Because, this... THIS is the year you finally get your act together. After all, future behavior cannot be predicted from past performance, to paraphrase those mutual fund TV ads...
Look, just make peace right now with the fact that you are doomed to be defeated by your own misguided ambitions and you will save yourself a load of heartache later (you rarely see that disclaimer on the mutual fund commercials, btw). To quote Homer Simpson "'Trying' is the first step towards failure".
Fine. Don't take my advice. But at least make sure that your list is packed with things that can't be easily quantified. This way you can "lawyer-up" the results in a couple of months by redefining terms and conditions turning a clear and obvious failure to reach your target into a shining, if fuzzy, success story that will help you sleep like a baby for the rest of the year.
For example, don't say "I am going to donate 10% of my income to charity", say "I am going to try and be a better person" instead. You see what I did there? I took an easily measurable goal - one that can be confirmed by others, no less - and turned it into a freshman's B-minus Philosophy midterm paper. It could mean anything! All you gotta do is let one person merge into traffic without flipping them off and you are golden!
What? That's cheating? Sigh... Ok. How about this? Instead of saying "I will lose thirty pounds this year" say "I will try not to eat two bowling balls worth of cheese this year". Since the average American eats over thirty pounds of cheese per annum, you have your hard-sounding goal (complete with stuff to record in a little notebook or what have you), and you have a 50% shot of being successful even if you do absolutely nothing at all.
Say... I just thought of something... you might even lose the weight by not eating 30 pounds of cheese. I know, it sounds borderline crazy, but it just might work. Unfortunately, I can't think of a way to test this madcap theory without a control person who volunteers to eat sixty pounds of cheese in 2011. Oh, wait, nevermind... Odds are I will be seated next to someone on a plane early next year that thinks that limiting themselves to 30 pounds of cheese during Lent is the height of self-restraint anyway, so I'll just ask how it's going when the time comes.
What? How dare you! I am not afraid of failure! I embrace failure as a matter of course, I'll have you know, mainly because I often have little other choice. I'll prove it right now. Here is my list of easily quantifiable resolutions for 2011. I will later post them in the sidebar under my BMI and give little updates on how I'm doing.
Please note that each of these things is "interesting" and "definable". This is to further distinguish this list from a typical collection of ambiguous, boring goals. I mean, I am not a fan of goals like "I'm gonna get in shape" (boring, fuzzy), but I'm also not a fan of goals like "I will not kill today" (exciting, worrisome, plagiarized). Trust me, though, that pen-spinning guy from the VW Sign and Drive commercials is “on the list”...
Anyway, each of these is intentionally and significantly out of my comfort zone. You only have to know me to know how far out of the norm these goals are but I have provided a small explanation as to why these items are “resolutions” and not “hobbies” for those who don't know me.
Catch a Fish - How can 'going fishing' count as a resolution? Well, the last time I went fishing is when I was five years old. As I recall, I caught a sunfish and an eel. How hard is it to stick a worm on a hook and drop a line in the water? Not hard at all, but that's not “fishing”. There is an encyclopedia of information about fish, rods, reels, bait, lures, casting techniques, etc, etc, I need to gather and distill in short order before I can act as a convincing teacher for my young son. Yes, I will be eating the fish, too.
Try Out for a Play – Public speaking freaks me out like nothing else can. I am cool with it if I am infinitely comfortable with the subject matter, but that only happens about 25% of the time I do it. So, I want to try out for any small part in any small play in any of the playhouses in the area. Mind you, I don't have to actually get the part – I'm not an actor after all – but I would definitely get super mega bonus points for pulling that off..
Run Two 5Ks – I have been quit smoking for about six weeks now, I think. No, wait. It's closer to 52 days 7 hours. Instead of replacing smokes with food and Xbox, I have been working out fairly consistently and I am in close to the best cardiovascular shape I have been in in about two decades (not really saying much, but there you go). I don't have to win or even place well, but that's not the point. I hate running, see, and I would like to stop hating running.
Qualify with a Pistol – I have fired a handgun about twenty times in my life. Fifteen of those rounds were fired about twenty years ago, and the other five about ten years ago. Basically, I know nothing about guns and, as with the fishing, this is something I feel I need to be able to teach my kid someday. What does qualify mean? I'm not sure. The NRA has a link to some sort of qualifying standards that seem ridiculously easy to meet (ten rounds in a paper-plate sized target at 15 feet, no time limit – or something like that). My dismissive attitude toward it is most likely based on my lack of understanding of the qualification and my lack of experience. Oh, yeah... I will be learning to shoot right-handed (I'm a lefty, see), so look out world – or at least the portion of the world forward of my position and lacking hard cover should look out.
That's about it for the resolutions for 2011... the public ones anyway. I have a few more things that I hope to accomplish during the upcoming year but I am keeping those to myself. I will crow online if I meet them or fail in an especially interesting way, otherwise I will shoulder the burden of my ineptitude without the snide derision of you guys. You know who you are.
Keep an eye on the sidebar for updates, and wish me luck. In return for your luck, I leave you with this one last piece of advice, found in the instruction manual for the Cr-48 Notebook:
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