myself at the end of the internships. And the reason I think I did is because they were written down and I could always refer to them to remind myself of what I was doing there and what I was trying to achieve.

See, I told you it was going to be short. You didn't believe me. Back to goals...

During the summer, I finally decided to set some goals for myself and what I wanted to achieve this semester and in the forseeable future. This is after Godwell and Rev. Burrell have been prodding me about them for a while. I wrote some fancy goals for this semester that were frankly really hard to achieve in retrospect but would have done me a lot of good if I had come close to meeting them. Well, guess what. They were in a Word document on my computer and I never opened them till I was writing this. I didn't even come close to meeting most of them. Why? because I never saw them. So, if you write goals, put them in a place where you can see them often. Preferably everyday.

So, it took me having a horrible semester to have an understanding of why goals are important in the process reducing my GPA. Well, I think it was worth it. If I had had a normal semester and gone on to do well next semester, the maximum my GPA would have increased this academic year would have been that 0.01 I was telling you about earlier. Now, it has gone down and can go up again next semester :) and I have learnt how important goals can be. (Disclaimer: I didn't do “bad” on purpose just to give me an opportunity to let my GPA rise again, that would have been plain stupid).

Finally, one more thing: with the right motivation, you can turn whatever situation you are in around for good. I got my motivation to stop the slide and turn the situation around based on a few things that happened during the semester plus I didn't want to fail. I am not going to go into details of what happened on that fateful day because this entry is already too long but with the right goals and/or motivation propeling you, you can accomplish what you need to do.

ManU reminds me of Arsenal

Watching Manchester United play today reminded me of Arsenal at their prime. Speed, quick passing, and counter attacking football are virtues that this United side that defined the Arsenal team.

Did you see Ronaldo's second goal and United's third? classic Arsenal. Moving from one end of the field to the other in seconds with one touch football. Reminds me of the second goal against Spurs when we clinched the title at White Hart Lane.

Compare Vieira's goal with Ronaldo's goal. Will post Ronaldo's goal when it comes up on YouTube.

The only thing is that this United team might have more resolve than we did. Did Fergie look at Wenger's team and pick out elements he liked to merge with his own philosophies? If so, brilliant.

Did Fergie drop Ruud and then subsequently sell him so he could play Wengerball?

Scholes goal was a scorcher. And we won 6-2. Go figure.

You are the fan of the year

In keeping with the spirit of you being named the person of the year, FoxSports has named you its fan of the year.

I could feel for some of the fans of some of those teams and what they had to go through while supporting their teams. Highlights from the list that I can relate to:

• Houston Texans fans who saw the team choose Mario Williams over Reggie Bush and Vince Young
• Mavs fans in the NBA finals last year
• Lakers fans in the playoffs last year against the Suns
• Newcastle fans and all their injuries
• 76ers fans who lost AI and kept Webber.
• Eagles fans who saw McNabb go down injured but TO doing well in Dallas. (I don't think Eagles' fans should be sad. They still have a chance of winning the division if they beat the Cowboys this weekend).

There are lots more there. Check it out.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

The title of the seventh Harry Potter book has been revealed. It is “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows”.

I can't wait for this. It was just last week that Ayomide and I were talking of this, contemplating different scenarios for what would happen.

This is a site devoted entirely to Harry Potter.

Amazon book page here. [Via Paul Kedrosky]

Worst semester ever

I had the worst semester ever. And I am not talking about grades. I haven't seen my grades so I am not too sure how I did. Doesn't look that bad but there's hope.

So what made this semester the worst semester ever?

• I was so tired all throughout the semester and this resulted in the apathy towards classes and school work at the beginning of the semester which I referred to here.
• This is the first time where I am not really sure how I did. Why am I not sure? Because I winged the semester and too many classes are too close to call while I am hoping that some other classes are curved so I can get a higher grade than I deserved. Normally, I am pretty sure where I stand with no need to actually see my grades to be sure how I did.
• The last few days of the semester were a lot of stress as I had to catch up on lost school work and lost work work.
• To compensate for time lost, I still have a lot of work to do and I am going to be working through the holidays and I have been doing so since I finished for the semester. This is the first time I actually have stuff I need to do during the holidays. Well, apart from my internships.

So, that's the semester in a nutshell. I will tell you later what turned the semester around for me.

This post was written with Windows Live Writer Beta. I will have spurts where I am offline and need to blog so I am finally testing it. Pretty good so far. All the reviews are on point.

To all the doubters out there...

The Colts responded with a big win. Peyton Manning had an excellent game and the defense had a much more improved game. All the troubles haven't been fixed but this was better. Now, if we could get this out of Dwight Freeney and the rest of the D more consistently, ...

On the other hand, I think the Bengals lost the plot depending too much on the run because of how terrible the Colts run defense was. They should have played a more balanced game depending more on the 3 amigos which is their strength. I hope they make the playoffs because I like them.

Cannavaro is world footballer of the year

After winning the European footballer of the year award, Cannavaro has been named the FIFA world player of the year.

You are Time's person of the year

Seriously. After naming YouTube its invention of the year, Time has named you its person of the year.

I might need to get a DVD player

Over the summer when Jon (guy in pic) was trying to get a DVD player, I wondered why he wanted to get one because he had an Xbox? (maybe the PS2). I told him not to get it since his console could already play DVDs. I told him to get the Xbox 360 if he wanted to get something by all means since it could serve two purposes. He didn't listen to me and bought the DVD player. He might have been right...

Tonight, I was trying to watch the Da Vinci Code on DVD and my PS2 refused to play it, just attempting to read to no avail. I tried another movie and it worked so I knew it technically wasn't the PS2. I however remembered that this sort of thing had happened before where my PS2 would refuse to play a DVD but a DVD player would because it wasn't as sensitive as the PSs2 was. So, I borrowed Supo's DVD player and it played without a hitch.

So, I might need to get a DVD player for situations like that. Maybe make it an HD DVD player.

C'est fini

I am done for the semester.

The journey started here, we hit a bump here, lost a soldier here, three reached the finish line here, and the remaining four passed the line throughout this whole week ending today.

I finished my room for Digital Design I on Saturday, had a critique on Tuesday which wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. By the way, there are some really talented people around. You should have seen the illustrations people came up with, the thought they put into what they were doing and how they could describe stuff. It was unreal. I just looked at my room and tried to illustrate what I saw that was pleasing to the eye. At least, I confirmed that design is not for me. Was fun though and the skills learned should come in handy.

Had Computer Systems Lab and Senior project finals on Wednesday, and made progress on the operating system. Wasn't fully working but worked to an extent. Not sure how that would work out...

Peace out!!!

Contrasting fortunes

Arsenal surprised everyone by picking up a point against Chelsea in a game we might as well could have won if not for Essien's wonder goal. Nobody should tell me how many times Chelsea hit the bar, do you know how many times we hit the bar against Bolton and still lost?

So this is another big game which we have done well after beating United at Old Trafford, beating Liverpool and Spurs at Emirates and going to Stamford Bridge and picking up a point. You know what, I think if we start considering Bolton a big game, we might be able to start picking up points against them.

On the other hand, the Colts seem unable to stop losing. The run defense which has been the achilles heel all season is now leaking points everywhere. The Colts were obliterated by the Jags and are in danger of losing any type of home field advantage they were planning to have at the end of the season.

Tony Dungy, please, find a way to stop the run or else we would lose our first playoff game (I have no idea if that's going to be a wildcard game).

And the Lakers play the Spurs later tonight, let's see how they do.

On another note, LT just broke the NFL single-season TD record today with his 29^th TD today. He has three more games to put the previous record into oblivion. Any doubts on him winning MVP?

Henry says Cannavaro is not a worthy champion

After being snubbed for the European footballer of the year, Henry was uncharacteristically quiet and nothing was heard from him. He seems to have finally spoken up saying Cannavaro is an unworthy champion.

I am not sure when these quotes were attributed to him but shouldn't he be focusing on the Chelsea game tomorrow? I know he's not playing but he's the captain and should be helping the team prepare for the game tomorrow.

4 down, 4 to go

Yesterday was the last day of classes. As the semester draws to an end, it's finals period.

I started the semester with 8 classes, dropped Real Estate, and had three finals yesterday. These were in Modeling and Simulation, Systems Management Analysis and Accounting Principles I. And they were back-to-back.

I have finals in Senior Project and Computer Systems Lab left, a room to illustrate for Digital Design I and an operating system to write.

Internship project shipped: AdWords Hosted Business Pages

For those of you who wondered what I did at Google, I can now tell you what I worked on my first few weeks there.

I was an intern with AdWords. Normally, AdWords was restricted to advertisers who had websites but my project changed this enabling small and medium sized business with no online presence to have an AdWords account and be able to advertise with Google.

Why did I wait this long to tell you? Because my project has shipped. The official AdWords blog just announced it.

If you want to advertise with Google and do not have a website, now you can. You can find out more about Hosted business pages or AdWords in general by clicking here.

Cashley cole notes

This is really funny. [Via ANR]

The Wiki: One wiki to rule them all

In class the other day, Dr. Shurn assigned us something to read on “The Wiki” and we were all wondering what he was talking about as we had never heard of anything like that before. He then explained to us that he was referring to Wikipedia. We all laughed as it sounded really funny. Lateef and I later agreed that that was cool and Lateef has been referring to Wikipedia as “The Wiki” ever since.

There are a lot of wikis out there so why is Wikipedia the one? Well, most wikis are for small groups, company intranets and such while Wikipedia is public and has some pretty good stuff although it has its issues. The fact that it's easily accessible and can be easily edited in this time of user generated content adds to its appeal.

So right now, Wikipedia is the wiki to rule them all.

The way I use Wikipedia is chronicled below.

Anytime I am looking for information on something specific like NLP or the Revenue recognition principle, the first place I check is Wikipedia, not Google. If I can't find what I am looking for on Wikipedia, I then google the term I am searching for. On the other hand, searching for something like the System.Web.Security namespace or Kobe's 81, I use Google directly.

Wikipedia makes it very easy to access content based on its URL-naming scheme. These are the steps I take to access content on Wikipedia:

• Press “Alt-D” to go to the address bar.
• Type in “en” to go to Wikipedia, and a list of all the recent pages I have been to on Wikipedia shows up.
• Press down x number of times to go to one of the URLs
• Press “Shift-Ctrl” in combination with the left arrow key to go back a few steps and delete the highlighted portion of text until “http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/” is left in the address bar.
• Type in what I am looking for, press enter and boom I am at the desired page.

Now that seems like a lot of work, but it happens really fast especially as the process seems almost automated to me now. From time to time, that doesn't get me what I am looking for and I have to refine case sensitivity or actually search on Wikipedia. Now, some of you might be wondering why I don't just search directly on Google or even Wikipedia especially as there is a search bar in most modern browsers (“Ctrl-E” takes you there in Firefox and IE7). Well, the problem is that my default search engine is Google or Live Search depending on the browser I am using and I don't know a shortcut to change it when I need it and doing it with the mouse is just too slow.

Kobe reminds us he's still around

Remember his 81?

Well, this wasn't quite like his 81 but this was beastly as he was dropping points left, right, and center. He tied a Lakers franchise record of scoring 30 points in a quarter. Guess whose record he tied? His. Against Dallas last year when he dropped 62.

Why am I raving over Kobe scoring just 52 when he has scored more before? Well, because there are people like you who still think Lebron, Wade, or Anthony are better than he is. Well, did you see his numbers? 19-26 FG, 12-15 from the line and scoring 11 in a row at one time. And these are not layups like Lebron or Wade will score but fadeaway jumpers that Kobe has made look so simple.

Finally, want to put his 30-point quarter in perspective and compare it with the all time greats, here's your comparison.

My boy is back.