Are you the resolution type?  Most resolutions are about changing something that you don’t like about yourself.  Entering a new year gives us all a window of joviality.  Then we take that joy and bury it underneath a pile of expectations based on things we’ve come to not like or even hate about ourselves.  Wikipedia has a list of top goals as the old calendar is discarded.  Let’s debunk some of those and set some that are way more realistic!

1. Reduce Stress. Talk about arbitrary.  How do you expect to accomplish that?  Last I checked stress was involuntary.  No one shoots for a more hectic existence, do they?  Stress happens, and when it does it is way beyond your control.  Go with something more concrete, such as practice breathing more deeply for 5 minutes a day.  Find practical ways to pause.  Read old Ream posts!  Resolve to appreciate beauty or discover art.
2. Pay off debt. In order to accomplish this you have to free up the money that you actually make to catch up with what you’ve already spent.  While this is a great resolution it will require a change in your lifestyle.  May I suggest, Want less crap. Look, paying off debt isn’t magic.
   
3. Be Less Grumpy. Whatever.
4. Loose weight. Which totally flies in the face of last year’s resolution to pack on an extra 25 pounds.  You gained it because you set brilliant, moving-target goals like “reduce stress”.  Included with this resolution are other subresolutions such as Eat Healthy and Get Fit. These kinds of goals are worthless, unattainable without a plan to achieve them.  What about Walk 2 miles a day?  Or Go to the gym that keeps deducting $33 from your checking account each month.  You don’t pay rent at Wendy’s.  Eat at home (you remember, the place without the wall menu).
5. Get a better education. I like this one, but again I think it should be more concrete.  Try Enroll in one class instead.  A more frugal option would be read better books.  If there is a guy smiling on the cover of the majority of the books in your library, you’re probably swimming in the shallow end.  Most likely the reason you want a better education is because you want your life to become a better story.  So read better stories.  Every used bookstore in the world has a shelf of recycled Steinbeck from local high schools.  They’re just like brand new as high schoolers have only pretended to read them!  Buy a copy of all of them.  Start with The Winter of Our Discontent (Penguin Classics).  That’s my favorite!

Resolve to live richly and deeply in 2009.  Have a stress-free, very skinny, non-indebted, intellectually improved and of course HAPPY New Year.

What are your resolutions?