My ultimate goal: Attain a career, whatever it may be, that allows me to live comfortably.

Step 1: Search for a new job, preferably full time, with higher pay then the current one. (within 2 months)

Step 2: Re-enroll in school, taking courses that sway towards whatever career I plan on being in. (Must choose what career I want to attain by second year of school) (must re enroll by 24th birthday) use this year to attain my license, and start a small savings to go toward a car. Use my 2010 tax return, along with my savings to finance a new vehicle.

Step 3: Work at new job, and go to school, complete at LEAST an associates degree in two years (no slacking off, drinking, smoking etc.) (2011 at latest)

Step 4: Use my newly attained associates degree to find and secure an even better job. (within 2 months of attaining degree)

Step 5: Work at new job, and go to school, complete at LEAST a bachelors degree in the next two years. (no slacking off, drinking, smoking etc.) (2013 at latest)

Step 6: begin search for new career, and secure work in new career. (attain for within a month after graduation, but allow a realistic 3 months)

Step 7: Continue to take select classes, to keep myself educated in other fields, and expand horizons. Continue these classes until new career is set in stone (at least two years in same company) and I am able to be financially stable completely on my own (2015 at the latest)

Step 8: Begin my new life of independence. Figure out where I want to settle down, and purchase a home. (2015 at the latest)

Thats it. 2015. Seeing as how its 2009, I have six years to turn my life around, make myself better, and find my place in the world. I am currently 23, and I feel that if I put my mind to it, I can have a career, education, and my own life by the time I am 29. If anything happens earlier, then so be it. But, if I am 29, still in this position, wherever I happen to be living. Then...I have lost. Then it will be time to hang up the gloves, and just bow out quietly.

Time is so crucial for me right now. It seems like last year I was 18, living on my own, big plans BIG PLANS PEOPLE. I had it all, and I thought I knew everything. But then, slowly, by 19 I realized I knew nothing. I have now spent the last four years trying to make up for the past four years. Every time I take a step to fix one thing, I am walking away from something else.

No more, I need to fix this. I need to fix myself. And, it starts with this: A job change. SImple enough.

I feel that with a better paying job, that utilizes my skills just a BIT more, I can have the confidence in myself to pull myself together. So thats where we start. Find a new job, get my license, start saving. 24 is right around the corner. I will have lived a little over a quarter of my life (based on average male life expectancy of 75-80). I realize that a good 70 % of that was childhood, but even then I wasen't helping myself any. Once I hit 30, I will have lived half of my life (based on my familys average life expectancy). That is only seven years away. If the past six years have flown by so quick, how are these seven gonna fly?