New Year Resolutions

I have rarely made New Year resolutions in my life. The occasional January when I have considered some goals, I have decided not to set myself up for failure by declaring a resolution. As a young boy, I set some resolutions for the New Year, but usually had missed the mark by the end of January. This year, I have decided to give some realistic thought to establishing some habits that positively impact my life. I have developed a list of resolutions – ten in all, but only four will make this blog. The remaining six are more personal in nature and more difficult to measure. I would like to make the Big Four a vital part of the blog by tracking my progress (and hopefully my faithfulness) toward the goals. I will make some sort of measuring chart on the blog so if you visit periodically throughout the year you can hold me accountable for the progress.

Here are the four resolutions and a short explanation of each.

1.Blog : (3 times per week) = 150 posts during 2012
I really enjoy writing, but often the tyranny of the urgent and the call of convenience destroy my priority of written communication. The sporadic postings of this blog were a disappointment to me this last year. My goal is to keep this site up-to-date during 2012. My daughter-in-law maintains her blog (Silly Eagle Books) every day and has developed quite a following – you should check it out if you have young children (www.sillyeaglebooks.com/ ). My goal is not to attract a large reader base (although that would be nice), but to practice the discipline of writing. I have found that expressing my thoughts on paper is a vital part of my leadership role. The better I can put my ideas down on paper, the more effective I can be in sharing my vision. So my resolution is to submit at least 3 times per week. Now this is a huge commitment for me since this is my third year to blog and my yearly outputs to date have been 17, 60, and 30. For 2012, I plan to submit 150 postings. Is this too aggressive? Are my idealistic eyes bigger than my realistic schedule will permit? Only time will tell but I really hope that I can reach this target.

2.Run: (Three 5Ks per week) = 540 miles during 2012
I have been running pretty consistently since August of 2011. I started with a short distance (1.4 miles) from my house to the main intersection and back. I expanded that to a nice 2.4 mile run around the neighborhood. But I really wanted to run a 5K so I found this great little circuit that circles our housing community that measures 3.6 miles. It has some nice hills that challenge my old legs and provides me with a great little workout. Spring, summer, and fall are not too hard to maintain a routine, but those winter months can be tough to keep the pace. My goal is to run between 500 -550 miles this coming year which averages out to 3/5K runs per week. If God will provide the good health and strong knees, I hope to accomplish this resolution.

3.Weight – Maintain current weight +/- 5lbs (160-170 lbs) during 2012. I have worked hard this past six months to lose weight. I have lost nearly 30 pounds and find myself today at 163 lbs. However, I have lost weight before and then regained. In fact much of my adult life has been a roller coaster of loss and gain. I feel really good right now and would love to maintain my body weight over this next year. My running resolution (#2) will help achieve this goal as they will go hand-in-hand. Diet is such a key as well. I have a strange but effective diet right now that seems to work for me. But I need to be careful not to “fall off the wagon” and begin to eat unhealthily.

4.Read – minimum of two books per month = 24 books during 2012. I enjoy reading, but finding the time to systematically do so has not been easy to accomplish. I have a 35 minute drive (one-way) between the two campuses of my school system. I make this drive twice a week, so I have taken this time to read (listen) to books on tape. What a great way redeem the time. I have been able to read several books this past year and hope to continue this practice going into 2012. As I complete a good book, my comments and review might appear as one of the three blogs I plan to make each week. Two books per month does not seem to be very challenging to some of you. My wife reads that many each week, but for me, I think this is a stretch. I have never counted the number of books that I read each year, so this will be enlightening for me as I move throughout the year.

Really? New Year resolutions? They may go up in smoke after the first week OR they may be a focal point of fun and order. What do I have to lose? Come back and check out my progress. Better yet, develop some resolutions of your own and chart your own progress. Happy New Year!