Resolution Hunting

As 2021 comes to a close and 2022 just hours away by the time I began writing this, I realize how terrible I have been with keeping this blog updated promptly. Sometimes, I’m not the best at keeping the initiative going in a few projects… mainly personal personal projects, like this blog.

With New Year’s Eve coming shortly, it’s come to my attention that one of my New Year’s resolutions should be focused on taking more initiative in my life. I’ve always been taking the initiative when it involves things outside of myself, like going above and beyond for some family and friends and even my coworkers and bosses, but whenever I try to do something for myself, I tend to fall flat on my face. Maybe it’s because of my depression and anxiety that holds me back from doing better with my life since my mind is wired to tear myself down whenever it can… or I’m just too lazy to do anything for myself.

Whether it’s one of these or both, or some other third reason, the one thing I’ve realized that I lack at times is taking more initiative with myself. I’ll always set up goals for myself and I’ll become afraid when I get too close to experiencing their potential for success or failure, and end up stopping in my tracks and make excuses for why I shouldn’t continue.

This makes it even harder because I don’t really do New Year’s resolutions. Personally, I believe in the mantra that every day is a new day to improve oneself in whatever way possible. So, I usually do what I call New Day resolutions. However, with my inconsistent ability to take initiative, especially with self-help projects, I come short of my daily goals or I never commit to the daily goal at all. But, I want that to change this year.

My New Year’s resolution this year will be to take more initiative with my life. No more failing to commit to goals I set for myself on the daily or making up excuses not to do things for the betterment of myself.

In the fall of 2019, I made myself a goal to lose weight and return to the fitness levels I had during late high school and college. In the matter of three months, I lost at least 20 lbs. by sticking to a consistent diet and exercise routine weekly. Unfortunately, I lost all that progress when I moved to New York at the start of the coronavirus pandemic in March 2020. At that time, I made excuses not to work out and eat healthy like “the gyms are closed” or “I don’t have the right shoes to pick up running again” or “I can have another slice of pizza and just have a bigger salad later,” and as a result I ended up gaining all the weight I spend days losing. But no more of that going into 2022. If I was able to lose 20 pounds by just keeping up consistent and healthy habits in a matter of months before, there should be no excuse as to why I can’t do that again and go beyond that to attain the goals I set myself before COVID.

I started this blog because I wanted to reignite the passion for writing that I had lost but made up excuses to not write more frequently because it wasn’t getting the perfect number of clicks that I wanted and sometimes felt like I was doing more work than fun with it. When I was not enjoying writing at my job as a digital content producer in Salt Lake, I was at least still writing and I was writing at least tenfold more a day compared to how much I wrote in 2021 alone. If I could write that much when I lost my passion for writing, can you imagine how much I can write if I stick to writing for passion again? I could probably have seven novels by now! Okay, maybe not that many but I think you get my point.

A resolution is defined to be an act to do something or not to do something, to take initiative or not to take initiative; and, I’m going to make my resolution to make more resolutions and stick to them.

I hope that not only will I reach the goals I set for myself this year and on the daily going forward, but I hope that everyone who reads this reaches their goals and commits to them too.

What are your New Year’s resolutions? Do you do them or not, or do you make daily resolutions like me? Let me know in the comments and I hope you all have a Happy New Year!