Published on | Prototyping: From UX to Front End — Medium Michelle Child

I listened to the first episode of a podcast today by one of my favorite accounts on Instagram — @thealisonshow — called “How to Get Shit Done” (only she didn’t say shit because she’s running a kid-friendly zone over there.)

First, I love this girl because she unapologetically names everything after herself and yet is one of the most selfless personalities I keep up with. She rocks at self-care, she’s open about being religious but doesn’t care if you are (just THINK if the rest of the world could hop on that train), she dances everywhere — she’s just got a genuine soul. And, she gets shit done.

Her and her husband listed off some tips on how they, as two self employed people, get shit done. The one that most resonated with me because I had never done this before was

“Visualize how much better your life will be when your goal is accomplished”

It’s so simple!

At the highest level, I typically divide my goals into career and personal goals, and I’m much better at accomplishing my personal goals than my work goals (usually).

So to focus on work —

I’m a User Interface / User Experience designer. My job consists of 70% product architect/design/development (I ❤ you Sketch), 30% marketing and branding (Adobe, we’re just friends). I love product design and development, and really want to dive deeper into development. Partly because I think it’s fascinating and partly because I think my career depends on it.

I know HTML, CSS, Sass, some Git and the Foundation framework pretty well. I want to become equally skilled in Javascript, jQuery, json, coldfusion, SQL, gulp, grunt, bower, I could keep going. I think accomplishing this goal would look like this:

Keeping my personal website up to date
Feeling confident when looking for new jobs or considering doing freelance full time.
Considering higher level positions (manager, director, etc.) because I have a solid understanding of a range of positions.
Having a passion project on the side

It would allow me to do things like this:

Create an application from start to finish
Design a Squarespace site in developer mode

My excuse I’ve kept running in my head is “I spend my entire workday on the computer, I want/I NEED my nights screen-free.” I want to go for a run, build some shit, have a drink and interact with human beings face to face. To me, it’s not a bad excuse. But it’s still an excuse. I need to change my thinking so I can get some shit done.

Lately, I’ve come up with this. My job is frustrating at times, but it’s also very corporate and moves slowly. I’m allotting some “personal development time” to my workday, everyday, to help get the ball rolling. I’m getting to my computer an hour earlier, and sticking to my chair until 5pm. The more I feel productive, the happier I am.

Right now, I’m doing one lesson of Learn CF in a Week a day. Today is looping! My boss is helping my coworker and I understand Cold Fusion, and it’s pretty cool so far, even if I am a bit lost on how things all fit in together.

Thanks for reading my ramblings.

Getting Shit Done was originally published in prototypr on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Getting Shit Done

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