I’m a sucker for New Year’s resolutions. I really just can’t seem to help myself. The new year unfolds before me like the blank pages of a journal (another one of my weaknesses) and for a few moments I think I can do anything.
Here’s a small list of past resolutions…
1) I resolve to get up early every morning. That one lasted about a day. I’m notorious for not being a morning person. I’ve tried everything. I put the alarm clock in another room…turned it off and went back to bed. I bought an automatic coffee maker…ignored it and stayed in bed. I placed chocolate on the alarm clock to bribe myself…ate it and went back to bed. Sigh.
2) I resolve to use a planner every day. You’d think being a writer I would like jotting everything down in a planner. What I’ve discovered is that I love the idea of a planner. I just don’t like to do the work. I’ve bought little planners, big planners, cheap planners, and expensive planners. But a couple of weeks in, I’m done. The only time I’ve stayed faithful was to my Franklin Covey in college. At my wedding shower, people wrote down advice for Mark and I on little slips of paper. One said, “Mark, if you want to regain control of the marriage just take her planner.”
3) I resolve to keep a food diary every day. I actually made it to about July with this one last year. I had a little spreadsheet in Excel. (I confess that I only use Excel as a glorified word processor. I don’t know how to do calculations with it. I just like typing things in the little boxes.) I gave up the food diary when I realized I wasn’t learning a whole lot, except that I eat an excessive amount of granola bars. Of course, this has been true since childhood. In third grade I was in a beauty pageant. The big interview question at the end was, “What’s your favorite food?” Everyone else said “pizza” and I said “granola bars.”
It all comes down to a very bad word that starts with an M—maintenance. I don’t really do anything every day except eat, sleep, and brush my teeth. I love to start things but don’t like to keep them up. Don’t get me wrong, I’m no slouch. I just tend to love the idea of something more than the reality of it. Maybe this year I should resolve not to do anything consistently. I might actually be able to keep that one…but not every day.
