Alex Polson's Personal Blog

Now that the holidays are over (not to mention all the snow having melted) it's now back to the normal day-to-day routine for many, including me. Some would say that with the new year we have an opportunity for a new beginning. There are certainly reasons to celebrate the new year, including a new president being sworn in and the hope for an improved economy, environment, etc. etc. Typically this is the time to profess your dedication to one or more new year's resolutions.

I have in the past participated in this tradition with a reasonable amount of vigor but this year I've decided to do things a little bit differently. I heard somebody (may have been a friend or maybe even Oprah) ask recently why we should need an excuse to better ourselves? Why should we need to wait for the beginning of a new year to start working on our goals? Instead of committing to one or more resolution's, which I would've likely failed, I've decided to start a list of things that I want to accomplish in my life; both long and short term goals. I've done a pretty good job of accomplishing general health-related goals like eating better (NOTE: as I type this I'm eating pizza and drinking a beer) and exercising more (which isn't really saying much given that I hadn't exercised regularly for years after earning my degree) so it's time to move on to other things.

Instead of committing myself to a single goal I simply want to make sure that I'm constantly moving forward with at least one of them. A lot of my goals are long term which tend to be a bit intimidating. I believe the only way that I can accomplish these goals is to break them down into smaller, more attainable ones. Combining this with regular "check ins" to see what I've accomplished will help me move forward.

I realize this whole thing seems a bit structured but sadly that's really what I need in order to accomplish anything.

Having gotten that out of the way here are some of the things I'm going to try and accomplish:

• Writing more: I've loved to write ever since I was in Elementary school but definitely don't do enough of it. I want to start keeping a diary of sorts and sharing things via this blog. I would also like to work towards writing a book about the life of my father which I've written about previously.
• Continue to improve healthy habits: I've been eating better and exercising regularly for the past several months. I also want to run a half marathon that's coming up in June. We'll see about that. 😃
• Accomplish more personal projects: I have a reasonably sized list of projects that I'd like to pursue including organizing my photos and writing more code. Because I have a tendency to lose interest in a project after a while I want to make sure I stay focused and follow them through to completion.

Lots to work on but I'm only committing to gradual improvement. Maybe if I get saucy later on in the year I can commit to more but at this point I really need to take baby steps.