new year's resolutiony-type things

[ltgmars]

Every year I don't remember whether I'm the type of person who makes new year's resolutions (and it's less about what I feel like doing and more about whether or not I did in the past, because if nothing else, I'm that kind of person who hates being inconsistent), but typically in my heart I enjoy the opportunity to start fresh and decide, "It's arbitrary, but why not make this a day to tell myself I'll change something?"

Honestly, I make a lot of resolution days, and I never follow through. It'll often be something like "starting next month" or "starting next week" or "starting tomorrow" or even "starting when I get home from work", but nothing really lasts. Apparently it takes 30 consecutive days to make something a habit; I've yet to reach that with anything.

But! Ever the optimist, here are my resolutions for whenever I'm able to start them and stick with them and not get frustrated or dejected if I miss a day or two or several:

1. Keeping in better contact with friends.

This is just something I'm bad at doing. I think about people all the time, but I never take that extra step to let them know, and how will they know if I don't say anything? Keeping in better contact with people and keeping lines of communication open will be a lifelong project, but I guess now's a time to work on it. This includes eventually -- gulp -- going back to Tumblr full time.

2. Being more time-efficient.

There are a lot of little pockets in my day that I don't spend doing anything productive. And I have so much that I want to consume and produce that it's really silly for me to sit around for the ten minutes in the morning before we leave, not doing anything. I could be reading! I could be writing something! I could be moving my body a little! I have a lot of goals I want to achieve, but none of it will happen if I don't make a conscious effort to change the way I spend my time. So from now on I'll try to be less distracted and live more fruitful days.

I'm also going to try to post more on DW/LJ for real, so sorry that this first post is so dry. XD

Comments

[thoroughlynerdy]

I feel like both of these things I can transfer to my own life since I am terrible at keeping in contact with people and I spend too much time doing absolutely nothing of worth, so that's something I should work on as well!

If it makes you feel any better, I read a study a while back where it said it can take anywhere from three weeks to almost a year to form a habit since it all depends on the person. So don't take it personally or as a failure if you can't get into a habit immediately, I've found that forgiving myself when I fall "off the wagon" is the key to success--so what you didn't write today? It's not the end of the world, just the end of your consecutive days. Write tomorrow and start that count over and all will be okay in the end.

Sorry, I think this comment got a little wordy and is now half the length of your post!

[ltgmars]

Mm, while I believe in the forgiveness concept in theory, I'm unfortunately a really rigid person in practice, so I like consistency and I like habitual actions. It's a lot easier for me than for other people to get dejected if I miss a day of something, or I mess up some kind of habit I've had going for a while.

That being said, I kind of like how my resolutions are more concepts than they are concrete actions, because the concrete actions are what trip me up. It's a lot easier for me to feel bad about missing if I have a resolution that says "contact a friend once a week", after all. But if I use the resolution as a kind of mindset change, it seems less doomed, because if I'm consistently thinking about being in contact with friends, maybe that habit of contacting a friend once a week will come up on its own.

I don't know! We'll see how the year goes. XD Good luck things on your end, too!