They say one of the problems with most resolutions is that they’re too vague, like “lose weight.” So, I’ve tried to create a list of specific and measurable goals for this year, and my approach is that if I slip up one day, it doesn’t mean the end of the resolution. In reading How to Think Like Leonardo DaVinci, I learned about mind mapping and thought it a good idea for figuring out what resolutions to make. For starters, I tried to be holistic in my approach, focusing not just on the physical. But on the subject of the physical, I will say that one thing I miss about Tstan is that the foods I ate there were fresh and free from all the junk that gets put in U.S. food. For example, the eggs I ate came straight from a Balkanabat chicken butt that very day or day before, vegetables hadn’t been genetically modified, and meat didn’t come from animals pumped full of antibiotics and steroids. So I’d like to eat fewer processed foods, and more vegetables in general. Certainly I can’t go to an entirely organic, raw foods diet right now, but my goal is to eat at least one meal a week that is preservative/additive, etc. free.
I have other physical resolutions, like drinking a minimum of four glasses of water a day, but I also wanted to have some mental resolutions, one of which is to read a book a week. I’m currently working on one my dad gave me for Christmas called The Resignation of Eve. In another category I labeled “career” on my mind map, I’ll be striving to write something every day and a blog post every week. That one may have to wait a few days as I currently have a raging head cold and my brain feels like, and seems to be functioning about as well as, cotton candy.
Admittedly, part of my motivation behind all these goals is to keep myself busy while I await decisions from the grad schools I applied to, but they are all good resolutions to make nonetheless and may make for more writing fodder, which is always a good thing.