Planning for Sabbatical

I am currently working for MAQSoftware and will be taking a sabbatical from next month for concentrated (hopefully J) study before my M.S. in Computer Science. Before leaving my company, I wanted to do have a concrete plan about what I am going to do for next couple of months. People around me were skeptical about this step as I was doing great at my job (I recently got a big raise and was placed on good project). So I decided to jot down the purpose and plan for the sabbatical.

Duration: 3 months

Purpose:

1. To improve my vocabulary.

2. To prepare myself for research.

3. To improve my programming skills.

4. To improve my health.

5. To enjoy life …

Plan:

Purpose number	My plan
1	1. Listen to audio of wordlist whenever I take rest (daily). 2. Give test – Big Book (daily). 3. Read my mind map book of words (weekly).
2	1. Read computer science topics and research papers and prepare mind maps. 2. Brainstorm the mind maps, use lateral thinking (ask questions – Why, How. Don’t neglect seemingly illogical conclusions). 3. Document every crazy ideas and reserve some time every month to think about them. 4. Watch technical videos and create mind maps. 5. Maintain a bibliography and document every reference (use notations) in your mind map.
3	1. Create a mind map (one for each programming language you know) that encapsulates every language constructs. 2. Maintain an online programming cookbook (best practices, code snippets, coding styles, design patterns, components, etc). 3. Also, create mind maps for standard library for each language and try to correlate them.
4	1. Yoga, Meditation (daily – 1 hour (morning)). 2. Exercise (daily – 1 hour (evening)).
5	1. Movie or hangout with friends (weekly). 2. One Trip (Goa – 10-15 days). 3. Spend more time with family.

Some important points:

1. “Preparing for research”?

2. What to do when I am bored?

· Watch technical videos.

· Go for a walk.

· Listen to music.

· Have a constructive discussion with someone (Use yahoo or telephone if the person stays far away).

· Go for a movie.

3. Work hard and follow strict discipline. I may not be the smartest or the most hard-working person, but I know one thing about myself – “I don’t give up regardless of what other people say”. I will keep on trying until I succeed. I will be defined by my work and not by my resume. It doesn’t matter if I am in the best college or if I am in the worst college.

4. We all have what Einstein had during his time - access to all patents (www.google.com/patents), 24 hours a day and a human brain. In fact, we have much more information available and also better tools to organize it than what he had. So, ideally if we all organize our information more efficiently and think more clearly and more constructively, we can better even Einstein.