sunrise, trees, oil rig, north Fort Collins

New Year’s Resolutions

I usually don’t make new year’s resolutions. Why? Well, if I ever thought something needing resolving, the best time to make a resolution is right now, in the present moment. Why wait until January 1st?

But I can see how the start of a new year can be a good time to bring on changes in one’s life. A new calendar is like a clean slate; an opportunity to start anew. So this year I am going to make some new year’s resolutions.

What are they? Right now I have two. As usual, they are related to my perpetual “I wish I had more time” wish, something I have been obsessed about for at least the last 7 years (when I started plotting Early Semi-Retirement to give me more time for things important to me) and perhaps as far back as 15 years (when I was starting to pull all-nighters in high school and college). Here they are:

  1. Wake up early. For now I will define that as no later than 6:30 am, although eventually I want to be getting up before the sun does. Why?
    • It would maximize the amount of daylight hours to be outdoors or to just see sunlight (a proven mood enhancer).
    • It’s a nice feeling to have gotten a lot of things done well before half of the days is over.
    • It seems like every person I know of who seemingly accomplishes a lot of things wakes up early.
    • I would get to see more sunrises.

    The problem, then, is how do you turn a late-riser into an early riser? I don’t have any sure-fire methods so please drop me a line if you do. For now, my strategy will entail going to bed earlier and placing and turning on an alarm clock at least 15 feet away from bed (so I am forced to get out of bed to turn it off). It seems like having discipline is key: both in forcing oneself to go to sleep at a reasonable hour, and in getting out of the warm bed early in the morning.

    What could really help is if I could sleep less. I keep hearing about those people like Donald Trump (or my mom) who seem to get by perfectly fine on only four or five hours of sleep a night, but as one who seems to need 8-8.5 hours/night, I’d like to know how. This is something I plan on researching (expect a blog article on this sometime in the next couple months).

  2. Spend less time reading the news, aimlessly surfing the web, checking email, eating, and standing in the shower. I probably have a few other time-wasting habits, but those are the most egregious of them. (Note that I did not include “blogging” in this list because at least when I post on this website, I am getting practice in writing, organizing my thoughts and keeping a record of events for posterity.)

How well will I stick to these resolutions? Ask me in a few months! In the meantime, happy 2008!

sunrise, trees, oil rig, north Fort Collins
Sunrise as seen from Felix Wong's back yard in north Fort Collins.