The last few days of December are filled with people making lists, typing 1, 5, or 10-year plans, and updating their vision boards. Inevitably, getting in shape or losing weight is at the top of most of those lists. Just ask the membership counselor at any gym.
But why do we make these resolutions at all at the beginning of the year? It doesn't make much sense.
Allow me to propose a few scenarios:
#1
A young woman sits at home with her three-year old daughter on a lovely afternoon in October.. The daughter approaches her mother and says, "Mommy, I'm hungry." No response. The little girl tugs on her skirt and with more desperation laments, "Mommy, I'm soooo hungry." The mother looks down at her starving little girl and smiles.
"Hold on, baby." She gets up and walks to the kitchen. She opens a drawer and pulls out a piece of paper and a pen. As she scribbles onto the paper, she looks at her daughter and says, "I know you need to eat. I'm gonna make sure I start feeding you at the beginning of the year."
#2
A bachelor, let's call him Joe, sits in his apartment watching ESPN . Joe is a bit of a Renaissance man, therefore he has prepared a meal for himself: fettuccine with a seafood alfredo sauce. After the delicious dinner, he falls asleep watching the game. When he awakens he rushes out to work. When he arrives home that afternoon and opens his front door, he is greeted by the wonderful smell of all the preparation of last night's dinner that he forgot to take out. What does he do? Does he immediately take out the trash and douse his with Febreeze? No. He goes to his vision board and looks at a picture of a pristine kitchen that he cut out of Better Homes and Garden and thinks "January 1st...January 1st."
My point is - if you know that there is a change you need or want to make in your life, you should start working the very moment you realize it. Imagine the progress you can make between the time you you know the changes you want to make and the beginning of the year.
There is truly no time like the present.
So, I resolve to better myself sooner rather than later.
Happy New Year!
(When is it too late to say Happy New Year? I'm thinking after January 4th. So, I take it back.)
Hello there.
5 comments:
I don't make resolutions; maybe because I have so many fatal fawls if I waited until the new year I'd probably never make it lol.
On a more serious note, surprisingly, on this commentary, you and I are in complete agreement. It doesn't make sense to only self-assess once a year anyway or a at prescribed time. We should all be a constant work in progress. Besides, there's never a good time to make drastic change or improvment. It's like having a baby, or getting married:you'll never have enough m money or be sure if it's the right time or the righr person. Some times we just have to make up our minds to be like Nike and "Just do it".
So true. Well, except for the marriage part. I think that's we many people end up and relationships they should. You should, at the very least, think that you're marrying the "right" person.
As a matter of fact, that goes for babies, too.
Well of course careful thought must go into such life changing decisions. I'm not at all advocating not" digging deep before you leap" and of course thinking really intently before deciding to bring a life/lives into the world. What I'm saying though is the sometimes some people spend so much of thier lives on the timing being right, and or, having enough money, that they end up waiting too long and sometimes missing a golden opportunity or alienating someone because of indecisiveness and wanting to control every single moment of everything/occurrence of their life. Much like waiting to start on some sort of improvements weather it be weightloss, eating properly... so yeah, you're right, it was more of a loose analogy, the whole resolutions and marriage/having a baby thing, more than a direct one but I think you get my drift/ where my train of thought was going. Sometimes we just have to make the decision to do what needs to be done tomorrow. Every big decision I've made thus far has come w/ very careful thought but once I made up my mind that was it: when I had my last child, I looked at myself one day and said it was time to get back into the size I was before I had my four kids, I signed up for the gym the next day; when I finally decided I was going to wear my hair in it's natural state it was a Thursday and while my best friend decided I should wait and consult a sytlist to help me transition, I picked up my sissors and started snipping...sometimes waiting to do something that's necessary does nothing but makes natters worse or makes us sink deeper into bad habits/situations.
Enjoyed, as always :-) I usually don't make resolutions because of my tendency to forget them or, at times, convince myself that I never made them. I have mastered the Art of Self-Deception. With that being said, I resolve to do what I say I'm going to do, when I say I'm going to do it, and not give myself any easy "outs". There...DONE!
I'm glad to see you're writing on the blog again. Looking forward to more great pieces from you =)
Post a Comment