New Year’s resolutions. Did you make any? No, I didn’t, either. But what I did do was gather the equipment needed for two and have it in my mind to do a third. You might think that this is copping out, or somehow less effective than sitting down on New Year’s Eve and formally deciding what to resolve, or getting up on New Year’s Day, sitting on the side of the bed and making a momentous decision, but it isn’t.
See, what happens to most people is that they dream big when it comes to resolutions, and they have a mindset that says once you slip off track, that’s it. No point in carrying on, Oh well, never mind, better luck next year, bring on the cupcakes. However, if you break your goals down a little bit and make them manageable and not so arduous, you have a much better chance of sticking to them – especially if you accept that you are going to fall short of a perfect record sooner or later, and deal with it by simply picking yourself up when you can, and taking another run at it.
One of my most successful New Year’s resolutions wasn’t actually begun until February when I felt ready, and that was giving up sugar1. I knew that if I tried it on New Year’s Day, with the remaining Christmas goodies sitting around taunting me, I’d fail spectacularly, so I waited. Did I fall off the wagon? Sure. I ate dessert about five or six times that first year, I ate lots of dried fruit to compensate for the lack of sugar, and I allowed myself a certain amount of chocolate – dark chocolate, with a cocoa content of more than seventy percent – but basically, I did cut out all added sugar, and by the end of the year, I called it a success. It was a success because I had succeeded more than I had failed, and it was a success because after a matter of weeks I no longer craved sugar, and by the end of the year, I was not enjoying it much when I did eat some. It was also a success because I was more than ready for year two and I’m now embarking on year three, but by now it’s part of my lifestyle, not a resolution. I still eat dried fruit when I fancy something sweet, and the odd square of very dark chocolate or a sugar-free biscuit, but if I want a dessert now, I ask for fresh fruit. Most restaurants are happy to supply me with a plate of highly expensive but beautifully arranged melon, and some are able to come up with a pretty good fruit salad.
So what about this year? I have two goals. One is to keep a journal, which I used to do but stopped when my life hit a depressing phase and writing it up was a bit much. However, keeping a journal is a great way to keep track of what you’re doing with your life, writing a bit of family history, counting your blessings etc. You can use it to record food, if you need to work out what is causing you problems or if you want to track your nutrition generally. You can use it to track your exercise, your creativity, your learning … In fact you can use it for all kinds of things2.
The other is keep up a moderate amount of exercise. We already have a treadmill and an iJoyRide3, but depending on which bit of me hurts most on any given day, I need to vary my options. We don’t currently have a dog, which would make us get out more, so we have decided to buy ourselves a recumbent exercise bike, and it’s ordered. It’s not here yet, but that doesn’t worry me because .. well, see paragraph two. Before it arrives, I need to start on resolution number three, which is to de-clutter.
Now, de-cluttering is my bête noire. I am hopeless at de-cluttering. It makes me anxious to toss things out, even though I really hate my clutter. There is far too much of it in my house and I want it gone because then I’ll feel less anxious about it4 and it will be easier to clean my house and have guests to stay, etc. Thing is, it is absolutely no use at all me deciding that all my clutter will be gone by the end of the year, or that I will do such-and-such an amount every day or every week. No, the only way I will be able to manage this one is to resolve to do it when I can, but to record it in my journal when I do. The way this works is that not being able to write down ‘I cleared one shelf/one box of junk or whatever today’ when I’m writing up my journal in the evening will induce a mild sense of guilt and put a very gentle pressure on me to do it, if only to be able to write about it later. Because there is no set amount to do or a time to do it, I will not suffer the hopeless ‘fallen off the wagon’ guilt which can make it seem futile to try again. I’ll just do it as and when. See?
Well. I’m pretty sure I can do the journal – after all, I’ve done that one before – and the exercise bike is very do-able, because there are times I’ll be able to get on and pedal, however slowly, when I can’t face the treadmill and I won’t have to go outside in the biting cold to do it. The de-cluttering? Well, I like my theory on that one.
Don’t hold your breath.
1 Try it. It’s probably the single best thing you can do for your health (if you are a fairly normal person and not a drug addict or something), and you will be stunned to see what foods sugar is added to when you start to read labels. Frozen chips, ham, savoury crackers, soups, cooking sauces … the list is endless.
2 And it gives your children something most enlightening to read after you’re gone
3 Look it up. It’s most entertaining.
4 Though possibly quite anxious about what I might have thrown out that I will desperately want next week or that I might have thrown out by accident