Try

Last night, I watched a video of a woman who had lost her hearing at age 18 and had almost given up on life. In the video, she was on stage at America’s Got Talent about 10 years later singing a song she had written named “Try.” Since she couldn’t hear, she had an interpreter there so she would know what everyone was saying. She had near perfect pitch as she sang her song. It was an inspiring video about going from defeat to triumph by deciding just to…try.

Just like in the lyrics of the song mention, I realize that the main thing getting in my way is me. I don’t tend to give up anymore. But I have given up plenty of times in my life. I don’t give up on people or responsibilities. I just gave up on myself countless times. I’d settle for what people told me I was and left it at that. I wouldn’t try to truly be who I was and would accept being who others thought I was.

I’m done with that…mostly. I’m trying to be me now. I still feel like I’m in a transformative season with all of this. But I’m at least trying now. I don’t imagine many in my life ever meant for me to be anything other than myself. So I’m not saying it is anyone’s fault but my own. I don’t even know why I allowed any of this to happen in the first place. But I’m glad I’m on this path of healing, growth, and trying to be me now.

I don’t intend for this to be a downer. I’m actually quite encouraged by these thoughts. I wasn’t even aware of what had happened until I moved to Florida. And it wasn’t until recently I figured out I was the one getting in my own way. “Try” just reminded me of all this and she had put into song how I’ve been feeling these past few years. I’m grateful she wrote and shared the song and that I came across it on Instagram last night. You can listen to it on YouTube here.

I decided to upgrade my subscription to Claude AI today. I’ve been thinking about it for over a month now. I’ve tried various test for weeks to try to optimize my usage on the base Pro plan. But I kept running into their limits. So I’ve gone up to the next tier. It promises 5 times the quota. I’ll see how that is in practice. Since I just started with it today, I won’t see the benefit yet. But I imagine I’ll know within a week or two if it’s worth it. I do think this should allow me to start working on some other projects in parallel that I’m ready to get going as well. Notesprout has been hogging the quotas…LOL

I can run multiple sessions at once now. The quotas aren’t just about time. They are more about usage. If I plan well, I can have the system coding in the background on multiple projects while I do other things. I’m actually doing that now as I write. I’m working on a new calendar feature for Notesprout. Claude is implementing my design and I’m writing this blog post by hand in a stable version of Notesprout. I started this feature over the weekend and began using parts of it yesterday. I’m growing it more this week. What I think I’ll do is setup planning sessions where I work out what I’ll have Claude do each day or week. And as it finishes each of its coding sessions, I can plan time to test and approve the work. This will also help me at work since we will be getting the same toolchain soon.

We watched “Peter Pan” today! I love these Disney classics. I’ve seen most of them many times. But it’s like watching for the first time again. I’m so glad we are doing this. And on Friday, we are seeing “Toy Story 5” at the theater. I’m so excited! This is our third movie theater experience “together.” I know we are 2000+ miles apart. But since we are seeing the same movie at the same exact time, it feels like she’s with me and I with her. These are special experiences that we cherish.

June has come to an end. It was a good month. I’m looking forward to July. I have some more things to…try…hehehe I hope it’s a great one!