The New Self-Improvement Plan

A few years back, I got to thinking about New Year’s Resolutions.

I made them every year since I was 19. On New Year’s Eve, usually in the middle of a long night of drunken revelry, I’d decide on all the things I wanted to accomplish that year. The goals were usually vague, things like write more, lose weight, get better grades (back when I was a student), or save money. All the nice things you’re supposed to say. Invariably, by the time March came around, I’d abandoned most, if not all, of those promises. Around my 36th birthday, my resolutions for that year having failed months prior, I started thinking about why.

Why was it that I went into every year with the best intentions, and always failed?

The first answer I came up with was that my goals, while noble, were too big and too vague. I came up with all these lofty ideas and I had no idea how to accomplish them. I had no clue what the end would look like. Lose weight? Okay, but how? And how much? Write more? Sure, but what am I writing? Someone smarter than me once said that a goal without a plan was just a wish, and I had no plan at all.

The other thing I realized is that I didn’t have to wait until December to identify my problems. That’s passive, and there are 360-odd days before New Year’s Eve to recalibrate yourself. Hell, my birthday is in October (Libras? Anyone?), so why should December 31 be the designated day of self-reflection?

Starting with my birthday that year, I decided to stop settling for resolutions and start working a plan to improve myself. In three months, at the end of December, I’d check in and reevaluate, then again three months later, and three months after that. I’d adjust the plan and see where I was at and try to figure out what I had to do to get closer to that goal. Sometimes it worked, and I got everything accomplished. Sometimes it didn’t because life doesn’t go as planned. But the attempt at mindfulness and accountability meant that I didn’t spend as much time hating myself.

So, in light of my birthday this month, here’s what my self-improvement plan looks like for age 42. Because as we know, 42 is the answer to the universe.

1. Improve my health and fitness. I lost 20 pounds between January and March of this year. Don’t worry though, with quarantine and the closure of everything, I found those pounds again. All jokes aside, between October and December, I’m making a concerted effort to dump that weight again. I’m working on re-establishing the routines that helped me make so much progress in the early part of the year. I also want to learn a new recipe every couple of weeks and introduce new, healthier foods to my repertoire. I’d like to also try a slightly different workout philosophy. I’ve been lifting for bulk for the since I was 16 years old, and while I was never bodybuilder-sized, I was always a big dude. It’s hard enough to fit in this world being tall, I don’t necessarily need to be a hulking mass anymore to be healthy and fit. Ideally, I’d like to look good in pictures when my fiancée and I get married next year, and that’s what I’m working toward.

2. Develop and maintain my writing routine. The best thing to come out of quarantine was the opportunity to write more. I had so much more time to type out words or scribble in a notebook. I’ve done more writing in various forms in the last six months than I have at any point in my life. It’s amazing what happens when you can’t go to a bar anymore. And while I do miss having a social life that extends beyond my front door, I can’t say I’m mad at the writing output. So, for the next few months, I’m aiming to expand on that. I’m challenging myself to write every day, especially in November for NaNoWriMo.

3. Read voraciously. I’ve done more reading since March than I have in several years. I usually do a Goodreads reading challenge every year, aiming to read 15 books a year. This year I’m at 11 so far, and I can probably finish 15 by the end of the year. The bad news is that my TBR list is 23 novels deep, plus some nonfiction, reference, and textbooks. That list is constantly growing. In the next three months, I’d like to surpass my reading goal, and beyond that, I want to have my queue down to three by my next birthday.

4. Find and maintain balance between work, writing, and life. Social distancing made isolation a new way of life, so it was easy to throw myself into work and writing. And while that’s shown some benefit, in the last six months I’ve become such a homebody that venturing to Target or Best Buy with my fiancée has become an event. And while this lack of activity is necessary so the country is possibly—finally—able to get clear of the pandemic, it’s become difficult to develop connections to other people. All work and no play makes Frank super awkward. I’d like to balance all that homebody-ness by trying to make friends and connecting where and when I can. After all, there has to be more to life than Target.

And that’s my partial list. There’s more, of course, that’s either personal, mundane or both. List items include calling my mother more, reaching out to friends back East, and curing cancer. But that stuff is so much easier to hold myself accountable. And little by little, as I hit these goals, I’ll hopefully improve.

So what’s your plan? What do you want to improve? Sound off in the comments section, or on Facebook!

#birthdays #writing #improvement