2021 Resolutions

I’m not a great “goal setter” per se in terms of New Years resolutions. Or in general. I have, in the past resolved to do things, but usually around my birthday rather than around the New Years.

But in 2021, there’s no getting around the fact that we’re entering into the year not necessarily 100% better than we left 2020. On January 20th, things get somewhat better (in terms of more boring), but the pandemic still rages, the lockdowns still are in place, and life isn’t “normal.”

Realizing that, I know I’ll have to recalibrate my goals when things return to more normal, until then, here’s a list.

Separate Work and Life

This is really difficult, because the difference between work and life is “which computer am I using” and “what room am I using it in.” I’m not returning to the office for some time, and while I’m moving my home office to a different room, my “commute” per se will still be measured in feet.

This will require gamification. There is no “getting in my car” and “arriving to work” and “going to Starbucks on the way to work.”

I wake up at 5AM and I have to take my daughter to school at 7:45AM. I start work between 8:30 and 9AM.

The goal for 2021 is to make sure from 5AM to 8AM I do not — and I repeat — do not engage with anything from my phone or computer. No doom scrolling, work or computers.

This requires not taking my phone to my garage where my gym is, which means I have to write the next days workout on the whiteboard the night before.

So to keep work and life separate, I’m isolating the things that enable “work” and “life” to their different corners, and not allowing them to co-mingle.

Drink Less

It’s all cute and adult until it’s not. I know from friends and the Twitter-verse that the anxiety around the election, and the general “meh” of life entire has people exploring all manner of drink delivery options, types of Scotch and the like. Me included. It’s expensive, but it’s also this kind of chemical way to force the mental gradient down to 0 at the end of the day.

I need to explore better ways of doing so, which means exploring things such as meditation (I am not good at that) or even just going for a walk (I am bipedal).

Control the Things that Can Be Controlled

I’m sure I’m not alone in this, but with an election year, a raging pandemic, social unrest: it wasn’t a good year for control freaks. As evident (waves around at a house that talks to me), I like having absolute control of everything from my lighting to the environmental systems in my house. I like to feed my brain with information and then be able to act on it.

To be one of 7 billion people, or even 350 million people all effected by the same thing creates a paralyzing sense of chaos. It is very difficult to think, “others are as pissed as you, and it’s their job to fix it, not yours to worry about it.”

Easy enough to say, easy enough to repeat, but you still find yourself up at 3AM researching how the electors certification in Michigan works.

Twitter and the instant nature of media has created a sense that if you can read it, you can effect it. Twitter in particular does this because when something you say can and does effect things, it can lead to disastrous consequences (see Bean Dad). The illusion of effect driven by the collapsing of media hierarchies and influence does nothing for calibrating what your real sphere of influence is.

Here’s a hint though: reach your arms out and turn around 360 degrees. That’s your sphere of influence.

Don’t Allow Normal to be Normal

At some point mid year, we’re likely to get a shot or two and things will start returning to a semblance of “normalcy.” That’ll be fantastic. I remember normalcy from about a year ago. But normalcy itself had things about it that I’d rather not lock myself back into.

Namely: normalcy was about movement from one thing to the next more than it was about standing still and taking in the “now.” We’ve all been focused to be introspective recently, and share that introspection with people close to us. I don’t want to revert to the entropy to the extent where all I am doing is catching myself while constantly falling forward.

Whatever normal ends up being, it can’t and shouldn’t be the normal I enjoyed. As shitty as the “now” is, its version of “normal” involves a lot more time just being..me and with my family, us. That all in all isn’t a bad thing.