2010: I resolve to…

Once every three hundred and sixty five days we have a rebirth. A new beginning. A chance to re-evaluate our lives and make resolutions to change for the better. A new year.

Or do we?

Not to be cynical or anything, but isn’t January 1st just the beginning of a new month? And don’t we have a new month every thirty (or so) days? Hell, narrow that down just a bit further and you’ve got a new week. And we have one of those every seven days. Narrow that down even further, and you’ve got the beginning of a new day. And we have one of those every twenty four hours.

Stay with me. I know this is starting to sound redundant.

A new hour every sixty minutes, and so on and so forth. My point? Why do we wait three hundred and sixty five days, an entire year, to sit down and write out resolutions? Resolutions that most of the time, none of us actually even keep? Seems rather silly, doesn’t it?

I read “The Speed of Trust” by Stephen M. R. Covey (the legendary Stephen Covey’s son) and in it he actually talks about this phenomena. Talking about self trust, he relates about setting his own personal goals, and keeping them, in order to build faith in yourself. In his story, he talks about making a New Year’s resolution to give up soda pop. About a month into it, he started to realize the weight of his decision. The initial drive, and motivation starts to dwindle, and your left with a real decision. Scrap the ludicrous idea that probably means nothing in the long run, or follow through. Stephen ends up keeping his resolution, but learned something along the way. Realistic goals are much easier, and more fulfilling.

Where am I going with this?

Most of us make crazy resolutions. Like starting out on January 1st with 20 push-ups, and 30 sit-ups, and then adding 2 a day for the entire year (a close friend of mines goal). That means by the end of 2010, he’ll be doing 750 push-ups and 760 sit-ups a day. Sure, that’s physically possible, but is it realistic? Probably not. Time restraints, and just straight up motivation will inevitably become a problem.

Other people will make resolutions to lose weight, without setting smaller goals in between to make sure that they reach those goals. Others will strive to read a certain number of books through-out the year. My advice is this. If you’re going to make New Year’s resolutions, make sure it’s something you love. And make it general enough that you can set smaller goals through out the year in order to accomplish that big goal.

I know this is a different tone for me, and it’s probably not going to be this sort of stuff very often. But, indulge me. All of that being said, here are some of my resolutions that I’ve (thoughtfully) come up with:

1. Write more often.
2. Get out of debt.
3. Read more often.
4. Work towards pursuing a career I actually enjoy.

Happy 2010. :)