Realistic, Attainable, Loopholed…Perfectly Imperfect Resolutions for Me
Add comment January 3rd, 2008
Archive for January, 2008
Truly Smart Resolutions Are Vague Resolutions
New Year’s resolutions are always challenging for me. It’s so easy to be too ambitious and set your goals too high, which invariably leads to disappointment. I’m sure everyone knows someone who has given up on their resolutions before the end of January. However, being ambitious can drive us to become better people and to excel, so maybe it’s good to set lofty goals?
In my past life in the corporate world, we taught our employees to set SMART goals for themselves. Who doesn’t love an acronym, right? SMART goals are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Timely. This system works well in business, as it can teach people to divide challenges in smaller chunks, improve their performance, and measure their progress… but it’s not a very pleasant experience to try and run your life like you’d run a department!
I’ve always taken nearly the opposite track when I set my yearly resolutions, or rather renew my resolutions, because they have been the same for years: I’m purposely vague. Every day I strive to do at least one thing in three categories: something that focuses on knowledge or brain power, something that focuses on health or body power, and something that focuses on family and friends.
Photograph by Sally Mahoney. Some rights reserved.
This is obviously very vague, but it’s that vagueness that allows me to stick with it. For the first category, I can read an article, story, textbook – anything from which I can learn. Or maybe I can play a game of chess or have a debate with someone. Anything that grows my mind works – even researching and writing an article! For the second category I can obviously work out, but as much as I’d like to, I don’t have the time for a full work-out every day. However, a long walk with the baby counts too, or maybe eating a healthy salad for lunch. And the last category is always the most fun: get in touch with a friend or relative, play with the baby, do something nice for someone.
Those resolutions may seem very vague to people who set specific goals like losing a certain amount of weight or saving a specific amount of money, but ultimately they help me attain what’s always been my main goal: to be a better person when I go to sleep than I was when I woke up.
Submitted by Stefan Raets. Stefan is a refugee from the corporate world. When he isn’t reading or writing, he’s probably feeding or diapering his newborn son.
1 comment January 3rd, 2008
A Writer’s Resolutions: A Year in the Life of a Manuscript
Along with my resolution to stay upbeat and optimistic no matter what, this year I’m going green. I’m going to achieve my writing goals (and along with them, my financial ones) and I’m going to be environmentally responsible while doing so by reusing and recycling whenever possible.
Most resolutions fail because they’re spur of the moment ideas born solely out of optimism, with little planning behind them. But I’ve done the groundwork and mapped out some practical applications of my resolutions to keep me on track all year. Here’s my plan for 2008, step by step:
1. Finish editing the novel and start submitting it. I can’t get famous by keeping it in a drawer, can I?
2. Recycle all my old bank statements and tax returns from the last 15 years. I’m going to need that filing cabinet space to store royalty statements and big thick tax returns once I get a cushy contract with a major publishing house.
3. Recycle unsent letters. There’s an exercise encouraged in marriage counseling where one writes a letter to her uncooperative spouse and says everything she wants to say, however she wants to say it. The spouse doesn’t get to the see the letter, it’s just to vent. I have an entire boot box full of them, all beginning with phrases such as ‘Dear !#%&@’ and ‘Dear Mr. Sensitivity’, that I reread occasionally after I’ve had a few glasses of wine. I could mail them now, and perhaps he’d even laugh. But imagine the postage fees! No point going into debt right at the beginning of the year. Besides, I need the postage to keep mailing out my manuscript–because, mysteriously, it keeps coming back. The publishers I’ve sent it to thus far must have a full list for quite a while.
4. Go on a diet and get some exercise. I want to get in better shape before I start lunching with the other literary greats. I’d like to lose at least 20 more pounds than necessary so I can fully indulge in New York cuisine once I’m flown out to negotiate a contract. But I doubt there’ll be time. Oh, and the talk shows! The camera adds at least 10 pounds; I don’t want to look too fat on Letterman.
5. Recycle the small pile of rejection slips. They all say almost the same thing, word for word, just on different letterhead. Not worth the space to keep them.
6. Dig out the few most entertaining unsent spouse letters for safekeeping. I kept meaning to take that box to the recycling center, but luckily I put it off. Those witty gems might be worth something someday when I’m a famous novelist. Maybe I’ll even send one to the ex after I’m a household name, just as a sign of goodwill. He could sell it on eBay.
7. Recycle more rejection slips, except the one with a handwritten note that I can’t read because it’s blurred by a coffee stain. It looks like ‘monklurp fxp tipto n’ when I squint. But it’s still special: an editor actually took the time to scribble something illegible on the rejection slip! That means I’m getting warmer…
8. Instead of wasting yet more paper, start calling publishing houses to see if they’re even looking at manuscripts, or if their lines are full for a while. There’s no point in wasting time sending my book to places that don’t currently need new books! If they’re accepting manuscripts, I will then explain that they must have mistakenly put mine back in the envelope without reading it.
Photograph © (c) Inkswamp. Some rights reserved.
9. Write some letters to publishing houses. Letters I would never, ever send unless I planned a major shift in career path. Letters questioning the sanity and good taste of several key people. Write my first ever letter using only expletives and exclamation points.
10. Recycle those letters. Responsible, see?
11. Recycle more rejection slips. What is wrong with these people, don’t they know they’re wasting precious natural resources? I printed that manuscript to be read and appreciated, not just shuffled from envelope to envelope!
12. Drunk dial Simon & Schuster. Explain to the woman on the phone that in the spirit of recycling, they didn’t need to send my manuscript back to me. She could have kept it and put it somewhere else instead.
13. Send letter of apology to receptionist at Simon & Schuster. Include a note asking her to recycle it when she’s finished.
14. Send my novel to all my friends electronically and on CD-ROM, since clearly no publisher wants to take a chance on something so original. Yes, of course I’m happy about it; it all worked out just as I had planned! I never really wanted it published on paper anyway. Think of all those trees…
Shelley Ontis lives in Illinois, surrounded by corn, cows and pick-up trucks. She claims it’s not nearly as exciting as it sounds.
1 comment January 2nd, 2008
The 2008 Resolution Bonanza Spectaculaire
Every year I’m optimistic about New Year’s resolutions, and every year they fail me miserably. Or, perhaps more to the point, I fail them. I’m one of those people who’s the poster child for every old cliché adage about “best intentions”. I get a lot of stuff done, don’t get me wrong. But those lofty New Year’s goals we set for ourselves every year…not so much. I handle the day-to-day things with flair, and maybe it’s my “God is in the details” mentality that makes it hard for me to throw myself wholeheartedly into vague, big-picture aims. I know what I want to accomplish today, I even know what I want to accomplish this weekend—but for the whole of a year? Who can say?
This year I was going to resolve to never make any more resolutions, because I hate feeling like a failure. But then I realized if I’m going to set myself up for failure anyway, I might as well do it with panache and bravado. I might as well choose resolutions that I’d make happen if I could wrinkle my nose like Bewitched and turn fantasy into reality. And it’s funny, in a sophomoric sort of way, to have the odd out-of-left-field resolution to proclaim when some well-meaning soul tries to make idle chit-chat out of the “Well, do you have any New Year’s resolutions?” line.
So I present to you my 2008 Resolution Bonanza Spectaculaire. Roll out the red carpet, put up the big tent, and suspend your disbelief…seriously.
In exact order, for no particular reason:
- Take out a loan and secure the services of Posh Spice’s plastic surgeon.
- Secure the services of David Beckham.
- Hire a team of top-notch scientists to develop the ability to time travel; return to May of 2007; wrangle tickets to the 300 Los Angeles premier; and make good on my brilliant idea to somehow convince David Wenham to let me tag along—and to buy me a perfect Yves Saint Laurent and Manolo Blahniks just for the occasion.
- Did I mention #2?
Photograph by Maulleigh. Some rights reserved. - Buy season tickets to both West Ham United and Los Angeles Galaxy teams, and advance book all the necessary travel arrangements to be in East London for every home match, then on the other side of the world in Los Angeles for every match there. Sometimes simultaneously.
- #5 probably should have been win the lotto in order to allow for #6. In fact, #1 might well have been win the lotto, too. I’d still want those Manolos from Wenham himself, hand-delivered to my door. Hey, I’d tip.
- I can’t remember if I mentioned #2…
- Read every single book I have purchased over the last 5+ years that, due to studies and the general business of life, I haven’t yet gotten around to reading. And trust me, we’re talking a lot of books. I’ve had to empty out chests of drawers, donate my clothes to the needy, and use the storage space for unread books. 2008 would be The Year of the Really-Really-Really-Belated Oprah Book Club.
- Figure out a way to get Entertainment magazine to stop sending me “WARNING: YOU’LL NEVER HEAR FROM US AGAIN” letters every week since I once subscribed back in, oh what was it…1982?
- All the way to #10. You must’ve forgotten #2 by now. Take a moment to refresh your memory.
For all those with genuine 2008 Resolutions, I say: may you have better luck with them than I’ve ever had with mine. All the best to you and yours in the new year.
I’ll just be over here working on #2.
Dina Ely is a freelance writer, poet, and author of short fiction. Readers can contact her at dely723@yahoo.com
1 comment January 2nd, 2008
