Happy New Year!!!

NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTIONS

Everyone makes them, no one can ever seem to keep them. I saw one lady last nite on TV make a resolution to start gaining weight and start smoking. Good job lady...especially with her two kids right there with her...with role models like her, who needs Tiger Woods? Anyway, I digress...oh, yeah, the resolution thing...

1) Start smoking

Just joking...i just find that resolution to be so freaking retarded...but what do you expect? This is America...and people will do anything to get on TV...even pretend to put their kids in a balloon...but again, I digress...

So my REAL top 3:

1) Financial Stability. Some people make this a priority over 20 to 30 years. For me, this happens this year. Few people ever have the opportunity to control their lives, because few people ever WANT to take control of their lives once they find out how difficult it is. It's about time I take advantage of the opportunity I have in my hands and make a serious move...Stable $100k jobs are a thing of the past...much like Liz Taylor, the boogeyman, and...well...my past.

2) Physical Health. My doctor told me 3 years ago that I should lose 15 pounds. The easiest way would be to cut off my head and one arm. I am not so much for that option, but for those that know me, losing 15 pounds is quite a challenge...i just don't know if I have 15 pounds to lose...BMI (Body Mass Index) is such a tricky thing...it's like the English system of measurement, the traffic lights by my house, and car insurance rates...no one knows what the heck it's based off of, but everyone still seems to go along with it regardless of how inconvenient. I am not sure what I'm going to do with this one, but I will go with the flow, since this will inevitably be on everyone else's resolution list as well. In the end, I'm not so sure all doctors these days really care about patient health or take a look at a particular situation...I feel like they just generalize, cover their asses for malpractice suits with socially acceptable recommendations, and get the hell out...makes me want to beat the snot out of them sometimes (yes, THEM...since that doctor i have moved on to find even more equally incompetent doctors elsewhere in the bay area...yay for me).

3) Social Stability. Yes, even I need friends. As much as I'd love to bury my head in this blog, if all holds true to form, like anything created by Al Gore, it will probably go up in flames eventually. And if it does, I need a backup plan...like friends :-P. It's so ironic that in this information age, where facebook, friendster, myspace, and many other sites reconnect us to old friends, classmates, relatives, etc...that we can manage to allow our relationships to degrade to the point that we communicate LESS with them since they are now so seemingly accessible (at least their face shows up on my facebook site each time I log in)...or is it just me? On the other hand, I have learned that you don't need a lot of friends, but rather just a few close ones that you can "do or die" with, and who are willing to do the same with you...I am going to spend more time looking for those kinds of people because I feel like relationships with those people are what make life truly worth living.

So that's my top 3...and yeah, it's everyone's top three every year, but if I can do something different than what most people do...like actually put effort into sticking with these things, they're not things that take an insurmountable amount of time or resources. Sure, you've got to work on them every day, but such is anything in life...from a significant other to a job to anything that requires long term commitment, right?

In the end, it's really about (as mentioned a bit earlier) taking control of your life. And it doesn't start with quitting your job and buying a plane ticket around the world. It starts with small things that we can manage, that lead to bigger things we can manage, that eventually add up to being able to manage our lives without killing ourselves (or our doctors). I feel like 2010 will be a big year for most people because of the ecomonic times we just made it through (so much for the year of the Golden Pig in '08) and the resilience within most people. Some will or already have thrown in the towel, but where there's dispair, there's opportunity (anyone know of a good doctor? seriously!!!), and when times are tough, we find out the most about ourselves and what we are truly made of.