2011: A New Year's Odyssey

I don't make New Year's Resolutions anymore.

"Why?" you ask, politely inquiring while you sip your macchiato, hoping my answer will be brief for once.

(No such luck).

BECAUSE...New Year's resolutions are like things you put on a family Christmas list.
What you really NEED for Christmas is a brand new car or a liver transplant. But, you can't really put that on your list. Too expensive. Too big. Too overwhelming. Too invasive surgery-ish. So, you have to put something small - something attainable.
Like...new socks.

But, the problem is that most relatively functional adults are able to take care of most of the small needs as they go. I'm never sitting around in early April with my big toe popped through a sock hole thinking, "I really need new socks. Only 7 short months til Christmas!"

Of course not.

I just buy socks.

And so do you. You buy socks. And underwear. And a new collander and music and toilet paper and kitchen bags and Apple accessories and cool t-shirts with irreverent phrases that make us feel hip. All of our basic wants and needs are taken care of by a Chase debit card and the Santa of immediate gratification.

Which leaves very little we want or need for our family Christmas list.

So, your list ends up filled with moderately-priced things that aren't truly important to you - but you wouldn't mind having. (ie: New pedometer and/ or Thai Cookbook.)

And that's how resolutions are for me.

What I really need in 2011:
A Focus and Goal for My Life - to have something to strive for that will one day make me worthy of an encyclopedia blurb and will validate my existence in this mortal coil.

Too big. Too overwhelming.
And very hard to accomplish.
Where do I start? And exactly how do I know when I've finished?
Chances are slim that I will wake up one day, stroll to my local coffee chain establishment, order a chai latte and then administer the heimlich maneuver to a woman choking on a biscotti, save her life and the life of her unborn child. Then, immediately achieve absolute clarity on the singular purpose of my life.
(To be barista!)

But, setting a random event as a resolution is impractical. There's no way to strive toward that goal and finally cross it off the list. It's too big. Too messy. Too poorly defined. It's just not practical.

The things on your list need to be easier, smaller, more attainable.
Something that leaves you with a sense of accomplishment.
But, here we see the flipside.
Goals that are too easily attainable can be dangerous too. In my 2005 resolutions, I basically just churned out a generic to-do list featuring such lofty goals as:
"#8 Better toothpaste" and "#14 Buy eggs".
(Those were taken verbatim).

(In my defense, I accomplished SEVERAL of my goals that year.=))

While attainable, there is no purpose or necessarily any big picture benefit from listing goals that are essentially chores.

And once again, we find ouselves seeking something in the hazy middle ground. Searching for a goal somewhere between the meaning of life and the reminder to buy groceries. Finding small goals that will help us if we achieve them, but offering no risk if we fail.

Our resolutions all become slight variations from the same template:

"1. Lose XX lbs.
2. Be a better person.
3. Do better stuff.
4. Make more money.
5. Change that bad habit I always feel guilty about.
6. Start that thing that scared me.
7. Get serious about that thing I said I would do last year...and the year before.
8. Keep resolutions this time."

There's something particularly awful about making empty promises to yourself.
And it's unbelievably tragic to have to make the same ones over and over again.

So, I quit it.

Two years ago, to be exact. I went cold turkey. No promises. No resolutions. No lists of things I should've done better before or swore to be better about in the future.

January 1st was just the first day of the next month. Like any other month.

No lists. No reflections. No goals. No reasons. No purpose.

And there's the rub.

I'm not a self-starter. I've never never finished anything that wasn't on a dare or didn't have a deadline.

So, in the past two years, I've done a staggering amount of nothing.

I'm 35. I'm not married. Or dating. Or can even remember what kissing was like. I have no children. I live in a tiny apartment. I have a job that's just a job - not a life goal or even a career. But, it pays my rent and keeps yogurt in my fridge. I have a car that's paid for even if it has a shocking amount of duck tape on the bumper.

Things are okay. Not maginificent. Not amazing.
My head is above water, but there's room for improvement.

If I had to make a wish list, there would be a lot of things on it.
*I'd love a better apartment or house. It would sweet if I could afford it too.
*It would be neat to have sex again. Even better if I could stomach the guy. A big plus if we actually loved each other. It's the trifecta if it could all happen without me getting so consumed by the joy of sex and fighting that I forget to live my own life. (Have I said too much?)
*It would be awesome to know to the core of my being what I was supposed to be when I grew up. And to be achieving that dream.
*I'd like my parents to stay alive forever. LIKE THEY PROMISED.
*It would be swell to travel to foreign locales. And would rock hard core if someone paid me to do it.
*It would be great to create something I was proud of. (Aside from my old sketches - which I like very much, but were summarily lost in the great Hard Drive Crash of 2010. (Screw you PC! Go Mac!))
*I would like money to rain from the heavens directly into my bank account in inexhaustible amounts.


Unfortunately, I have very little control over those wishes. I can have them. I can do a vision board. I can light a candle or rub oil on my forehead or sit cross-legged in silence and manifest them like Deepak Chopra and Oprah say you can. But, in the end, they aren't actions. They are hopes.

And in the wise words of Barbara Sher, it's not important what you do. It's important that you DO SOMETHING.

With that it mind, I will make one simple goal this year. It's tangible, quantifiable and will be readily apparent if I fail. To make it interesting, let me add that if I slack off and do not achieve it, I will cut off my hair. And I have awesome hair. Long. Mangeable. Creatively colored. And I look super man-ish without hair; I might as well grow an Adam's apple. So, these are stakes.

Here it is...
For 2011, my simple and only resolution is: to write 25 blogs.


That's it. I'm not good at blog-writing. It violates my sense of privacy and perfectionism. But, all of my quality friends tell me that's why I should write them. It's like emotional stairmaster to this control freak.

So, I'll write them. I don't care who reads them or what they say. And knowing me, I'll be up at 11:57pm 12.31.2011 crying, typing and stroking my hair trying to finish all 25.

But, there you have it. It's something. It's doable. It's quantifiable. And it has consequences.

Now, just 24 more to go!

Happy New Year, fellow cynics. =)