I was thinking about all the things I did in the past 7 days that make me a better person. A couple of years ago a colleague of mine was let go from her other job and for some unknown reason she had a box of coffee stirrers and she left it at the event's rec room. I took a few handfuls of the coffee stirrers because I had an idea for it.

I had about 117 (and later increased to 147) coffee stirrers. I keep it in a big stack in my drawer in my desk. If I make some achievement in the day, such as apply to a job, go to the gym or have a day at work, I will take one of the stirrers out as it marks one such achievement. The idea that I had was that there will hopefully come a time when that pile of coffee stirrers are all gone and when that happens I expect to be a much different person from the time I got them all together.

Often I forget that I have those coffee stirrers, and then I think about the last time that I looked at the stack (maybe it's 2 weeks or a month) and I start counting (using my calendar) how many big achievements or challenging situations I've been through over those days. Over the past 7 days I did 17 challenging things. 17 is a pretty big number. I've had a pretty long week and even though it was very 'ordinary' it was the hardest thing in the world just to keep going and get on with things. The easy thing to do would be escape or mess it up in some way.

I put together that pile maybe 2-and-a-half years ago.

I also have another thing lately (I have a thing about collecting odd items). At work they usually have lots of postcard sized adverts for art galleries or exhibits or DVDs and I am having an unsightly stack growing of them. I sometimes use them as bookmarks. I have a very cute bookmark that is a postcard of a Deer for example. I might start keeping a pile of these postcards and get rid of them each time I make some achievement. I like having these kinds of markers of achievement. I hear that sometimes people keep tattoos as markers of things, such as memories or special people. Badges are a very conventional way of marking achievments as well.

17 achievements since friday. I didn't get those two jobs. I'm disappointed more than I ever have been with myself. I just have to get on and keep doing things to the plan I've set. That's challenging.