New Year’s Resolutions

With the passing of the old year and the beginning of the new, many people make their traditional “New Year’s Resolutions”. I’ve usually eschewed these resolutions that more than likely will fail anyway. This year I’ve decided to give this whole resolution thing a go. I’m going to be successful at it too. I’m not holding myself to anything that I can’t do or haven’t done before and I’m going to focus on one thing at a time.

  1. My desktop is littered with different todo lists (Work, Home, Consulting, etc…). I’m going to get these cleaned off my desktop and into a comprehensive list where I can then focus on completing one of these tasks at a time.
  2. The open source community has a saying “Release early and release often”. I’m going to take this saying to heart but in the form of communication. I’m going to communicate early and often. Expect to see a lot more blog posts, tweets, status updates and the like from me in 2011. My goal is 1 blog post and 3 tweets a day.
  3. I want to work more. This seems like a strange goal since most people make resolutions to work less. I plan to work an extra 14 hours a week for the next 4 months. There are a couple of really simple explanations for this goal:
    • We are in the process of building a new house and I want to make sure to cover the expenses until our old house is sold.
    • I have a couple of personal projects that I’ve been meaning to work on but just haven’t found the time to do.
    • I want to finish up some of the projects I’m working on so I can focus on my next resolution.
  4. Spend more time with my family is always a perennial resolution for most people and it’s made my list as well. If I can pull off my previous resolution then I’ll have more free time. That free time is going to be spent with my wife and kids. I’m going to take those extra 2ish hours a day to play with my kids.
  5. I’ve lost close to 40 pounds before. I’m about 15 pounds heavier now then I was after that first weight lose. My next goal is 4 fold and must go hand in hand to achieve it.
    • Walk on the treadmill at least 3 times a week.
    • Eat at least 2 fruits and vegetables a day.
    • Decrease my portion sizes by 1/3.
    • Lose 40 pounds by the end of the year. Sticking with these first 3 goals will get me down those 40 pounds. That would put me on or about where my original weight lose goal was.
  6. At this point in my life I’ve been a smoker longer than I haven’t been. Once we’ve settled into the new house and things have calmed down it’s time to come up with a working quit plan that I can stick with.

These are some lofty goals for the next year, but they should be eminently doable with a strong commitment on my part and support from friends and family.