New Years and Resolutions

The last time I made New Year's resolutions was four years ago. I have happily lost the list I wrote up that time, suffice to say it was such a spectacular failure that I swore off making resolutions ever since.
Well, for some reason, I was feeling very positive and ambitious, and so I decided to go for it again this year. The best part of resolutions is making them, and I have always loved planning and making lists. Though, I belong to the "This weekend I am going to fix my life" school of resolution makers, so the hardest part was restricting myself to something reasonable.
Fortunately, I have a new plan to deal with this habit of mine. It is the rule of 3: I would make no more than 3 resolutions for the new year. I spent a pleasant few hours trying to prune my laundry list of resolutions. Finally, I cheated a little by framing "goals" instead of "resolutions". Actually, it isn't a bad concept - I realized that several of my resolutions were related, and were action items aimed at fulfilling various life goals - career advancement, losing weight (never seen that on a new years resolution list before!) etc. So instead of making resolutions about individual actions, I set myself 3 very concrete, measurable goals - i.e. "lose X pounds" instead of "go to the gym everyday".
Now of course, you can't attain goals without a strategy. So I made out an action plan, consisting of 3 lifestyle changes per goal. You know,
"lose 50 pounds" by
a) going to gym everyday
b) eating celery for all meals
c) running a marathon
(No, that's just a deliberately exaggerated example for illustration purposes - I would never be so unrealistic, not since 2003!)

So I have 3 concrete goals for this year, and a strategy of 3 lifestyle changes each to achieve these goals. Excellent! Now for the bad news - I have effectively managed to slip a list of 9 resolutions past my stern rule of 3. Therefore, I had to prioritize (and stagger). I picked one lifestyle change from each category, and that's the one I will concentrate on first. Good, we're now down to 3 resolutions again, but only for the first couple of months. Then, I'll have to maintain these 3 resolutions and additionally, pick up the next 3. Sounds easy, right? What could go wrong? This is why I never managed to keep a New Year's resolution - no planning, no strategy. All it required was a few hours of careful thinking. Onward & upward!

Then, a couple of things happened over the weekend. First, I tried my hand at snowboarding in Tahoe - and discovered that I sucked. I sucked so bad, I sobbed over my snowboard and swore never to go near the snow again. But fortunately, there was a friend around who didn't think I should give up "so easily". So I was cajoled out on to the slopes again. I strapped on the board, and bounced my behind on the Sierras several more times. I didn't exactly conquer the mountain, but we called it a draw. Then, later in the evening, I discovered that I had made a mistake at work. Just how big a mistake, I'll find out when I go in to work next week. But in the best case, it is still a pretty bad mistake. I spent all evening feeling like there was a huge weight in my abdomen. My can-do, conquer the world spirit was shattered into a million pieces. Where on earth did I get off thinking I had it in me to do everything I was planning for next year?
And then it came home to me - the failure of past well meant resolutions was not caused by lack of planning. The reasons were far more pernicious - getting easily discouraged, and losing self confidence when things went wrong.

So my friends, if you wish to keep your resolutions (and I know you've made them) - here's my advice... Don't let temporary setbacks, the caprices of fate or even your own stupidity, hold you back. Get up, learn from your mistakes and try again. It ain't over till it's over. Oh, and find yourself a friend who won't let you give up on yourself.

Goodbye, and a happy new year to all. What are my resolutions for this year, you ask? Well, I think its like with birthday wishes - if you tell, they won't come true.