Happy new year. Or is it "Happy New Year!"? Or maybe it's "Happy Gnu Year!"?. Whatever. I haven't written in a while. Now I'm writing about my new year's resolutions. You're thrilled, surely.
Instead of the specific resolutions of year's past that always get thrown by the wayside, I have decided to embrace a more conceptual idea of resolutions. Rather than things I will do that I didn't do before, these are ideas and behaviors about which I will become more resolute.
Health
I shall endeavor to be more healthy, the whole mind-body-soul thing. I don't know if that means I will ever take a yoga class, but there's still hope. I will try to find the inspiration I need to move my body again. I want to feel all the muscles connect and work together. I am going to try and free my psyche from the baggage--no, CRAP, that I've been hauling around. (see "self" below and "forgive" a bit further down). This may or may not involve interaction with a trained mental health professional; jury's still out on that one.
I will also heed the passage of time and limit my intake of garbage, for all the reasons that's a good idea.
Self
The last few years of my life have been, without question, kind of difficult. I'm not saying I didn't make the bed in which I now lie, but still, some tough times. I have ( new-agey word alert) "processed" much of the "information" I've gained over these years and I think I am now standing as tall as I've stood in a while. (Easy for me to say...) There have been some truly dark moments. Here I must also say without my friends I would not be alive. I wholeheartedly believe that.
Friends
My friends are my wealth, and I am rich beyond measure. I will cherish my treasure each day. I will no longer worry about who called whom last, or more often, and focus instead on what each friend means to me, and be the embodiment to them of that friendship. (I think that makes sense.) My friends have gone so far above and beyond the call of any "duty." I am humbled that they care so deeply for me.
Learn
My brain is very unhappy with me. Brain sad. Brain lonely. For too long I have let it graze along, munching quietly on nonsense and vapidity. My brain used to like me a lot, but I don't think I ever gave my brain the credit it deserved. Now I say, "Stand UP Brain, be accounted for! I shall not let you atrophy one millisecond longer." My brain is hungry for many, many things, and I will allow it to feast. Promise. Pinky swear. Really.
Write
I'm doing it! I'm really doing it! This sounds silly, honestly, but I watched a documentary about JERRY SEINFELD and he said something that affected me more strongly than anything in a long while. He was talking about how he would grudgingly work on his act 2 or three days a week, and then one day he saw some construction workers going back to work after lunch, and how even though it wasn't the greatest job in the world, they were going back. Jerry (I feel I can call him Jerry) said, and I'm paraphrasing of course, that if they can willingly go back to work day after day, week after week, the least he could do was give his job (which he felt lucky to have) the same dedication. There. That's it. It goes hand in hand with "Learn", but I have to use it, or I will lose it, in more ways than one.
Debt
I am not speaking simply of financial. I owe the world my consideration. I owe the earth my concern. I owe my friends my undying love and friendship. (I owe myself my undying love too, but that's harder.) I am going to honor my debts.
Forgive
This is the toughie of the bunch. I will forgive my parents for being my parents. I will try and remember that they are people who made questionable decisions under difficult circumstances that affected me greatly for a really long time. I can't say I will no longer feel the effects, but I will forgive them for their part. I will forgive myself for my own weaknesses. I must be true to myself and if I am successful, maybe the fear that has infiltrated all the cracks and crevices will go away. If I can forgive myself for the things I haven't done, or didn't do well enough, or did the wrong way, perhaps I can clear the way for finding out what I really want to do, and the voice and power I need to get it done.
Oh, and I'm going to learn Spanish. I am.
Today is the first day of the rest of the week. That's as much slack as I'm willing to cut it. Maybe tomorrow it will be better.
Who am I?
- Jennifer Walker-Shannon
- In my 15 years of marketing and project development, I have herded the cagiest felines, and wrangled many a word. I was born with the ability to string words together into sentences with relative ease and moderate skill, and I can manage complex processes, projects and people. While some think I have the patience of a saint, it is really an unnaturally high tolerance for pain that allows me to meet timelines, budgets and make disparate elements come together successfully. I am married to the most wonderful man in the world, Brett Shannon, have one cat, and many aspirations. Among them are: being a great wife, a good friend and a tolerant human being. Others include finishing my novel, finding a publisher for my biography of photographer Frank Worth, and ridding my cat of fleas. I am optimistic about most of those, but the whole flea thing is getting pretty annoying.
The Shannons
Subscribe To
Posts
Comments