Personal New Year

In honor of the August 1981 personal resurgence, I will henceforth mark August 1 as the start of my own "personal" new year and set forth a set of attainable goals for the year to come, as well as a plan to progressively achieve them.

What happened in August 1981, you may ask. OK, you have my permission to ask, but since the answer is kind of personal, I'm not inclined to share it in detail on this blog. In short, though, I had hit a major rut in my life and, by changing my routines and focus, I was able to get back on track and attain a sense of hope about my future. Not that I now don't have plenty of things to be glad and hopeful about. But I know that I can do better.

In my self-assessment, one thing that I will do is make two different lists. One will be the things throughout my life that I did that gave me the greatest pride of personal achievement. The other will be of special "magic moments" I've experienced that, regardless of my own personal role in creating them, still stick vividly in my memory as compelling snapshots of my life that give it a sense of joy and interest. Reflecting on my positive experiences should help me in determining what goals I want to set for myself this year.

One possible pitfall of making goals like this is to aim too high too quickly. And then suffer the disappointing letdown of not being able to live up to my goals. Back in August 1981, I focused on one academic project and changed my personal routine around in a way that not only provided an effective setting in time and place in which to do that project, but also that enabled me to alter some detrimental lifestyle habits with which I had become bogged down.

So experience has taught me that, although I may want to progress in many diverse areas of my life, I need to change in a focused manner, one area at a time. I need to incorporate this as well in any plans I have for self-improvement this year.