I often find myself thinking about ways I want to improve who I am. I think about losing weight. I think about eating better. I think about improving my work productivity and relationships. I think about being a better husband, a better father, a better friend. I think about being a better presence in the world, less of a curmudgeon, less cynical. I think about these thoughts daily, yet as is the case with 80% of the thoughts that pops into my head when zoning en route to work, strolling in between meetings, staring blankly out the window of my office, or listening intently to my wife's breakdown of the day... they're gone moments later. These aspirations are seldom kept in the foreground of my thoughts, where I'd be more inclined to act on them. Instead, their pushed off my mental plate as the next batch of thoughts takes their place, only to be pushed off themselves moments later.
....And you may ask yourself... "Well, how did I get here?"
I was told something this week that i've known for some time now. By a doctor. He's instructed me to drop 25 pounds before the end of the year in order to get back in control of my health. And even though I've spent at least two years privately lamenting my gradual weight increase, I've done nothing but continue to gain more, and maintained little or no focus on that goal.
The same exists in several areas of my life: I've been trying to be a better parent to my children and partner to my wife. I think i've made some strides but not consistently and not as effectively as I'd like. I've just finally gotten around to starting to make efforts to address the lingering need to unpack at home and instill some organization and structure, which greatly impacts my moods on a daily basis. As I recently told my mother in law, prior to a full blown effort to clear away boxes in the garage, navigating to the clothes dryer required performing a scene from Swan Lake. There's a huge amount of things I have been longing to tackle and the list builds, but I fail to keep up with it, and that's not necessarily because it's unreasonable. It's because I don't keep focused on the goals throughout my day. I'm more directed by the tides and winds within a day then I am by a charted map and compass.
This brings me back to the purpose of this new website category. It's based on a technique I used when I was a Sophomore in high school and reached the highest weight i'd ever been in my life. I set a goal to lose it, and I really wanted to achieve that goal. At the end of the school year I told everybody about the goal in advance. I'd made it public, and in doing so, managed to keep it in the forefront of my thoughts. Why? Because setting a goal I know I don't reach is easy to shrug off, but when everybody I know is aware of the effort, there's an aspect of saving face, or of 'putting your money where your mouth is' that comes with the territory. I knew at the age of 15 that if I went all around campus and told the people I'd see again that following fall that the i'd be 'half the person I was' when they saw me again, i'd make every effort to do so. I'd be embarrassed as hell to come back in September in the same condition, and so proud to come back having done what I set out to do. And I did. And based on that experience, I'm going to do so again. In broad strokes across numerous aspects of my life.
I'll probably refine it a bit along the way but if all goes as planned, this category will have a weekly entry in which, much as the namesake of Bridget Jones' Diary did, I'll record a brief snip of how I did that prior week in each of the areas I'm trying to focus on. I'll give myself a grading, perhaps comment briefly on failures or successes, maybe an overall general comment, and that'll be that. I'll make it brief, simple, concise and to the point, which will also ensure i avoid any inclination to wax poetic.
And if all goes well, in a month's time, I'll be able to look back and see progress, or at least have the lack of progress kick me into gear for the week ahead.
