Man Makes Resolutions For New Year — Experts Baffled
CAMBRIDGE, MA — It’s 2010. You may have noticed. Since it already seems to have been a trend amongst some of my friends, I have decided to also do a resolutions post before doing it becomes just silly. So without further ado:
Philosophical Resolutions:
- Adjust my philosophies on work. Less perfectionism, more kaizen.
- If things aren’t to my liking in ways that matter, make them better.
- If things aren’t to my liking, and I can’t make them better, don’t be afraid to walk away. (especially if it will make my life better to do so). Don’t be afraid to say no when doing so is reasonable.
- Be happier with my life.
- Be true to my self. Care less about others’ opinions.
Practical Resolutions:
- Have a substantially less shitty summer. Get an internship that I am happy with, and follow through.
- Take better care of myself. Get nutrition better. Try for regular meals, but failing that … just more and healthier than now. Exercise more (swimming regularly maybe. break-dancing workouts after the IAP class? Getting my DDR pad up here and doing that regularly?)
- Do some research. Find something UROP-like for if not this term, than at least by the fall.
- Actually follow through on a personal project or two. Improve my follow-through on ideas in general. These can be of the technical variety (e.g. ruby athena libraries, some barnowl extensions I’ve thought of) or of the social variety (e.g. “the burger crawl”, bringing back ΣΠΒ shirts). Ideally both.
- Get some of the web designs I wanted to do done and up.
- Follow through on responsibilities I already have. Always be dependable.
- Forgive. MIT gives me enough to stress about without holding grudges.
- Be happier with my life.
- Listen more. Maybe talk less.
I’m sure there are some I have that I can’t think of right this second. Maybe I’ll update this post if I think of them. Maybe I won’t.
Anyway, Happy New Year! Just a few more minutes until its been a new year for a whole day!
Good luck all around,
~Donald
Tags: new year, promises, self-improvment
Mmm, I like this post.
I find with health, if I make definitive plans and say, “I will do them” as opposed to “I will try”, they actually happen. You could, say, demand that you exercise MWF after class foo and eat regular meals on Sundays. (Keeping granola bars or the like around is also a good way to not skip meals.)
Just some thoughts. Good luck!
I’d be interested to hear more about kaizen and why it appeals to you. I am all for “less perfectionism and more viewing improvement as an atelic process”, but maybe the Wikipedia article just doesn’t do a good job of explaining the personal side of it because it focuses on the corporate side, or something?
It’s not a philosophy I have a lot of exposure to, per se, but I came across it in a design book I am reading, it seemed like an appropriate term for what I’m hoping to achieve. Mostly just the basic idea of the philosophy: “a philosophy … focusing on continuous improvement in … life in general”
That’s pretty much all I meant. (so in short, “I stole a japanese word for the sake of being concise at the cost of clarity”)