Every year, the arbitrary "Buy a new calendar day" strews the internet with Resolutions, and Tips for a Better Year, and other unhelpful hope-raising-subsequently-guilt-deepening ephemera. I've tried making resolutions. It doesn't work for me.
The last four years, I've carefully sat down and planned out how I can exercise more, and eat six small meals instead of two large, and will shop for local produce, and write every day, along with possibly starting a small side business, becoming a better heavy combat fighter, as well as fixing up the house. It all seems reasonable on paper. And then, like Hyperbole & A Half so eloquently/visually puts it, the wheels come off about a week later, because I am exhausted.
So I've decided to avoid the congratulations part of this cycle. I'm just going to take each day at a time. There will be no yesterday. There is no tomorrow. I will decide each day what I'm going to try to do. Maybe I'll succeed at all. Maybe I'll succeed at some. Maybe I'll fail at all.
But if I fail, the really hard part to implement will be no castigation for failure. No guilt. No spending the evening feeling horrible about all the things I didn't do. No patting myself on the back either for abnormal bursts of productivity.
What I'm going to be proud of, is trends, and building habits. If I manage to go to the gym 3 times a week, for an entire month, then I can pat myself on the back. If I manage to write my words every day, I can be proud of myself.
I need to build habits. Habits are hard to build, but they're a lot harder to break. By the end of 2012, I hope to have at least two new habits.
