Olympic sport: modern pentathlon

The Summer Olympics are on their way, so I will be writing about some of the more obscure sports and events of the competition. The Olympics isn't all gymnastics, track & field, and swimming.

One of my favorite sports is Modern Pentathlon. I even use "pentathlete" as the first part of my personal email.

The sport is a creation of the founder of the modern Olympic Games, Pierre de Coubertin. It is a multi-discipline sport, comprised of...yes, five events.

They are pistol shooting, epee fencing, 200m freestyle swimming, show jumping, and a 3k run. Coubertin wanted this to be a military sport. The events are intended to simulate a scout carrying a message through hostile territory.

Men have competed in this event since 1912. Women started in 2000. In the early days, the competition occurred over a five day period with one event each day. Now it takes place in a single day with about an hour between each event.

The video is of Sheila Taormina, an American athlete who is trying to qualify as a pentathlete for the Beijing games. If she does, she will be the first athlete ever...ever...to participate in three different sports at the Olympics. She was in the triathlon in 2000 and won a gold medal as part of the USA women's swim team in 2004.

What kind of pentathlete am I? Well...I can shoot ok, I know how to fence, I am a terrible swimmer, I can show jump, but I don't believe I could handle an unfamiliar horse on some of the higher jumps, and I haven't been running for some time. Nothing insurmountable, but I won't be challenging anyone at any of these events anytime soon.

I've always thought it would be great to build an Olympic training facility exclusively for Modern Pentathlon, that could be used by other athletes for their various sports, too.

If you can swim or run competitively, then USA Pentathlon would probably be interested in talking to you about learning the other three skill disciplines (shooting, fencing, and riding.) Who knows? You could wind up an Olympian.

Suzanne and I will never kiss

Let me say, at the outset, that I am not a big fan of entertainment news and celebrity gossip. Who they are, how they live, and what they do, just doesn't matter all that much.

But when I was a kid, there were certain actresses that I always found attractive. I didn't know why I did. I only knew that when they were on-screen, I felt funny, the good kind of funny. The crush kind of funny. I don't think I ever voiced it much back then. Certainly not to my friends. They would be merciless in their ridicule. Maybe I told my mom, I don't recall. I probably insulted everyone else on screen and gave a noncommittal grunt of acknowledgement regarding the actresses that I loved.

There were a handful that kindled these feelings. The list included Debbie Reynolds, Stefanie Powers, Julie Newmar, maybe Claudia Cardinale. But the one that was never in doubt for me was Suzanne Pleshette.

When I was a kid, she was Emily Hartley, the wife of Bob on The Bob Newhart Show. Her humor was dry and sarcastic and she had that gravelly voice. Some of the best scenes were when she and Bob had conversations as they prepared for and got in bed. Her character served as the psychiatrist's psychiatrist. One of the great episodes featured a story where Emily outscores Bob on an IQ test. I've got to go to Netflix and find that one.

Oh, I just found a picture of Emily. See what I mean? How could an 8 year old not fall for her?

So what is this post about then? Well, Suzanne, as you probably have heard, died this past weekend. I know people die. Yet you can't help taking for granted that people will be around. Especially those that are imprinted in your psyche.

No, I do not and did not obsess about her. I'm talking about an image or idea of someone that is stamped into your thoughts and memories, whether you knew them personally or not.

I've been lucky enough to only lose grandparents so far. The toughest loss being my maternal grandfather when I was 16. Even then, it took about three years before it really hit me that he would never be back. Until that time, it felt like we were just apart. I was in the military. All that I had to do was to go home on leave and there he would be sitting on the couch talking about the news or music. You know, I think I've written about this before. I'll stop.

The key thing is, I just turned 44. I can remember when my grandfather turned 50. More often now, we'll be dealing with irretrievable losses until someday, I become one for someone else. I'm thinking that I would rather have memories. Memories of the people and the times we shared.

I'll always have my memories of walking to the corner store or the barbershop with my grandfather, of watching him play the banjo or casually bend bottle caps between his fingers (he loved RCs,) of hearing him call my grandmother "Lindy" (her name was Linda) and my mother "Rene" (her name is Irene) and of helping him mow the lawn and how he would get so upset if you took his photograph without letting him pose.

I wish I could talk to him today, if only to tell him how lucky I was to have him around.

And Suzanne Pleshette and I will never kiss. It isn't that I thought we would, it's that I thought there'd always be the chance.

Microlending around the world

I've been investigating setting up a bond ladder, a structure of bonds maturing at different times so that as each bond matures the funds can be reinvested in a new bond. This spreads the risk across multiple treasury or corporate bonds.

I'm also looking into investing a small amount in certificates of deposit. Oh, and the investment in Goldcorp is doing ok.

Then, I stumbled on MicroPlace. Here is a great idea: invest in MicroPlace and they make the funds available to organizations that make tiny loans to entrepreneurs in developing nations. The interest earned on the investment is between 1.5% and 3% per year. Modest for sure, but not unlike CDs and bonds these days. Plus, you get the added bonus of knowing that you're helping spread prosperity directly around the world.

I investigated a little more in microlending. And stumbled on another site, probably more popular than MicroPlace (which is an eBay company, by the way.) That site is Kiva.

Kiva works a lot differently than MicroPlace. On Kiva, you select the person or group top which you would specifically like to lend money. In this case, though, you, as the microinvestor, earn no interest. But making money on this sort of thing, and at these levels, isn't the point.

With Kiva, you loan funds in $25 increments. In fact, in order to give everyone a chance to make a microloan, Kiva tries to keep the loans to $25 per lender. The entrepreneurs are looking for loans of anywhere from $200 to $2000. Not a lot. Kiva usually fulfills the funding for a request within eight hours of posting it.

So, after talking it over with Jocelyn, who thought it was a great idea, we signed up and made a couple of $25 loans today. Pictured above is Nodira Samieva of Tajikistan. She operates a food market in Istaravshan. She wanted a loan of $1000 (already funded today) to expand her product line. She plans on repaying the loan over the next six months.

We made another $25 loan to Ajele Justina of Nigeria as part of a $1200 loan to help her buy textiles so that she can knit clothes to sell. That loan has been funded since I started typing this message. She plans on repaying it monthly over the next 8 months.

If you've done something like this, let me know about it. Or if you invest or loan through one of the many microlending organizations out there, tell me about it.

It literally took five minutes to make this happen today. Technology can be used for some amazing things at a very small transaction cost.

It makes me happy.

Secrets to Happiness: Secret #16

UPDATE: Jocelyn would like for me to point out that this photograph is not from our kitchen. I agree with her and apologize to her for perhaps leading some of you to believe that I was representing my own home. I was not.

Much like the not-so-secret Secret to Happiness #5, this one has to do with a relatively simple household chore. You can probably guess from the photo.

Do the dishes

Daily. Don't go to bed until they are cleaned and put away or loaded in the dishwasher. Turn the dishwasher on before turning out the lights.

Dishes...for most of us, they aren't really a problem. But for some of us, they are a big deal. We don't have the energy or desire to tackle them, we have odd shaped glasses that don't fit in the dishwasher, or we made something that sticks to the sides of a saucepan. We can find a million excuses for not doing them until tomorrow.

Bad idea.

Because tomorrow the task won't be any more desirable. If a guy lives alone or with one or more male roommates--I'm about to make a sweeping generalization--he is at least 50% likely to let dishes stack in the sink for two days or more. In some extreme cases, pestilence can find a foothold amid the debris. We hope that someone will take pity on us or be filled with enough disgust to take care of the problem.

Dishes. Makes me think of a quote of The Lord of the Rings, when one character picks ups the ring that Frodo has dropped. He says, "It is a strange fate that we should suffer so much fear and doubt over so small a thing. Such a little thing."

That's the way I feel about a meal's worth of dishes.

A clean counter and sink is a real boost to happiness. If you don't like doing the dishes, then learn how to like it. They aren't going away. If you have a family, split up the work. Everyone can pitch in and get it done faster.

By the way, this includes putting clean dishes away once the dishwasher has finished.

You don't live out of your laundry room and baskets for clothes, do you? (If so, that'll be addressed in some future secret.) Don't live out of your dishwasher for glasses and plates and silverware.

Here are some suggestions to ease the pain:

1) Load the dishwasher immediately after using something. Exception is your drink glass, which you should use for the day.

2) Limit your use of difficult to wash glassware or dishes. This includes narrow stemware, fancy china, or anything that isn't dishwasher safe. They just discourage you from washing.

3) For handwashing, have a dish soap dispenser, sponge, and, optionally, rubber gloves (that fit you) available near the sink. For dishwashers, have the detergent and rinses handy.

For handwashing:

4) Buy a cheap dishrack to allow items to drain and dry that you've handwashed.

5) If you want to hand dry, keep a supply of linen dish towels clean and available. After a day's use, put them in the laundry.

6) Buy bottle brushes and scrub pads for hard to reach interiors and heavy scrubbing, respectively.

7) Wash glassware first. Pots and pans last. Change the water when it needs to be changed.

When dishes are dry:

8) Put them away.

I'm certain that most of you already know and do this. If so, I'd love to hear your suggestions for making this as painless as possible.

If there are multiple people in the house, I believe that everyone should share this chore. No one should be left to do this alone.

Unless I am visiting my parents. Then Mom can take care of them.

Alison

She had found a seat, part of a row of cheap imitation black leather and chrome seats which can be found in every airport in the world. She could see straight down the hallway where passengers were arriving from Terminal C. A steady swell of them flowed up the hallway. She thought that a large flight or two must have just deplaned.

She sat there, self-consciously, on the edge of the seat, leaning left, then right, straining to spot her mother. She didn’t like these crowds. They were all so busy, pretending to ignore her, but she believed they were scrutinizing and evaluating her. She already knew her nose was too big, as were her hips. She had a fleshy chin and she wore thick dark tortoise shell earrings that clashed with her pale skin.

She tugged the ends of her shorts, trying to cover the milkiest areas of her thighs. Her hair, pulled back severely, hung in a bushy red tail. Her glasses, too large by a decade, did not give her that sexy librarian look that she so envied. She kept the top two buttons undone on her blue gingham blouse, revealing a freckly chest with no cleavage. She wore simple tan flats because she was embarrassed by her tiny toenails. She felt mousy and suburban and uncomfortable.

People continued to march up the hall and out of Terminal C. Men in gray and navy blue, lightly rumpled, trudged along with heavy shoulder bags and speaking loudly and authoritatively into headsets about signing papers and setting up critical meetings. Women, in pantsuits or tight skirts, looked tidier, but talked into the same phones and said the same things. Their shoes, though, made annoying prissy clicks once they left the carpet and hit the glossy stone tiles.

Shifting her legs to make them look smaller and seeing no sign of her mother, she settled back to wait, half closing her eyes, trying to block out the people. She listened to warnings about abandoning luggage and trusting strangers. The deep plaintive voice of a singer crooned a love song through tinny speakers and the rumble of wheeled bags and the rhythmic clacking of shoes kept her immersed in yet disconnected from the crowd.

She leaned back and ran her hand through the tight strands of her hair when she sensed someone looking at her. She opened her eyes and saw a man, maybe thirty, flashing a smile at her and walking toward her from the Terminal C hallway. His teeth were white and straight. His lapis eyes and his short curled hair gave him an exotic air. His suit was a professional’s blue, the shirt crisp and white, the tie straight and subdued. His shoes were polished and bright. He wore a class ring and a gold wristwatch.

He looked into her eyes with happy recognition. She was still leaning back, taking in his beauty, when her self-awareness caught up with her. She had splayed her legs at a most unflattering angle. With some difficulty she sat up just as the man was within two steps of her.

“Alison?” he said. His voice was full of hope and excitement, both high and cheerful.

She pushed her glasses back on her nose and looked into his sparkling blue eyes. She opened her mouth, but no words formed. Her lips felt dry. Here was a man. A man was talking to her, in an airport. And a handsome man at that.

“Alison?” she repeated in a choked voice.

His smile left his face. “Oh, I’m sorry,” he said. His cheeks flushed a hint of pink. “I’m sorry. But you look like…you look like someone I used to know.”

“Oh,” she said in a downward aching tone. She wanted to change her previous answer, but the moment was gone. She could’ve been Alison. She could’ve been the Alison who had the terrible accident and lost her memories. This fantasy rolled through her mind as she kept her eyes locked on his, looking up at him from her cheap black leather and chrome airport seat.

“I’m sorry. I can’t…you look just like her. It is so strange. You look just like her and…I haven’t thought about her in years,” he said. He gave her a thin-lipped smile of embarrassment.

“Oh,” she said again. She smiled a sad sympathetic smile and tilted her head. She could love this man, she thought. He was so handsome and vulnerable.

As if he heard her thoughts, he said, “Whew, my heart is racing. When I saw you…I couldn’t believe it. I thought, ‘Alison! After all these years.’” He touched his forehead. “Well, I better be…”

“What were you going to say to her?” she blurted out, maybe too loudly.

He laughed a good tension relieving laugh. She smiled wider but couldn’t catch her breath enough to laugh with him. She kept his eyes in view.

He clucked his tongue and sighed. “I would have said, ‘Ally, I’ve missed you.’ And then I’d sit and talk about the old days, if she had the time.”

She inhaled deeply. “I wish I were Alison,” she said, her voice just above a whisper.

If he heard her, he didn’t show it, but he gave her a sympathetic smile and said, “I’m sorry to have bothered you. I really am.” He looked at his watch. “You have a great day. Take care.”

“Ok,” she said. “You have a good day, too.” The words came out strangled as if she couldn’t suppress her anguish. And she watched him gracefully walk away, probably toward baggage claim and rental cars.

She sat. Then stood. She paced. Five minutes later, her mother trundled up the hall from Terminal C. She ran to her, hugged her vigorously, and took her carry-on bag. She wanted to hurry her along to baggage claim.

“What is going on, child?” her mother said. “What are you so excited about?”

She didn’t answer right away. She continued walking and smiling.

She felt, she knew, that love was possible. She wanted to hang on to that knowledge for as long as she could.

Inexhaustible - the song

Robin Frederick has a site with pages on how to write a song.

She recommends a few steps, but I only focused on the first two:

1) Title the song
2) Find a ghost song and rewrite the lyrics

After that, there are other steps to picking chord progressions and changing the melody so that in the end, you have a completely new song.

I promised a song in yesterday's post about the Iris Murdoch book that I am reading.

The song title is Inexhaustible. If you think that was easy to work into a song, you are mistaken. There is nothing inherently romantic about that word. It is an intellectual word, cleverly used by one of Murdoch's characters to define love.

The ghost song that I selected is a secret, but it shouldn't be too tough to figure out. Because I haven't written any music for the song, you'll have to make up your own melody. Use the ghost song, if you can figure it out. Feel free to guess in the comments.

Here it is. Like it or not. Take it or leave it. Laugh or cry. I spent a grand total of two hours on it and I think it shows. Please note that I was waffling between "baby" and "lady" in the lyrics. I went with "baby" because that matches my speech better.

Inexhaustible
for Jocelyn (who never reads my blog)

Walk by my side, baby
I’ll never tire of saying your name
We stroll along and I feel the sun
Even in the rain.
My heart races at the touch of your hand
Finding you, I could not have planned
When you look into my eyes
When you kiss me and say
“Oh, my love, I hate goodbyes,”

I think you’re inexhaustible to me, baby
You’re inexhaustible to me

Wrap your arms around me, baby,
Touching you stops all time.
Until forever passes
I’ll just stay in this love sublime.
You have me trapped; I don’t want to leave,
Life without you I can’t conceive.
We’re actors in a love story
Don’t know the ending and the script remains a mystery.

I feel you’re inexhaustible to me, baby
Inexhaustible to me

You think that someday I’ll lose my affection
This infatuation will die.
You think that maybe I’ll find perfection in another’s eyes.
But in your eyes I see something more
And it’s your love that I want to explore.
There are no limits that I can see
If I start now, I can discover you for eternity

I know you’re inexhaustible to me, baby
Inexhaustible to me
You’re so inexhaustible to me, baby

Whew! Does inexhaustible work in this kind of lyric?

A hint of citrus

I'm getting three meals a day here at the old Aberdeen Woods Conference Center (now renamed to the Dolce Atlanta Peachtree...just rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?)

Now, you can stuff yourself at one of these things with every entree they serve and starches and deserts--they have snacks available for grazing all day long--or you can try to eat healthy.

I've been selecting healthy foods for breakfast and lunch and letting myself splurge a bit at dinner.

This morning, I had oatmeal, some roasted potato, a small piece of sausage, and some fresh fruit. One of the pieces of fruit was a beautiful orange.

I sliced into it and peeled away the skin in small sections. Each tear and squeeze sent a cloud of zest into the air. I was surrounded, doused even, in the aroma of fresh orange citrus. Even the waitstaff commented on how good it smelled.

That's when I started thinking about how simple pleasures can just pop up out of the least consequential things. Sure, peeling an orange can be a chore, but the balance tips to favorable when the zest shoots into the air and tickles your olfactory nerves.

I think we should eat an orange every morning just so that we can take in a snootful of zest. That's real aromatherapy.

There must be some scent that you enjoy. Remember Pine-Sol and Pledge? What about the smell of frying bacon? Baking bread? Come on, there must be something. Let us know in the comments.

A couple of lines from a book I'm reading

I've been traveling the last couple of days for work. A day in Charlotte, NC and the rest of the week I'll be down here in Georgia in a little town outside of Atlanta called Peachtree City.

Over the weekend, we headed somewhere, shopping, I think, and I had to hurry and pick out a book to read. This is what I do when there are long stretches of familiar road or I am waiting in the car while Jocelyn and Monica are in a store like Bath & Body Works. Funnily enough, Gabe has been bitten by the reading bug, too. He is reading for fun! When he isn't on the Wii. We've got to talk about this Wii thing in another post.

Anyway, I couldn't grab my current non-fiction books because they are just too heavy. So is the Calvin & Hobbes collection. I'm between novels, so I grabbed an old paperback that I bought years ago and have never read. (I buy books at used book stores. This book is an old mass market paperback that cost me less than a dollar.)

It has been superb. The book, and you might have already read it, is by Iris Murdoch. It is her first novel, published in 1954, titled Under the Net. The novel is about a writer, well, a would be writer, he mostly does translations because he can't focus on his own ideas, who doesn't want to do "real" work and would prefer to live a leisurely life of instrospection and artistic endeavor. He and I have a bit in common (but we're not exactly alike.)

Anyway, I'll let you read the book when you're good and ready to do so.

In the meantime, I have two quotes that I want to share with you. The book is full of quotable passages. I'm in love with this novel...yet if any novel is pretty and challenging, I'll fall for it. I'm easy that way.

Here are the quotes--they take place in the same chapter, only a couple of pages apart:

1) "...to find a person inexhaustible is simply the definition of love..."

I like that. The other person always seems fresh and new, he or she always has at least one element of mystery, and you never cease in your wonder and curiosity. Isn't that the opposite of familiarity and indifference? I'm going to write a love song that uses the word inexhaustible.

2) "The substance of my life is a private conversation with myself which to turn into a dialogue would be equivalent to self-destruction."

This is my fundamental issue with blogging. I feel like I desparately need to write. And to write well, I believe that one has to be authentic. And to be authentic, even in imaginative work, one has to pull truths out of themselves. That is the tough part of writing.

That is the tough part of intimacy.

I think it is the tough part of being fully human.

On that deep thought, I'm turning in. Class starts early tomorrow.

Sometimes we're human

I was talking to my sister this evening while driving home from my work (I was in my 5-speed sanctuary) and I was lamenting what a sucky week this has been so far at work.

I returned to work, yesterday...my 44th birthday...and discovered a serious mistake that my 43 year old self made at work before the holiday. The mistake cost considerable time on the part of a couple dozen people and involved another company. In some cases, our customers received some shocking information about some of their purchases.

Everything will be fixed this weekend and we'll mop up the debris next week. This was not one of my shining moments. My mistake tore a huge chunk out of the carcass of my credibility. It was a heckuva birthday. For 24 hours, even my self-confidence was shaken. But, you know what I've done since then?

Everything I was doing before. I just made a mistake. I fumbled the snap, threw a wild pitch, missed the open shot. The important thing though, is that I was trying to make something happen.

Risk aversion is not part of my work ethic. Certainly, I try to identify and minimize risk, but I will not refuse to act because the outcome is uncertain, or the plan isn't perfect, or I don't have all the facts.

What is my role at work? I'm an innovator, a designer, a strategist, a process breaker, a solutions provider, a culture changer, and a mistake maker. That last one goes with the territory.

And I wouldn't want any other type of work.

10 Resolutions for 2008 - The H-N Way!

The following resolutions are written in the present tense as affirmations rather than traditional future-oriented resolutions. The contents of each may be currently completely true or untrue or somewhere in between. Please do not assume that the opposite of any of these resolutions is the current truth (though in some cases, it will be.)

1) I care about other people and my experiences with them are positive and pleasant. I like and value the company of others.

(Do you see why I admonish against going with the opposite as the current truth? I don't hate people and I'm not always caustic and unpleasant to be around. I swear.)

2) I routinely set aside judgment and weigh the evidence and the situation before I react. I let my emotions settle before responding.

3) I love to write. I write truthfully. I make people laugh and help them get through their days. My writing improves by writing everyday.

4) I am open and honest with myself about my feelings. I understand them and accept what I feel as normal emotion.

(You might notice that I try to avoid stating a negative. For (4), I could have said, "I don't berate myself for how I emotionally respond to things," or for (2), "I don't respond immediately and emotionally to setbacks and situations." The reason for avoiding the negatives is to avoid stating the behavior that I'm trying to avoid. Avoidingly speaking, that is.)

5) My home is clean and free of clutter. I enjoy living in my house. My things are organized and easy to find. When I am at home, I feel creative and energized.

6) I fit comfortably in all of my clothes and I feel great about how I look. My body is strong and lithe. I eat healthy food and I stay hydrated.

(Yeah, I can hear you chuckling to yourselves over these last two. Compare how they read to a typical resolution: "I resolve to declutter my house and make it a pleasant and energizing place to live" and "I will lose weight and get in shape and eat right." Just saying these things evokes a burdensome feeling. I immediately start thinking about all the ways I have to make these things happen. It feels like chores.

I think that stating them as affirmations, and using them daily or multiple times per day, will lead my subconcious to creative ways of making it so. Repetition of the words will make it ultimately true. Is this naive? I don't think so. I think the traditional resolutions are naive. The implication is that we know how to accomplish our goals. Part of the problem is undoubtedly that we do not know. Sure, we know what to eat and how to exercise, but we don't know how to make it part of our lives other than sheer brute force. That seems like a rather childish and bullying approach to changing oneself.

I'm going to try this more positive, present-tense method instead.)

7) I am a painter. I enjoy working with oils, acrylics and watercolors. I paint whatever interests me and I always finish a painting. My skills improve by painting and drawing every week.

8) I am a member of a large family. I am a good husband, father, brother, son, son-in-law, brother-in-law, uncle, nephew, cousin...and grandfather...

(see? Already the power of resolution (3) kicks in. We'll cover more on this revelation as time goes by.)

9) My work is rewarding and valuable to me. I do what I love and am well-paid for my efforts. I am happy for the successes of others and I look for ways to reward and challenge people.

10) I can read, write, and speak basic Mandarin Chinese. I learn at least one new word each day. I understand the language better each time I use it.

(Wow, that last one just jumped in my head. I think it has to do with the Beijing Olympics.)

Let's hear yours, if you'd like to share.

Happy Resolving Day!

I received the beautiful and heavy 3 volume slipcased Complete Calvin and Hobbes for Christmas. A wonderful gift that will be in my family for a long time. So, in honor of the gift and the day, I chose this panel from among a dozen images for New Year's Day.

While this cartoon doesn't necessarily reflect how most of us feel, it does an excellent job in ridiculing how most of us act. By that I mean that we make resolutions and then we fail to keep them. We act as though we really don't need to change. We act as though we are happy with who we are. If that is so, then why put ourselves through the whole resolution thing anyway?

I've tried resolutions. I don't like them. But, as the dozen or so regular readers know by now, I'm not the best at hitting my commitments (like where the heck is that Frosty story, hmm?) Committing to accomplish things that I'm not really committed to in the first place is just a major energy suck. They drag me down, they sap my creativity.

[Please, don't misunderstand me. I believe that art (whether literature, painting, composition, whatever) is about 1% inspiration and 99% follow through. For example, anyone who thinks that a Mark Rothko or Jackson Pollock painting would be an easy thing to recreate versus, say, a Velazquez, hasn't stood before (or over) a 20' by 25' canvas before. Think about the effort to write and edit a novel, even a short story. The best ideas still need to be kneaded and worked into something viable and beautiful. Of course, there are exceptions. These exceptions take nerve more than effort, such as John Cage's 4'33" or Marcel Duchamp's Fountain. But they are only memorable for their cleverness, not their beauty. Sheesh, how did I get on an essay about art?]

When we think of resolutions, we are thinking of our selves. I can't resolve that Jocelyn will be a better spouse, but I can resolve that I will be. Resolutions are about changes to self. They're tough and I don't think that we respect them or take them seriously (of course, there are exceptions.) Plus, we typically state them as some vague future desire: "This year, I resolve to eat right and excercise more" or "I resolve to get out of debt" or "I resolve to spend more time with my family." I can't bring myself to say these things with any sort of conviction. They seem to be hectoring me to act. I can not tolerate hectoring, especially from myself.

But, I have a solution to this dilemma.

I resolve to write my resolutions as affirmations. That is, I will write ten "resolutions" as present tense statements of fact about myself. The fact that they are not presently true is irrelevant. They are affirmations. They are positive self-talk. By reading them or saying them everyday, I believe they will have more lasting and positive impact on my life than vague promises to myself stated on January 1st.

My next post will contain my new styled resolutions. Laugh at them if you want, but I'm taking this seriously. Or try it yourself. Take your forward looking resolutions and make them present tense. Read each way out loud and see which one makes you feel better and exerts more positive energy.

For those that have stuck with me through a very spotty December, thank you.

Happy New Year!