Wednesday, January 2, 2013

Resolutions?


Did you make New Year’s resolutions this year?  Are you one of the scoffers who maintains that no one keeps resolutions anyway so it’s a silly practice – or do you cave into the romanticism of the whole thing and do it anyway?

Most of my family belongs to the scoff party, and while I agree that the concept of resolutions shouldn’t be limited to a couple of days at the beginning of each new set of 365, there’s something tantalizing about the year ahead.  Like a blank diary, all crackly-stiff leather, with cool, slippery pages begging to be scribbled over with ink.  Or like a map with an idle compass in the center – you just have to choose where you want to go.

So I’m going to fall in with the masses this year.  While these aren’t “new” resolutions, this will be the first time I’ve inked them onto paper.  (<< I actually wrote this in the back of my planner, so I did really use ink!)  And because I’ve become a compulsive organizer, I’ve categorized my resolutions this year.  Does anyone else do that????

Practical Plans (ie: these had better get done or else)

-- get better about time management and organization.  I cannot stand another year of racing out the door late to work, while the front door bangs shut on the sea of chaos inside.  I’ve discovered from keeping other people’s homes clean that I’m not a messy person – I’m a clean person who doesn’t know how to stop making messes.  A lot of this has to do with time and burnout too – there’s not a ton of incentive to power through cleaning late at night after I’ve spent the whole day doing it somewhere else.  There isn't much time either.  And I have a toddler.  Clearly, I need some concrete strategies here.

-- find more patience.  Do you have some I could borrow while Hunter is in the throes of toddlerhood??  When H was born I swore I would never yell at him or discipline him when I was angry.  This year I failed on both counts.  Somehow I need to learn to be as patient at home as I am at work – even when we’re late or he won’t sleep or he pours his food over his head right as we’re about to leave for work or he’s screaming on the floor and I don’t know whether he’s in pain or throwing a tantrum.  I am meeting with two family counselors to try and strategize ways to maintain parenting calm even under extreme stress.  This is my second-most important resolution for 2013.

-- figure out what I am doing for work/school, and decide whether or not I want to graduate 6 months early or go a bit slower and start working part-time as a CNA.

-- learn to like myself.  Okay, that one probably belongs more in the Impossible Dreams category.  Or perhaps When Pigs Can Fly.  Seriously, though, while I suspect liking myself is a looooonnnngggg way off, I would at least like to negotiate a truce with myself.  A bit of acceptance would be a place to start.  And no more of the I’m-so-stupid-I-hate-myself-I-hate-myself mantras.

-- make God the solid base of my life again.  I hate being a stormy-weather Christian.  I want to teach Hunter about being a child of God, and to do that, I need to be one first.  (This is the most important resolution!)



And then I have the I Would Love To category…

-- run five miles without walk breaks.  Survive.  Do it again.

-- write again.  Fiction.  I want my head filled with characters again.  I feel them at the edges of my mind, pale-ghost faces and WHAT”S THAT WORD fingers tap-tapping at the windows of my imagination.  Even if it’s only one short story, I want to hear that gorgegous cacophony of story-on-the-brew in my brain.

-- make a new friend.  An honest-to-goodness live-in-my-town, go for coffee, workout-partner friend.  Randomly: why on earth don’t they make “friend-ing” websites?  Forget about a date - all I want is a friend!

--  have one day, even just a few hours, where I am just me.  Not mom or student or employee or daughter or any other label.  Just me.  I’m envisioning either a gallop across a summer-thick meadow with the strong-tea smell of horse sweat in my nose, or perched at the top of a "peak" of the Porcupine Mountains, just me on a rock under a clear blue sky.


That's where I'd like to take my year...what about you?  If you made resolutions, share in the comments, please?  If you blogged about them, even better - share the link!

4 comments:

  1. I didn't so much make resolutions as just look at my life and see what I really needed to work on this year... I think something about resolutions and me don't work - they're made to be broken. :) At the same time, I'm the kind of person who needs to write a list if I want to get anything done, so... not sure how those fit together. :P

    But ouch... what you said about liking yourself... *headdesk* Boy, was I off on one of those rants today. :P There are times I really quite like myself, I do. But once I start beating myself up - it seriously took me almost all day just to make myself stop. :P
    And I know you have like no time... but when I realized how bad I was getting, this is the stuff that kind of first caught me up short: http://firstseekhim.blogspot.com/2012/06/good-enough.html (Which maybe makes it sadder that I had such a struggle today... :P)

    Here, actually I'll copy over the part that I have to keep going back to - and that usually keeps me from taking myself to task quite so hard. (I have been doing a lot better!) But every time I go you idiotic moron! I have to stop and remind myself that no,

    • I am a child of God.
    But to all who have received him--those who believe in his name--he has given the right to become God's children … (John 1:12).

    • I am a friend of Jesus.
    I no longer call you slaves, because the slave does not understand what his master is doing. But I have called you friends, because I have revealed to you everything I heard from my Father (John 15:15).

    • As a child of God, I am a fellow heir with Christ.
    And if children, then heirs (namely, heirs of God and also fellow heirs with Christ)--if indeed we suffer with him so we may also be glorified with him (Romans 8:17).

    • My body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who dwells in me.
    Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit lives in you (1 Corinthians 6:19)?

    • I am chosen, holy, and blameless before God.
    For he chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world that we may be holy and unblemished in his sight in love (Ephesians 1:4).

    • I am redeemed and forgiven by the grace of Christ.
    In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace (Ephesians 1:7).

    • I am a citizen of heaven.
    But our citizenship is in heaven--and we also await a savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ … (Philippians 3:20).

    • I have been chosen of God, and I am holy and beloved.
    Therefore, as the elect of God, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with a heart of mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience … (Colossians 3:12).

    There. In the off-chance that any of those are the encouragement to you that they were to me. :) Praying God's blessing and aid for all your resolutions!

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    Replies
    1. Katherine, thank you so much for those beautiful thoughts – and for taking the time to copy and paste – many, many thanks!!! I'm so sorry you're part of the “self-loathing” club. :/ Those are powerful words that you have put together there, though, and with your permission I think I'll print them off and add them to my quote board.

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  2. I'm not making any resolutions this year...Just because I'm too lazy to do it and figure that if I want to, I can start any old day. :P

    You might find this blog really helpful: www.ourmothersdaughters.blogspot.com, especially with the organization and patience part.

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  3. Kate! That blog is AMAZING! I saw this comment a couple days ago, checked the blog out, and my house is already far more organized than it ever has been. Thank you soooooo much for sharing! How are you, btw? We haven't really “talked” in forever. Do you have my email address?

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