Another New Year

The calendar tells me that we have begun a new year. I've been wondering recently what would happen if I intentionally forgot what year I was born, and how my life would change if I actively ignored the clocks and calendars that surround me. But for one more year, I'm going to put aside such radical notions, and actively conform to our societal structures (y'know, more or less). Next year, we'll see...

Anyway, to take convention to its natural destination, here are this year's resolutions. I am going to try to feel more. Why I don't feel as much as I should is a mystery to me, and I don't really know if I want to feel more (ah yes, the paradox of actively wanting and passively not wanting), so that might be the trickiest. The other ones are easier.

I'm going to be more assertive. I'm paid to be the loudest, clearest and best idea "seller". Everybody in communications is. It's time I figured out what that means for me, and took the implied authority in that role seriously. (Rather than just being concerned with my competition, for example.) And often I've prevented myself from saying things because they seemed so obvious to me. I figured that everyone had already considered and disregarded my idea out of hand. But as I've started to express myself, I've found that I really am unique. I'm going to explore that. I have a crazy number of ideas, and I'm going to start making it other people's responsibility to edit them. (Actually, as I think about it, a surprising number of my ideas are 'taking'. I'm not taking credit for, well, anything actually. It's just assuring that I'm not the only wacko out there.)

Finally, I'm going to take more risks. Not in a para-snowboarding-near-rusty-barbed-wire-fences kind of a way. (More like a motorcycle-rider-fascinated-with-watching-motorcycle-crash-victims-in-hospital-shows kind of a way. That raises the reality stakes like nothing else!) I'm talking about the way I treat life. I've been playing it too safe. I'm going to jump and trust more. I've been watching some people I know do that, and I'm tired of being the jealous bench-warmer. I started some of that in 2006, and, well, I think it's working for me.

In short, I think I want to be more human this year. That sounds like a resolution worth keeping!