For exactly one year now, I’ve kept track of my daily activities and daily mood using a great app called Daylio. It’s given me a great sense of my year, and even challenged a few assumptions I had about my mood. And so, I present, a kind of mental health annual report for 2018.

Methodology

Every night at 10pm, the Daylio app prompted me to record two things: My mood (on a scale of ugly to great) and the activities I did that day. The app lets me customize the activities to my general life. I recorded nearly every day, but there are eight days in total where I forgot, all of which in the first half of the year.

Major Life Events

Really only one “major” life event occurred in 2018, and that was Jocelyn and my move to Vancouver Island on June 1. It’s interesting to see the difference in various activities and mood after that date.

Mood

My best month for mood was September — which I attribute mostly to the fact that we had been settled on Vancouver Island for a few months, business was great (still is), and had our tenant in our basement suite (and it was her “good” month).

I wasn’t surprised to see February so low — that was mostly due to a significant event that occurred that really stressed me out. February had the only day in the entire year that I scored a day as the lowest rank possible (“ugly”). To score Ugly, the day had to be at the level of me completely consumed by anxiety or grief and literally not wanting to get out of bed.

You might wonder why June was so low, especially considering that was the month we moved to the Island. I was surprised to see it that low too. But after the stress of moving and the novelty of the new place wore off, I fell down a bit of a pit (my usual reaction to severe stress — I’m great “in the moment,” then collapse a bit after). I also, foolishly, tried to give up nicotine the day we moved. The timing was a bad idea.

There was, in fact, only one day in June that I scored as “Bad” (better than “Ugly”) but the month’s average was brought down by a lot of days ranking as “Meh.”

October fell quite a bit because our tenant became a huge problem — drinking excessively, significantly damaging the suite, having loud altercations with guests, and resulted in police attendance, numerous fruitless warning letters, and more. It was stressful as hell sharing our space with that energy, and distracting to my day. I’m not surprised to see it dropped off.

May was second-best because by then we found our new house and were getting ready to move. Lots of excited, happy anticipation.

Since November, though, things have been climbing up, and this last month of December we haven’t had a tenant at all, and have had a pretty restful time.

In total, though, I think I had a pretty good year — and score most of my days in the highest mood rank, with second-highest closely behind. Indifferent or bad days only consumed about 15% of my days, which I think was great overall!

What Contributed to the Bad Days

Jan 4 : Had the flu

: Had the flu Jan 27 : My company’s bank account got hacked and it put me in a foul mood all day

: My company’s bank account got hacked and it put me in a foul mood all day Feb 19 : Did not get the Vancouver Island condo we first put an offer on

: Did not get the Vancouver Island condo we first put an offer on Feb 25 : Frustrated that we couldn’t find “the right” Island home

: Frustrated that we couldn’t find “the right” Island home Mar 21 ; A lot of stress waiting for our second house offer to be accepted

; A lot of stress waiting for our second house offer to be accepted Apr 9 : Inspection of the house we put an offer on found mould in the attic

: Inspection of the house we put an offer on found mould in the attic Apr 18 : Bored at work conference in Seattle. Regretting going.

: Bored at work conference in Seattle. Regretting going. May 20 : A little down about learning we would be losing one of our long-term clients to them taking it in-house (but happy for them)

: A little down about learning we would be losing one of our long-term clients to them taking it in-house (but happy for them) Jun 9 : Unusually weepy and snappy. Probably nicotine withdrawal combined with de-stressing from the big move.

: Unusually weepy and snappy. Probably nicotine withdrawal combined with de-stressing from the big move. Sep 29 : Long ferry rides kill me spirit.

: Long ferry rides kill me spirit. Oct 26 : Got woken up at 2:30am because an altercation our tenant was having. Police were called. A guest of hers literally kicked her door in.

: Got woken up at 2:30am because an altercation our tenant was having. Police were called. A guest of hers literally kicked her door in. Nov 4 : Tenant suite inspection found massive evidence of smoking in the suite (it was horribly bad). Had to issue eviction notice next day.

: Tenant suite inspection found massive evidence of smoking in the suite (it was horribly bad). Had to issue eviction notice next day. Nov 6 : It seemed like everything went wrong (probably still feeling the stress from the tenant stuff). Woke up at 4am. Snapped at Jocelyn, who was away for work. Our dog had diarrhea all over the house. It was a bad day.

: It seemed like everything went wrong (probably still feeling the stress from the tenant stuff). Woke up at 4am. Snapped at Jocelyn, who was away for work. Our dog had diarrhea all over the house. It was a bad day. Nov 11/12 : In Whistler for a weekend away, and I was snippy for some reason. That said, we were both anxious about leaving our house with all the tenant chaos going on, I was afraid she would accidentally (or not) burn it down, and we hired a security company to sit in our driveway at night and I obsessively checked our security camera feed.

: In Whistler for a weekend away, and I was snippy for some reason. That said, we were both anxious about leaving our house with all the tenant chaos going on, I was afraid she would accidentally (or not) burn it down, and we hired a security company to sit in our driveway at night and I obsessively checked our security camera feed. Dec 25: Honestly, I’m not a Christmas fan. And I really don’t like receiving presents. Felt like I hadn’t gotten “enough” presents for the loved ones in my life.

What Contributed to the Great Days

Generally, the three things that contributed the most to me scoring a day as “Great” were either having a really productive day, getting errands done outside the house, or visiting with friends. Specific notes from good days:

Productive days at work or as “household COO.”

Good prospect calls

Dinners with friends

“Found maybe cute house with rental income” (the house we ended up buying)

Infrequent taking days off and spending them leisurely playing video games

Coordinating all the move details, and feeling like I was doing a good job at it

Client upgraded me to the Presidential Suite at the hotel

Saw hilarious Nerdy Burlesque show with J and friends at Victoria ComicCon

Good speech performance and audience reaction

Learning that Jocelyn’s dad would be our first tenant for a couple of months (he was NOT the “problem” tenant, for the record)

Moved into new house!!

My gaming laptop and VR setup arrived

Hosted live online municipal election coverage on the Island — thousands of viewers. Super-fun.

Kids actually visited our house on Hallowe’en! I dressed up. I got spooky decorations. I did cool lighting. It was awesome.

Signed tenancy agreement with our new tenant, coming in on January 1.

Average Daily Mood

Turns out, Saturdays were generally my better days through the week. Probably not that unusual — it’s the start of a weekend, with a couple of days free to do errands, play video games, and generally not worry about work.

It’s interesting that Tuesdays are (marginally) my worst days. I’m assuming that Mondays get a lift because I am likely more productive the first day of the week, when I do a lot of planning, then it drops a bit when I have to actually DO the work I planned. 😉 The week picks up from there.

Sundays are probably lower just due to the same “Sunday blues” that a lot of people feel, realizing the weekend is over.

Activities

One of the great things about the Daylio app is you can tell it what activities you want to track, and can customize it for your own life. Here, then, are the number of days I did various activities in 2018:

If it weren’t for the surge in gaming I did in the last month of the year, my most frequent activity would have been making dinner (see below for specific monthly counts).

I learned last year that, especially when you work from home, cooking is a great way to separate work and regular life. I’ve made some pretty great dinners, I have to say. And the ones I’m mostly proud of, I put on my Instagram account at @todmaffin. (See the “Food” story highlights.) We got an Instant Pot for Christmas, so perhaps that’ll overtake gaming in 2019. I wouldn’t put any bets on it. 😉

I’m pretty pleased that I only spent eight days sick, but disappointed that 41 days this year I woke up way too early (i.e., like 5am — and not being able to get back to sleep). Some of it was related to the tenant stress, but I wonder if some of it is just me getting older. My pillows aren’t very comfortable, so that might be it too.

Jocelyn and I only spent eight nights apart in 2018. You’d have to ask her if she wants more. She probably does.

As for the relatively low bath/shower count, I’m a soaker-bath kind of guy. I really only take 2-3 luxurious baths a week and that about does it. I almost never shower. Because I don’t usually go out to the gym (*cough*) or do any running around, that seems to suffice. I think. Maybe I could do to increase it a bit.

I should probably clean and tidy more often.

I track more things than these shows, for the record, but some I’m keeping just for me. 😊

And now, the highlights.

GAMING: Jesus. What the hell happened the last two months of the year?! I went from gaming every other day at the beginning of the year, steadily increasing to almost every day. God damned Overwatch.





MADE DINNER:This seemed to increase once we moved to the Island in June. I think part of that is just due to a larger kitchen, frankly. And since Jocelyn started working from home that month too, dinner times have been more consistent. Yay December!





LEFT HOUSE: Yes, this is the total number of days where I left the house (i.e., drove somewhere — doesn’t include just leaving to walk the dog or get the mail). It’s interesting how much it spiked in the summer — probably lots of new house errands. I’m also not sure why it dropped so low in the last two months of the year, though there is definitely a correlation between that and my gaming count. ☹️





WORK FROM THE COUCH: I’m quite pleased how working from the couch more or less stopped when we moved to the new house. I have a big new office on its own floor here, and I guess I like it. The spike in March/April was because we had to disassemble all my office furniture in the old condo so we could show the place to buyers. It was converted into a second bedroom, making working from the couch really the only option.





DAYS SICK: Overall, it’s been a healthy year! I had three sick days in July (each about a week apart) which I think somewhat came from the moving stress finally sinking in.

Overall Impressions and Learnings

Overall, I’m really pleased with 2018. Jocelyn and I found a perfect little house, in a beautiful and friendly city. We’re both healthy, and we’ve got a good financial plan set in motion. That makes me feel great, and is itself a huge reason why 2018 was generally a good year.

As well, having the actual data has showed me that I have many more great/good days than my brain likes to make me believe I have. Knowing that fact itself helps with mood.

The bad days didn’t affect me as long-term as I’d always thought they did. It seems I rebound faster than I have been giving myself credit for.

One thing that changed a lot in 2018 was that I deliberately took a lot fewer speeches. I’ve been speaking professionally (i.e., for a fee) for 20 years now. Twenty. It was nice to take a break from the travel and work for a year or so while we moved and got things settled. And I’m pretty proud that I stayed solidly in recovery, even through those few most-stressful days, though I could probably go to meetings more frequently.

Finally, I don’t think the word “learnings” is an actual word.

Looking Forward

Definitely learned that getting things done (regardless of whether it’s for work or household stuff) helps my mood a lot, as well as spending time with friends, so I’ll want to try to increase those activities in 2019. Also, a big factor to me having a good day was leaving the house for an errand or meeting or something. Good to know.

I’m thinking about putting exercise on that list in 2019. Even if it’s just walking more, or maybe going to the gym with J occasionally. I’m not getting any younger, and I’d like to be around a while longer.

In Closing

I’m a lucky guy. I found a dream girl to marry (she’s hot and a scientist, y’all!), we like the same things (even video games), and she’s good at cuddling.

I’m closer to my mom here on the Island which is really important to me, and my nephews and nieces think I’m a cool uncle.

We have a beautiful brand new house with rental income, and we are absolutely loving living on Vancouver Island. Honestly, if we knew it was this good, we’d have moved way earlier.

I have such an amazing team at work — all my people are super-smart, fun to work with, and our clients are seeing solid growth from the day we get involved.

2018 was overall really, really good. I can’t wait to see what lies ahead.