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Episode 274: The Ouroboros of planning to plan (or a better title Hobbes comes up with)
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Hello, Podwalkers, and welcome back to another episode of the Goblin Lore Podcast!
We have a lot going on here, which seems evergreen at this point. Alex does discuss some of what is happening in Minneapolis and while Hobbes is not on the recording he wanted to also just say that people need to pay attention to what is happening in Minnesota right now. Alex today returns to a topic we love during the new year... Planning... Purposefully... or at least planning to plan... purposefully
We also finally have a Linktree with all of our discounts/resources including how to join our Discord
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As promised, we keep Mental Health Links available every episode. But For general Mental Health the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) has great resources for people struggling with mental health concerns as well as their families. We also want to draw attention to this article on stigma from NAMI's site.
If you’re thinking about suicide or just need someone to talk to right now, you can get support from any of the resources below.
- National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 988
- Veteran's can Press 1 at anytime to be taken to the Veteran's Line
- Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741-741
- International suicide hotlines: A comprehensive resource list for people outside the US.
- IMAlive: Click Chat Now to access a live online network of volunteers through instant messaging.
- TrevorLifeline, TrevorChat, and TrevorText (LGBTQ+ crisis support): 1-866-488-7386, or text “Trevor” to 1-202-304-1200
- Trans Lifeline (US): (877) 565-8860
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Opening and closing music by Wintergatan (@wintergatan). Logo art by Steven Raffael (@SteveRaffle)
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Solo Hosting
00:00:01
Hobbes
Hello, Podwalkers, and welcome to another episode of the Goblin Lore Podcast. um It's going to be weird one today. It's only me, so I'll just do my intro real quick. I am Alex. I am not really on on social media. that i I am in the Goblin Lore Discord, which is a fun place to hang out and is open to all.
00:00:23
Hobbes
My pronouns are he, him, and like said, it is just me today.
Reflecting on Challenges in 2026
00:00:27
Hobbes
There is a lot going on. There's a lot going on sort of politically and globally and also personally in the lives of the hosts.
00:00:39
Hobbes
This is our first episode being recorded in january the year 2026. It's in getting close to the middle of January as I'm recording this. We'll be posting it about the middle of January. We were, we took a hiatus in December. Recording was getting a little spotty there too, just because December is full of a lot of events and going ons for folks. And so we decided to take a bit of a break and it was a little hard to come back, but it has been a little while and I would like to have an episode recorded and I had some capacity, mental, and and some time.
Planning and Resolutions Discussion
00:01:16
Hobbes
And so the three hosts, Taya, Hobbs, and myself, talked and decided I'm going to record a solo episode on a topic I've talked about a bunch before. It's a topic that is always kind of on my mind at this time of year. So I wanted to to kind of talk about planning and new Year's resolutions and my history with some of that. um because because it's it's it's a topic i i think a lot of i think a lot about around uh new year's you know in january in particular and i i feel it's a good topic to talk about and it's it's something i know i can do i can do solo but um before i get into any of that i am going to talk about
00:01:59
Hobbes
a little bit about what's been going on in the Twin Cities recently, if if you all are aware of events.
Criticism of Federal Actions in Twin Cities
00:02:06
Hobbes
There has been a occupation of our city by federal forces represented mostly through the ICE organization and i think DHS, Homeland Security, has said that they are sending more forces.
00:02:22
Hobbes
um There are more federal immigration officers, ostensibly what they're supposed to be, in armed immigration officers in our cities. Then we have police in the Twin Cities.
00:02:38
Hobbes
This is a federal occupation of our city that represents half of our state's population, a population that voted against the sitting executive in this country, which is a Bad luck.
00:02:50
Hobbes
Yeah, it's not been great. um a A civilian named Rene Good was murdered a few days ago as I'm recording this. We had closed, schools were closed last week because of fears that spread, because they abducted children at high school parking lots last week.
00:03:17
Hobbes
And, um you know, all sorts of other other things going on. And so I just want to just just kind of give some context around why things are a little tough for us right now. Some of y'all might be aware, two of ah both myself and Hobbs are based in the or in the Twin Cities right now. I grew up here. Hobbs has been here for for a number of years, moved here from California a while ago and has been here for quite a while. And it's it's not good.
00:03:46
Hobbes
It doesn't feel great. to have all of these things going on. And just, you know, regardless of, you know, I'm not going to say regardless of this stuff. This this stuff is fucking unacceptable. There's some BS story about fraud and things. And yes, there was some fraud of, of,
00:04:06
Hobbes
funds for some stuff going back to COVID and some things that were being misused, they're being prosecuted. Those people are being prosecuted. We don't need 2,000 fucking ice in our streets firing tear gas on civilians to to deal with people who are already being prosecuted. And even if ah there was more you know fraud, waste and abuse to to to find, you don't find it by sending militarized immigration officers into a city.
00:04:33
Hobbes
That's not how you find that. That's not how you do any of that. That is how you terrorize a population. That is literally what they are doing, is terrorizing a population. But it it doesn't actually resolve any of the things that they say they're trying to resolve because that's not what they're trying to do.
00:04:50
Hobbes
If that was what they were trying to do, they would be working towards that, but they aren't. theyre They are sending in armed and masked people federal officers to to terrorize this this population that politically does not align with the current administration.
00:05:09
Hobbes
So we have all that going on. um With all of that going on, I have... To get into to
Importance of New Year's Planning
00:05:17
Hobbes
transition awkwardly into the topic of planning, say it is now New Year's. Well, it's it's middle of January. Often the conversation around New Year's resolutions will happen in December kind of talking about it on on day one. And I say this is kind of a Topic we've covered a few times. ah All in all, i still I think it can still be nice and helpful to to cover topics ah multiple times. it It lets us bring new perspectives. It lets newer folks who who haven't gone back to older episodes to get some of the the things that we've been saying. And I don't know. This is just a topic I like to talk about. And it feels nice now.
00:06:00
Hobbes
um My history kind of going back to the New Year's resolutions, like a lot of folks, I think I tried to do some New Year's resolutions and they didn't really work for me. But a lot of times it fell into a structure, for me at least, there were kind of, there were too absolute, too all or nothing, and too dependent on the first, which is maybe funny for someone who's been saying, this is a good time of year to talk about this. But that's kind of part of my my journey for it. At first, it felt like I had to come up with something by December 31st. If I didn't have something figured out by the time I woke up on the first, it was already too late.
00:06:33
Hobbes
It would be something you know too too much of an absolute. I'm going to do X every day. I'm going to do Y never or whatever. And then within the first two or three weeks, the first time I missed that ah or less than two or three weeks, perhaps, then all of a sudden it's like, well, not too bad. Next year I'll try it again. And that just never felt like it would work.
Flexible Goal-Setting Approach
00:06:55
Hobbes
And then kind of in that rot rotation sort of next step I had,
00:07:00
Hobbes
You know, the whole, well, if it was something worth doing, I should, I could just do it at any time, which is true. But then eventually I sort of came back to this idea that, well, yes, you can at any point in in time, try to start a new habit or try to break old habits or try to... start a new thing, make plans for something. i the The beginning of the year is just a really convenient, because it's just a convenient time to do it. It's a time when everyone's talking about resolutions. It's a time when your calendar has run out and now you need a new calendar. And so it's a good reminder that it's a good time for a fresh start sort of thing. And so that's where
00:07:45
Hobbes
it's it's It is a helpful you know tool for that. It's a helpful reminder of that. It's a helpful thing to hang that on. But you don't have to be beholden to exactly the first, exactly then That's why I, at least for myself, I've kind of got into this habit of just in January, spend some time kind of thinking about making plans for the year. Or in December, to be honest, a little bit too. i' I'll think about some stuff beforehand, especially for some hobby things, some books I want to read, some games I want to play, some stuff I want to watch. a lot of that stuff I'll be kind of thinking about toward the end of the year. Honestly, Thanksgiving weekend is a, is a big, is a big sort of back end of that for me where that's,
00:08:28
Hobbes
That's a time where I sit and think about what had I planned for this year? What do I have left? It's a long weekend for us in the United States. It's right at the end of November, sometimes literally this year. The last year it was literally the last few days of November was Thanksgiving weekend. So we get Thursday. The last Thursday of November is always Thanksgiving. Then we usually, like for myself and a corporate job, I get both Thursday and Friday off and then have the weekend weekend. And just the way my my family situation is, I tend not to do Thanksgiving with folks, though I have family and and friends who would be more than happy for me to be there, but I like it for myself as kind of ah a long weekend at the end of near the end of the year to be a little introspective because it's also not the end. There's an entire month still.
00:09:15
Hobbes
after thanksgiving now christmas and things can get busy in december but it gives me the opportunity to just like pick one or two last things to be like hey i won't hit this goal but maybe i'll finish this book or i have two left in this series let's see if i can finish this series off sort of thing um but then it's also the the first sort of opportunity i take that to think about what i plan to wrap up in december but also what I want to work toward in the next year, what goals I want to start January with. um If there's things that maybe I can start in December, because again, stuff doesn't always round out perfectly. Maybe I get all of my reading goals done by the end of, you know, middle of December and now I have a couple of weeks. where I can start on maybe a particularly big book that feels intimidating. But if I start it in December, I can finish it in January and have a head start there. So kind of and as the capstones for me, it's it's usually January to really solidify and... and
00:10:14
Hobbes
build my plans for the year and then kind of November to think back, feel out kind of how I want to finish the year and start to think about my plans for the following year.
State of the Alex: Self-Assessment Practice
00:10:24
Hobbes
And then, so for me, this has kind of taken a few different forms over the the last few, i say the last few years. This has taken some different forms over the last decade and a half or maybe even two decades, to be to be honest. um One of the things I have talked about in on this podcast too when we talk about planning uh yeah i see i um there's something i like to call the state of the alex it's it's based off of the u.s's uh state of the union which is a thing mandated in the constitution the president has to do i think it just is periodically but it's become a tradition to do it once a year Um, that then has sort of inspired a few folks like what the head designer of magic has done his own thing is an author. I really like who, who does something similar on his birthday every year, kind of talking about his, his books and his series. And so I've kind of adopted that model. I kind of adopted that model for myself. Um, and the oldest one I can find is 2013.
00:11:24
Hobbes
So over a decade ago now, um looking back i don't think i had annualized it at that point it took a little longer for me to to annualize it but um so the state of the alex sort of evolved on this ultimately how i how i ended up building it into was a six categories six different components different parts of my life roughly split i mean there's there's a lot of things that would kind of fit in multiple categories but Six. So these are the vocational.
00:11:55
Hobbes
It's my job, what I do, career goals and things like that. There's financial, which of course is impacted a little bit by vocational as well. There's my social thing. There's recreational, which also has some overlap with social. Personal, which is more mental health. If I'm thinking about my apartment, the spaces that I'm living in, if I am going to move or things like that. And then physical.
00:12:23
Hobbes
And so, of course, I i also, being being the weird language person too, I have, it took me a few years to figure out how to have all six of those have a similar word structure with the, you know, all at the end of them all. That's why I don't just have a job. It has to be vocational so it fits the naming scheme.
00:12:41
Hobbes
But this, I have, would go through each of these usually in January, sometimes it'd be little a little into February and kind of the goal here was two sections in each of these six. I wanted to think about where I am at right now.
00:12:55
Hobbes
How do I feel about my hobbies and recreational? How do I feel about my you know relationships with my friends and families and time that I've been spending and things I've been doing with them, which obviously has some overlap with recreational like magic definitely fits into both social and recreational.
00:13:12
Hobbes
And so I kind of think about where am I at right the exact now? How do I feel about that? And then that helps to inform what do I want to do moving forward? You know, roughly a year, but not necessarily even a year. Like I want to, this is less, in in a lot of ways, this thing became less of a goal goal, list of goals for specific goals over the course of a year. and more of a just annual check-in, where am I at and what do I want to do? And and and to be perfectly honest too, even as as much as i gru I personally grumble about it, and lots of people grumble about it, there was a little bit of structure um built baked into this, informed from annual performance reviews that I do at work.
00:13:57
Hobbes
They by and large kind of suck, but there is something to be said about checking in, where are you at? And that's one of the things my my work actually does. We have our big annual review, which is the thing that actually really matters at the end of the year. But we also have in July, we do a mid-year check-in and that you don't have to do much. doesn't There's no real like consequences if you don't do a whole lot for it. But the point of that is to help out your annual review at the end of the year gives you an opportunity to talk to your supervisor about where you're at, where they feel you're at. What do you feel you want to work for toward in the next six months? Um, and also it's just really helpful when you sit down at the end of the year to have, have some thoughts from six months previous, as opposed to having to think about the entire 12, having those thoughts from the mid year means you don't have to, you only have to really think about the last six months, but, um,
00:14:53
Hobbes
Anyway, so this is this is a structure I've used used for a number of years, though actually I used it for about a decade because the last one I have, the last fully filled out one was
Using the Rote Runner Planner
00:15:07
Hobbes
2022. I started one in 2023 and never finished it. And this is a thing I've been meaning to get back to. 2026 now, so i missed. didn't finish the one in didn't even start it in And now kind of thinking about whether I want to get back into this for 26.
00:15:25
Hobbes
for twenty six and And honestly, i it literally just today occurred to me. i was to be kind of thinking about recording this episode last week and then sat down to record it today. But it occurred to me like...
00:15:38
Hobbes
two hours ago that I think part of the reason why I haven't done it. I think it could still be helpful for me, but I realized that there is something else I've been doing that has filled that in a little bit because one of the things, obviously, as I said, there's the...
00:15:52
Hobbes
The planning and the thinking, and there's a lot of that, but it's also nice as just a journaling thing. It's great that I can go back to 2022 and read. What do I think about what's going on in my social life at that point? See, 2022 was a really bad time. It was a really weird time. We have the COVID pandemic in 2020. So I have my thoughts written down from early 2022, thinking about where I had been the last couple of years, what I wanted to be doing looking forward.
00:16:25
Hobbes
And so that's very nice. But one of the things that I've been doing recently, last few years, in fact, I went but dug my books out and I tried to start in 2020, but 2022, in fact, is where I really was pretty consistent with using Rote Runner.
00:16:41
Hobbes
Rote Runner is a planner. I can't remember how they describe themselves. I can look that up through the magic of the internet. But ultimately, it's i have used it as ah as a planner. They have they have a digital 12-month planner. They have a new 12-month physical planner, I think. By and large, I have been doing their six-month planner. So it's done two per year. um But it's just, it's really nice for me. So they, yeah, I don't know their tagline, align your focus, a achieve with purpose. I don't know Purpose Planner, I think is one of their names for it. I don't know exactly how they describe themselves, but other than than that, but it is...
00:17:28
Hobbes
It's a book I really like. I think theyre they have a bigger size. They have a smaller size now too, which is a US s person. B5 and A5 doesn't mean anything to me. I just have to look at which one's cheaper. And I know that's the small one because it's a paper size. For if for US s listeners, that those are paper sizes that are used as a little more of an international standard. I don't know how international how widespread, but I know it's it's more than just the, I think, I think it's one more thing where the U S has its own weird system and lots of other people have a unified system that is helpful for them, less helpful for us to have to translate to our own weird systems. But anyway, this is one of the reasons I like this book is it, so it has month broken down, but then they have each, they have five weeks for each month and just an individual week. So I can open the book to a page and have seven days across it
00:18:23
Hobbes
some some little categories like top goat three goals not to do list i'm grateful for to buy to connect spots for meals there's there's lots of little things and i don't ever use all of it but it is really nice when i'm trying to track my food because i need to cut carbs or whatever and so it's nice to have okay well now for however long i'm going to track what i have for breakfast lunch and dinner every day There's a little water counter. There's some other stuff in here. I use it to help track habits like taking my vitamins and and taking you know my pills and stuff. um But then it just has, there's also spots where i can just track, you know, little fun things. I have a spot for books. I use half the book section for games because I also play a lot of games. and And so it's just, for me, this has been really helpful to keep track of all of this stuff. um some again Some of it, there's there's things I just don't use.
00:19:16
Hobbes
But it's really nice for me to have this. And it's a nice, easy thing. like I throw in my backpacks and I bring it to work every day. bring it home every day. i don't necessarily write in here every day, but most days I'm updating things or making plans for the weekend. I use this as kind of a unified calendar because I have like, you know personal and social stuff on my phone. I have work things on my work computer. I have multiple other places where things are. And generally I use the road runner to be sort of the, the calendar there it to sort of like the month to month on the week to week to sort of keep track of all the things, which is, which is really nice. The last two or so years have been pretty consistent. the The first couple were fairly spotty. I'd go, I'd go a few weeks or a month or two without using it, but it's still nice to have, have these books to be able look back at that.
00:20:08
Hobbes
It's a little less convenient than having a whole series of Google Docs, which is what I had for this the state of the Alex stuff. But still, it's it's really nice. um If it is something that's interesting to you, like I hate the idea of trying to sell products to people because not everyone's going be able to spend. These are like $30 and spend $60 for a year to do this stuff. But I don't know. Maybe you can buy it.
00:20:33
Hobbes
50 cent notebook if that's what they're sold for anymore and and kind of build something similar for yourself. But if you are interested, um they, the, the creator of Roadrunner actually did come on our show a few years ago.
Discussion with Roadrunner Creator
00:20:45
Hobbes
It was kind of neat. I, I, just randomly sent them an email and said, hey, we do some some mental health giveaway stuff. Would you mind donating some of your books to that we could send as as prizes, giveaways for for this stuff? And he said, sure. Also, do you want to record an episode? And we said, sure. And so he, your fan came on and It was a really fun conversation. He had never really knew what magic was. And so we got to kind of explain what magic is to this guy and talk about kind we use the book. And he gave us some stories about how he created it and iterated on it. And even in the couple of years I've been using it, there's been different iterations. Like I said, the size is definitely one of them, but even just some of the contents, they've kind of rearranged what little different things are in here.
00:21:30
Hobbes
which is is kind of fun to see. So that is a thing you can go back and find from a few years ago. I want to say that was probably in 22, I think is when we probably did that, or when we first started doing it. In fact, there was an episode where I got Hobbes a Rope Runner, and then I took one myself, and I just like walked through the book with him, all these different sections and things, which was fun. I think it was later that year, so I'm going to guess it was 2022. Yeah, it was it was was a lot of fun.
00:22:00
Hobbes
One other thing i realized too, and and that might be helpful, and it's it's less a planning thing and more a
Mindfulness and Positivity Exercises
00:22:08
Hobbes
mindfulness thing. I know we talk about this. I've talked about this with Hobbes. He's brought it up. I've brought it up a few times. In fact, there let me just say it and then give more context around it. So this is a a mindfulness exercise he taught me, and I know he's talked about using it, um is at the, i believe they do it at the end of the day.
00:22:28
Hobbes
You write down three good things that happened to you that day and one thing you're looking forward to the next day. That is a practice I have used myself. um I generally changed it a little bit. Like I would do each morning, I would write three things about the previous day. And then one thing I'm looking forward to that current day, that kind of helped me.
00:22:50
Hobbes
Cause generally I would do that when I get to work, I grab breakfast at work. And then i would do that while I'm eating breakfast before I really start my day. And that was a really, for me, that was a really nice way to be mindful Similarly, but doing it in the morning worked a lot better than trying to do that at night for myself.
00:23:11
Hobbes
That is a practice I have fallen off of, and I think i might I might try to get back to that too. And that honestly was helpful in in the Roadrunner because that gave me ah a place to write those week to week.
00:23:23
Hobbes
um Though again, if if you have some other solution that that you use, You could similarly kind of write that out in those places. And I think that is, it's a helpful technique just to remember the little things like, and it doesn't have to be anything big and major. Like I had a great sandwich. I agree. Yeah. Today, one of my good things would be a breakfast sandwich I had for lunch at work. So this this was there was a biscuit sandwich. These these are American-style buttermilk-like biscuits. There's a fried egg and cheddar cheese. They they put some fried tomatoes on there, spinach, and some bacon jam. And it was incredible. And I got some hash browns, and it was it was awesome. And so, yeah, just write down like awesome breakfast sandwich. Like that's great. And it's just these little things, especially when there is all sorts of the world being on fire in all sorts of reasons right now, both near and far.
00:24:25
Hobbes
um It's easy to lose track of some of these little things. And this isn't a whole like you got to, you know, positive, you know, force of positivity thing, but it's just like sometimes just in ah on a personal level, you need some reminder of just some of those little things because otherwise you can get overwhelmed. It's very easy. I know myself, we we talk about, we it's been a little while, we we you know talk about cognitive distortions. And like for me, a cognitive distortion that I i deal with a lot is catastrophizing.
00:24:55
Hobbes
For me, if you know one little thing goes bad and then second little thing goes bad, my brain immediately goes to, well, this is just an awful day that nothing good can happen. um And then I start to filter and it genuinely will start to like self-fulfilling prophecy that I will filter out those good things and not even notice them happening because the narrative is this is a bad day and only bad things can happen.
00:25:15
Hobbes
And so at a mindfulness technique like this, it can be helpful to push back against some of that to just remind you that, hey, this can be fun. Another good thing today, I was watching this this channel.
00:25:28
Hobbes
called Adventures in Ardia. I have no idea to pronounce this YouTube channel. But he does a thing called Roll for Sandwich. if you just search Roll for Sandwich. And this just this guy with a lot of, there's a lot of D&D sort of terminology to it. He even has his own like spell book that he uses to to fudge the rules just a little bit, but he just every every day for a period of time, he was like, all right this is season eight. I'm going to do every day for lunch or some number of days for lunch. He will sit down and just roll dice to randomly build a sandwich. And some of them look great. Some of them are absolute disasters.
00:26:02
Hobbes
And he eats them all and it's wild, but it's a lot of fun. and this is a show like just introduced to from a friend recently. And I sat down to watch some anime while I eating dinner before I recorded this. And then I decided to watch him instead. And the very first episode I watched, he was sponsored by some guy who wrote a goblin book. That sounds really interesting, actually. Somebody had to check that out, but ended up just being a chaos goblin sandwich, just wild chaos. And and it felt appropriate for for me about to record our our Goblin Chaos podcast. So there's another good thing for me today. So just, um i don't know, there's a lot going on.
00:26:42
Hobbes
And try to take care of yourself as much as well as you can. And try to take care of folks around you. it's It's not always going to be possible, but do do what you can. And even if it's small things, it's just...
00:26:55
Hobbes
write down, find a good time at the end of the day, the beginning of the day, and just just write down a couple good things that happen. And even if it's small, even if it was just a funny joke that your friends told you and y'all laughed about it for a few minutes, like that, that's stuff that's worth remembering.
00:27:09
Hobbes
um and So I don't have no no clue how to end this. So I'm just going to click stop and say, you know, take care of yourselves. you you get you I'm sorry. we we're we'll We'll see you later.