Yesterday I posted on Gastric Steps about creating SMARTER goals and resolutions (a post you should totally read), but the basic rules to follow when it comes to resolutions include making make sure they’re measurable, making sure they’re obtainable, and making sure you read them once a day. That last part is key; if you can’t even remember what your resolutions were, there’s a pretty good chance you won’t succeed at them.
The fact that I can’t even find my list of resolutions I made for 2014 does not bode well. I did find my list of resolutions I made for 2013 however, and another list I made in 2009. Boy, was I lofty. Several of them even made me laugh.
My theme for my 2015 resolutions is all about self-improvement. (That’s a good theme, by the way; making resolutions for other people’s improvements is a bit presumptuous.) It’s about choosing the way I want to live my life. Here’s my list as it stands, sorted loosely by category:
HEALTH
In 2014 I proved to myself that I can lose weight through diet and exercise. In 2015 I plan on proving to myself that I can do it for a full year.
– Lose 2 pounds/week for a year.
– Walk five time a week, at least 30 minutes a day.
– Keep using RunKeeper and MyFitnessPal
– Limit drinks to water, coffee, iced-tea, diet cherry limeade and diet lemonade (no iced coffee!).
WRITING and PODCASTING
– Update RobOHara.com three times a week.
– Update GastricSteps.com two times a week.
– Update VintageVideogameAds five times a week.
– Publish Gastric Steps (book) by 2/1/2015.
– Publish The Collector of Collections (book) by 7/1/2015.
– Write for at least 30 minutes every day before work.
– Record between 2 and 4 podcasts a month.
PERSONAL IMPROVEMENT
– Limit Facebook use to 30 minutes/day.
– Leave the house once a day.
– Plan something fun every weekend.
– Watch a movie, read a book, or listen to a new album once per week.
– Wear my seat belt.
– Get rid of 50% of my stuff.
(Yeah. We’ll be talking about that last one soon enough.)
FINAL THOUGHTS
– Read this list every single day.
– Do something on this list every single day.
I feel like I’m forgetting some things, so there’s a good chance this list could be revised in the near future. I have lots of things I want to do (like record music and some other podcasting shows) that I’m not committed to enough to add to this list. I have some other goals about helping out around the house with laundry and dishes and cleaning, but I haven’t been able to put them in quantifiable terms yet. Regardless, this is good list of things to start with. Now, to get started.
I know you’ll be able to adhere to this list for a while, but something will come up and things will get off-kilter. You need a re-boot sentence that allows you to reset the goals as needed, and to re-start the goal-oriented working as many times as you need.
FWIW
A few years ago, my wife and I made our resolution as simple as possible, something we could could recite to ourselves and to each other and to our daughters like a mantra. Some back story:
In 1991-1992, I worked as an employee at a Radio Shack store near my house. It was an okay gig, the manager was okay, and I made some friends. Out district manager was Ernie Harman. Back in those days, Tandy Corp would communicate to stores via mass fax. A missive would come in from home office, and as sure as the sun rises in the east, 20 seconds later we’d get a duplicate fax from Ernie, with his hand-written addendum at the bottom end:
DO IT NOW – EH
We laughed about it a lot at the time, but in 2012, we thought, “Hey, what a great resolution for a couple of folks who seem to have a problem with procrastination.” We adopted it, and have been getting more done in the same amount of time for 2 years now.
So since 1-1-13, our resolution has been DO IT NOW – EH. Not glamorous, but a lot of the SMARTER aspects are built-in, plus it has the ability to be used in a vast range of applications.
Happy New Year, Rob.
I loved the SMARTER acronym because it made sense and was workable for me. I double love DO IT NOW! I too am a procrastinator, and if I only adapt that one thing it will make my life so much better. Thanks Paul.
Since getting rid of 50% of my stuff is probably not possible, I think I’m converting that to another goal — earn $1,000 by selling things currently in my house. I’ll whip up a spreadsheet to track sales and prices and whatnot. That might be fun.