For someone with almost no resolve, I have an astounding amount of resolutions. Have more moments like this:
Read more, write every day, exercise every day, stop spending money like an idiot, stop eating garbage, stop gossiping, make big strides in my writing career, be neater, be more punctual, be a better friend, think better, learn stuff, try new things, be kind, be generous, be a better citizen, be happy with what I have, be calm, finish what I start.
These aren't New Year's resolutions. These are little orders I fire off to myself at five in the morning when I can't sleep; these are the things I think about when I'm doing one productive thing and can think of a hundred others I should be doing instead; these are the things that make me realize I am deeply, truly American, and addicted to the culture of self-improvement.
When New Year's day comes around, I wallow in resolutions. I weigh them, I consider them, I roll them around in my brain for days. Well, it's January 7th, and that's almost 2% of the year gone already. It's time to go public with my resolution.
I'm going to do a pull-up. And not by December 31st. As soon as possible.
That's it. It's my simplest resolution ever, and very common. It's really just one small, very attainable goal, and to many people, pathetic. There are probably fifty thousand blog posts about this very thing. But you know what? I don't really care.
The crux: it bothers me when people say things like, "I'm not creative," or "I'm not smart." And all my life I've said "I'm not athletic," despite having perfectly fine faculties, having two half marathons under my belt, and having taken goddamned gym class every weekday until I was eighteen years old. The only thing standing between me and athleticism is a pull-up, symbolic of all the things I can't do and have never done.
So we'll see how long it takes me to do something I thought I could never do, until the day I resolved I would. Bets?