For those who don't know, Webstock is a web technology conference that is held every year in Wellington. However, it is not just any conference - it is an outstanding one. Its mere name might suggest a kind of hippy sense of grandeur, and to an extent it lives up to that reputation. Geeks of today and the hippys of Woodstock are a long, long way apart, but I guess both share a compelling and defining idealism.
And a lot of Webstock is about idealism: but it is an idealism that is achievable. In fact, most of the speakers are of the "been there, done that" kind, even if not all of them are worth over $250 million. US dollars, that is. Some of them while very definitely legends in their own time, are still relatively poor. And I stress relatively, of course.
Last week was my first Webstock. I attended two days of pre-conference workshops, and then the two days of conference proper. It was quite tiring for me, having three 5am starts that week, and if you know me, you know I am a bad sleeper but I manage to get by doing my sleeping after 3.30am. So 5am is not a good time for me. And it has left me somewhat depleted with an ironman-distance race just two weeks out. But I have to face the reality that my world cannot continue to revolve around ironman-distance races if I want to keep doing them. And I do. Then there is the fact of having of deal with being around 800 delegates, and even though I liked 799 of them it's still a lot of people in my introverted face over two days.
I learned a lot. But let me step back three weeks to the Kinloch qualifier. While I was there I had a sort of a realisation. You know the type of realisation that is a long time coming, so when it finally arrives, none of it is news to you, but finally you are able to articulate it. And once you can elegantly articulate something, even just in your head, then perhaps you are further down the road to understanding it.
So, here is the thing: I have been chasing two things somewhat relentlessly for a while now. And they are Performance and Happiness. Now I am quite OK with the happiness status, and where that is at. But I began to realise I was so focused on performance that I wasn't performing well. Allow me to explain. I was viewing performance (and I suppose I am talking about work, training and racing, specifically) on a day-to-day basis, but I totally let a little thing called Organisation slip out of the window. And it very suddenly dawned on me while I was trying to fix bike tyres by torch light in my tent near a noisy road in Taupo, that my performance the next day would more than likely be much better if I had spent less time training and working, and more time sorting my stuff out. Instead I should then be tucked up sleeping peacefully in comfortable accommodation the night before a race that carried a lot of my hopes and dreams. It all ended happily, but it may not have.
Fast forward to Webstock. My take home message from the conference is this:
What I do is a craft. And that craft requires careful and continued attention. I have to do what I do well, and worry less about how long it takes or where the money will come from. I will build great things. First and foremost. And I will look after me, so that I can build great things. I will do it because I love it and I want to make stuff that people want and find useful. And behind that is a whole bunch of technical stuff which I won't bore you with, but for me it is really important too.
As I note in my headline, this blog is about journeys whether they involve travelling or not. Webstock was always going to be a journey, somewhat more than I can ever write about.
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