New Year’s and Me

Today is New Year’s Day. To me that means it’s another day with a different date. I honestly don’t understand all the hubbub and celebration for New Year’s.

On the face we are celebrating the calendar turning, and by that logic we should also be celebrating the start of each month and even the start of each day. This new digit in the year doesn’t automatically wipe clean everything we’ve done before. It doesn’t guarantee success moving forward. It doesn’t erase pain and loss.

I’m not big on New Year’s resolutions. I’m all for goals and plans, but a resolution that you won’t start until a certain date and must end or happen before a certain date that is defined by the calendar and not by you is far less likely to be successful.

I can hear the boos now. I can hear some folks calling me a cynic. That may be true, but what I’m really saying here is that we can’t live our lives defined or directed by a calendar.

As I am one that makes and lives by lists you would think that I would be all for the resolutions and the intrinsic goal setting that they create. But to me they just don’t cut it.

If we want to make year-long resolutions it would make more sense to do them at our birthdays. That is an individual time that matters to us personally, because that’s when our age changes (and at certain ages that means different privileges are afforded you). This makes the process more personal, and if it’s more personal it’s more meaningul. When it’s meaningful it is more likely to keep our attention and energy.

The one clear instance it makes sense to use the new year as a goal setting time is in business. In that case you have a clear set financial goal for the year, and every other goal that you create for the business should lead toward that year-end financial goal.

The new year does give the imaginary barrier for your brain to process the idea of starting something new or correcting a habit. It’s not a concrete thing, and that is probably why I don’t see its value. But I do love the idea of people giving themselves another chance and allowing themselves a fresh start. But we don’t need to wait for the new year for this to happen. We can make those decisions anytime of year.

When we recognize that we’ve stepped off the path or we see a better path along the way there’s no reason to wait. Make that move. Take the step toward improving whenever that step arises. Use that momentum and that initiative to help you propel further, stronger, and likely more sustainably.

Top 5 Ways to Spend a Warm Winter Day

5.   Swear at Mother Nature for her mood swings.

4. Open the windows and get some fresh air flowing through your car/home/office.

3.    Reflect upon times you’ve done the opposite of what “should be” happening.

2. Get outside for a walk, hike, bike ride.

1. Ignore that it’s different and just do what you already would’ve been doing.

My Top 5 TGIF Thoughts

5. Those shows on Friday night TGIF back in the ’90s were classics. #dididothat

4. What’s the TGIF equivalent when your job has you working weekends?

3. What’s the better way to celebrate your TGIF, stay in or go out?

2. Who has more claim to TGIF: kids in school or adults working? #educationORmoney

1. But seriously was there ever a better line-up of family-friendly shows? #familymatters #fullhouse #stepbystep #dinosaurs

Top 5 Hidden Perks of Christmas Season

5. The cookies, oh, the cookies.

4. Charities get to raise more money for their cause as folks are feeling extra generous.

3. A dozen variations of home light shows synced to the same program of songs within 10 minutes of your house.

2. Easy access to SO MANY Christmas movies on streaming services, cable, and regular TV.

1. People are genuinely thinking about being nicer to each other.

The Value of Christmas Movies

“Christmas is a loving, honest, and charitable time. And though it’s never put a scrap of silver or gold in my pocket, I believe Christmas has done me good and will do me good, and I say God bless it.” — Fred Scrooge, The Muppet Christmas Carol

Well, it’s now December, and it’s officially Christmas season. There are many things I enjoy about this time of year, but one well I keep going back to is that of Christmas movies.

A good Christmas movie, and honestly even a bad one, is just plain fun to watch. It’s full of feel-good moments, usually a little mischief, and–of course–a Christmas carol or two. It’s just plain fun to sit down and watch the holiday hijinks of Home Alone, the family drama and ensuing humor of Christmas Vacation, and the giant human who somehow thinks he’s an elf in Elf.

Then there are some movies I simply watch because they remind me of that time I watched it on VHS with my dad; or that time the Christmas season was wearing me down, but that movie came through for me. The nostalgia factor is high for the Christmas season, and there are many movies that come in clutch to get a dose of that feeling.

Speaking of feeling, some movies just make me feel things I normally suppress outside of Christmas season. Even though I’ve watched It’s a Wonderful Life a bunch of times I know that the next time I sit down to watch I will tear up thinking about his realization that his life mattered much more than he thought it did.

In our house we’ve made it a tradition to watch certain movies each Christmas season. We are a family that holds out until at least Thanksgiving evening before we’ll do anything Christmas-related. But between Thanksgiving night and Christmas eve there are a handful of movies we will definitely watch including Elf, National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, and a few others. We love these movies, because they do all of the things I mentioned before: they’re fun, they invoke nostalgia, and they give us the feels.

“Maybe Christmas, he thought, doesn’t come from a store. Maybe Christmas…perhaps means a little bit more!” – How the Grinch Stole Christmas

There are some movies that I used to watch back in the day (which for those that know that was a Wednesday), but no longer really want to watch. They’ve moved past the nostalgia and don’t give me that same sense of fun I once felt. I realized over the last couple of years that now that I’ve outgrown movies it’s time for them to be passed on to the kiddos. Now they can enjoy Mickey’s Christmas Carol and others in a way similar to what I used to do, and from time to time I’ll be able to check in for that nostalgic feeling if necessary. It’s great!

So, what’s your favorite Christmas movie (drop it in the comments below)?

Top 5 Things to Do with the First Snow

5. Make snow cones in all the colors of the rainbow (except yellow of course).

4. Look at it, and NOT complain.

3. Time your snowball making skills to see if you can compete with Elf.

2. Build an army of snowmen and set a battle re-enactment scene.

1. Take it as the final reason to go on vacation to a warmer climate.

Top 5 Reasons to Restart This Blog

5. So many more pop culture references to share and exploit.

4. Ideas are tired of being trapped in my head.

3. I went through all the effort to find this and remember my log-in, so I have to, right?

2. I miss the process and the interaction.

1. Change begets change, and the winds they are a-changing.

It’s Been Awhile…

I have been away from this blog for far too long. I let life, mostly work-life, get in the way of this. I have struggled with finding a “balance” between family, work, hobbies, and God for some time, and this has built up an irritation within me that I am not willing to live with any longer. I’ve written before about how to create balance. I am, by nature, a planner and a scheduler, yet I’ve focused too much on scheduling others and planning for business that I’ve failed to plan for myself and maintain “balance” in my own life.

The common mantra is “we all must find work-life balance”, and I’ve long believed in this mantra. But the more I’ve lived, the more I’ve failed to balance, the more I’ve thought about this mantra and realized it doesn’t provide enough clarity. I hear this mantra and picture an old two-pan scale with “work” on one side and “life” sitting directly across with no skewing in favor of either. This doesn’t work for me.

My job is demanding, and the success of my work directly relates to the livelihood and lives of many people. That doesn’t mean that I should give equal time and equal mind space to my job and home life. This version of balance, strictly looking at this in numbers, would mean I should give 84 hours a week to work and 84 hours a week to life (or if i take time out for sleep that would be 70 hours a week to work). The sad thing is that I’ve been doing that. For several weeks I’ve averaged between 60 and 65 hours a week at my job plus time spent driving to and fro, and time spent thinking through the problems and tasks if work while at home.

So, as the planner and scheduler I am, I went through the numbers and figured out what the right ratio for me truly is. In order to maintain my sanity, and to not feel overly stressed, I need to give more time to my not-work life than I do to my work-life. This is hard to do, but when it works out I can feel the difference. My target number for work is now 53 hours a week plus drive time (2 hours total per week). This allows 85 hours a week of away time for family, God, rest, and hobbies (and I suppose housework/yardwork too).

I’ve actively worked at this for two and a half weeks now, and though stress still comes (and always will), it is not a constant. This ratio is making me work to keep my days planned out and stay on plan as much as possible. I know that it can work, but I need it to work. I need to have my priorities straight, and give the right amount of time to each part of my life. Time to put in the work.

I hope to write again soon…