my thing with the resolutions

I've probably got a couple more posts in my system this month regarding resolutions, so if you're sick of the subject, consider this fair warning.  In my opinion, resolutions get a bad rap, so I'm staying in my corner, cheering, wishing their beneficial effects for all.

Maybe the problem is the word.  Resolutions is so non-specific and tired.  As you can see at left, I prefer the word Plans.

I have a lot of practice at this resolutions thing. Since my birthday is in January, this month always feels like a beginning to me and I've nearly always taken advantage of it to re-check my destination, consult a map, jot some notes.

Some people do a Vision Board this time of year.  I have never made one of those, but I like the idea.  My several attempts to stage a Vision Board party at my house, complete with poster board, magazines, glue sticks and scissors have fizzled -- couldn't make the calendars work -- but I may try and make one soon, if only to put up pretty pictures of sloths and rainforest to stoke my intention of getting to Costa Rica this year.

Resolutions, plans, intentions: they're not magic.  I have no such notion that I will wake up on January 1st a completely changed person, as Bernadette Birney put it on her blog this morning, "with new resolve--as though the past had been surgically removed."  Nope, it isn't that at all.

But wait: in a way they actually ARE magic, these little plans I laboriously write down, in pencil with color-coded underlining, in my brand-spankin'-new notebook on pages that I will later flag with a post-it, for easy reference.  There is something that actually does feel magical to me about creating a little space at the beginning of the calendar year to think about what I really want in the coming period, writing it down in my neat little categories, then using this Chart to steer my life throughout the months.  Not only do I consciously choose the destination, but I even get to make the map. Dude, that is magic.

And it works.  I swear.

OK, it's not foolproof.  Sometimes it doesn't stick for as long as I'd like.  Although I managed to settle my sleep in 2010 (Goal #1 under Personal, which you can see in the photo above), it is still something I work on -- although less consistently since my sleep is less disturbed now as a rule.  And some goals, particularly in the Financial section of my annual Chart, seem to migrate from year-to-year.  The nest egg is just a permanent fixture.

But I really can't say enough about how beneficial this process can be, no matter the bad rap it gets all over the place.

I'm in charge of my life. For me, that means I have a say in where I'm going and I go there consciously, with my bags packed neatly, never forgetting my toothbrush or a pocket knife, essential tools for all journeys, magical or otherwise.

And really if we're talking magic, there is nothing more magic than just being alive.

I'm driving. You in?