It's time for New Year's Resolutions once again. Since I have had a bit of a blogging hiatus, I will repeat the story of how I learned the power New Year's Resolutions could have:
The January after Cory was born (16 years ago now!), I was exhausted. Beyond exhausted. So far beyond exhausted I couldn't see "exhausted" in my rear view mirror.
I became very sick a few days after Cory was born -- should have been hospitalized, but my doctor decided to have me on IV antiobiotics at home for a month. During those first few months, our writing schedule was as packed as it's ever been, with deadline rolling after deadline.
And through it all, I was still saying "yes" to things. "Please come speak to our group." Yes. "Please come to a baby shower and oh btw, bring a very expensive gift." Yes. "Please read my script." Yes.
And if I tried to demur -- "New baby. So tired. Behind on my writing." -- all I got in exchange was arguments or pleading -- all the reasons why I should rebalance my priorities in favor of the person asking the favor.
Sometime in January, I jokingly replied to one of these requests, "Sorry, I've made a new year's resolution to say no."
The response was dramatic. The asker just said, "Oh okay." And went away! So, experimentally, I tried it again. And same thing. The asker took no for an answer -- and even said, enviously, "Wow, what a great new year's resolution."
Not surprisingly, having learned the power of a resolution, I have taken my New Years' Resolutions quite seriously ever since. Some stick. Some don't. This blog, in fact, is the result of a New Year's Resolution made in 2004.
I decided that I would have all of January to make a resolution. Take some time, get into the New Year, not be swayed by whatever Christmas might have brought my way.
I also decided that NYRs could not be wasted on daily habits. No diet resolutions, no exercise resolutions, no vitamin resolutions, no skin care resolutions. Because if I need a New Year's Resolution to get those right, then all I have is an excuse to bag them for the rest of the year ("Gotta wait till January to try again!").
Sometime during January, my resolutions come clear to me. Sometimes it takes to the end of the month, sometimes they're clear on New Year's Day.
This year, a couple of my NYRs are reboots. That's okay, too. Isn't that the point of a New Year?
Here we go:
1) Blogging. This is a reboot. I lost my blogging mojo sometime last summer, but have received just enough "Gee, I wish you were still blogging" comments to make me think it's worth picking up again. I honestly don't know if I will have that much to say, as I feel a decreasing need to let the world know what I think. But let's try and see what blog 2.0 looks like.
2) Reading. This is also a reboot from, I think, 2004 or 2006. I have a looooong to-read list, and last year, I just didn't get to much of it at all. Part of this was the discombobulation of the year. A small amount was that books on that list kept getting shoved aside for books we were reading in our Mother-Daughter Book Group. And a huge part was that time I might have spent reading I ended up spending online.
So this year, I return to the list. Even one or two books a month would be a start. In fact, as soon as I post this, I will jump over to the L.A. library's website and put a couple of books on hold.
3) Appreciation vs. criticism. I was raised in an intensely critical household, pounded by the negative day in and day out. As a result, I have always had a tendency to see the negatives in life. (Lee says I'm a cynic; I say I'm a realist.)
I've never been particularly fond of that side of my personality, but in recent months it's been exacerbated by the fact that I've been reading inordinate numbers of screenplays in various capacities (as a professor, as a friend, as a consultant or analyst). As a result, I find my mind automatically making lists of the good vs. the bad almost any time someone starts to speak. And I want to beat this tendency back (especially with two teenagers in the house, who really *don't* need the "what-you're-doing-wrong" list in front of them at all times). This will probably be the toughest resolution of the year.
4) A photo a day. This was a last minute resolution, made after I saw a friend's post on the
365 Project website. The site asks people to post one photo a day for a year. The second I saw it, I knew it was exactly what I'd been looking for.
For several years, I've been wanting to find some kind of structured way to keep a brief daily diary. If I believed in astrology, for instance, I might have looked at my daily horoscope and jotted down whether the day fulfilled it. But I do so much writing that the prospect of committing myself to yet one more thing to be written (and every day, to boot!) just never got me as enthusiastic as the idea itself did.
But the 365 Project doesn't ask me to write! It asks me to snap a photo with my iPhone and post it. That, I can do. And as of day 5, I've kept up with it. (Although, as the site itself reminds me, I'm only 1% of the way through the year.)
If you want to follow my 365 Project postings, you can do so
here. And I'll probably post many of them here on the blog as well, if only to make sure I post *something*!
...So there we have it. New Year's Resolutions 2011. But you still have 25 days to make yours!
