I'm a big fan of resolutions. New Years ones. Birthday ones. I think I just love any type of list. And it's extremely hard to keep your New Year's resolutions, yes. But I think the real problem is that we're not making the right resolutions. In order to avoid the cliched and terrible resolutions we've all heard a billion times, I think the secret of making good resolutions is to make ones that don't automatically set you up for failure. Example: Vowing to "Go to yoga more" is a lot less daunting of a resolution than promising to "Go to yoga two times a week." Does that make sense? Another tip? Don't make monthly goals, make seasonal goals. Four seasons sounds a lot roomier and more relaxed than twelve months do in my mind, but maybe that's just me.
In any case, I try to come up with good resolutions and here are what my 2014 ones were, if you were interested.
Check Facebook only once a day and take Sundays off.
Did this happen? Not even close. But I definitely went on it way less than in 2013. This is where I learned that I shouldn't be so restrictive since I'll be less successful in the long-run if I have ridiculous expectations.
Watch at least three documentaries a month.
This resolution might make me sound like a loser who yearns to be cooler by being more into documentaries and that's exactly right. I did it and yet I'm not cooler than you somehow.
Read at least two books a season.
Did it! Yeah!
Try two things off Pinterest a season.
Did it! Gonna do it again.
Apply for editor jobs at least five times a week.
Hahahah, didn't even remember this was on the list. Tip #2: Don't make long resolution lists.
Volunteer at least once a month.
Did it only for the first seven months. Fuck.
Do pilates at least five times a month.
Did this every month with the exception of stupid September. Goddam you September.
Juice at least four times a week.
Nope! Nowhere NEAR that many times. This one was way too lofty. Gotta aim lower for next year.
Never Google Kim Kardashian again.
COMPLETED! And this one felt good. I used to Google her a lot in 2013 to see her different outfits and pretty face and body and etc., but it was harming me more than helping me so I wanted to stop and I did.
Stop reading The Frisky.
This was a hard one, but I accomplished it. Maybe it doesn't seem difficult to you to stop reading something, but it was. I used to go on that site maybe twice a day, every day. And then somewhere along the way it became way less about women-centered topics and interesting articles to focussing more on pregnant celebrities and top ten worst dressed lists. I had to stop.
As you can see, I wasn't entirely successful - but the things that did happen? I'm pretty proud of those. I also wrote down every day that I either went to the gym or went to pilates last year and figured out that I went 137 days out of 365. That's 37.5% of an entire year that I was at the gym. Do you know how insane that is considering I hadn't given a fuck about exercise for, oh, say 27 years? 37.5%! I think that's incredible. And obviously I'm not saying that everyone needs to go to a gym, but, like, that's insane for me and makes me crazy happy to accomplish something so (typically speaking) out of character.
I'm still thinking of some new ones for 2015, so when I do there will be a post about that in a few days. This was an especially self-indulgent post AND I'M NOT SORRY!