The point of this blog is not to get you to have the perfect resolution. The purpose is for you to understand the path to getting better through your resolutions. You have to examine yourself and target what’s lacking and make it better. I want you to get moving towards your goals through an internal assessment of who you are and who you want to be. I’m personally never content in one space when I know I can do better. I try to keep moving forward in my attitude, my position and my vision. Nothing worth getting happens overnight, so start working towards that goal. Before I get into resolutions, let me first examine the purpose of resolutions so we all can understand how resolutions originated and what they should be.

There are several origins of new years resolutions;

The ancient Babylonians made promises to their gods at the start of each year that they would return borrowed objects and pay their debts.

The Romans began each year by making promises to the god Janus, for whom the month of January is named. The Romans believed Janus could forgive them for the wrongdoings in the previous year. They would make promises, believing that Janus would see this and bless them in the years ahead.

In the Medieval era, the knights took the “peacock vow” at the end of the Christmas season each year to re-affirm their commitment to chivalry.

At watchnight services, many Christians prepare for the year ahead by praying and making these resolutions.

Thanks Wikipedia ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My interpretation of a resolution is some vow or commitment to better yourself. I’ve learned to make my resolutions realistic. For example, “Being a millionaire by the end of the year” is not a resolution, it may be a goal but how realistic is that really? Now if you resolve to “Save ten percent of your income by the end of the year”, that’s a good attainable resolution. Shoot maybe by the end of 10 years saving 10 percent, you may be a millionaire.

My point is that all resolutions aim at making yourself better, self-improving, and becoming a better person, physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. As a young man, I had role models like; my uncle, grandfather and my mother’s boyfriend. As some sort of rite of passage, I always tried to think of a resolution that would make me better as a man or husband. I mean, they knew things about cars that I didn’t know so I would learn from them. My grandfather was a hard worker so I would try to work harder and not give up quick like I usually did. My mother would say, “Don’t half do it, do it until it’s complete”.

I’ve committed to several resolutions over the past 20 years or so. This is a list of resolutions as far as I can remember.

• Clean up my room more
• Take out the trash when asked the first time
• Learn how to swim
• Get my driving permit
• Learn how to jump-start a car.
• Learn how to drive
• Get a passport
• Pay off my Macy’s credit card
• Get accepted to college
• Study 4 times a week
• Learn how to cut my own hair
• Get a part-time job while in school
• Learn how to drive a manual transmission
• Don’t have any babies before I graduate college
• Don’t smoke any weed
• Graduate college
• Purchase a home
• Travel outside the country
• Pray more
• Volunteer/Mentor with an organization
• Pay my taxes on time
• Don’t get any speeding tickets
• Start my own company
• Join a church
• Lose 10 lbs
• Learn how to scuba dive
• Tithe regularly
• Eat red meat 1 time a week
• Join a dive club
• Run for office of my volunteer chapter
• Learn muay thai
• Don’t send out emails without proofreading
• Run for an office position of my national volunteer organization
• Start a mentoring blog

All of the previous resolutions were goals at one time. I can honestly say all of them were successfully completed.

My resolutions for 2014 were:

• Be positive, regardless of the situation be positive…make the situation better not worse
  • I think I’m at about 75%
• Control my temper…be quick to listen, slow to speak…2 ears 1 mouth
  • Also about 75%
• Wake up at 7am
  • Nailed it…although I didn’t say get out of the bed.
• Learn Spanish
  • Carrying this over to the this year
• Pay off all my credit cards…I paid them off once, gotta do it again
  • Umm paid all of them off but one by Dec 30th by Jan 1st I’m trying to pay off two
• Do not purchase any clothing
  • Let me try this again
• Go to Costco 1 a month…tops
  • Nailed it
• Blog once per week
  • Nope
• Learn to ice skate
  • Yup
• Finish screenplay
  • Didn’t even start
• Select 3 places I would live abroad (Bermuda, 1 down 2 to go.)
  • Still can’t think of anywhere but Bermuda, South America is a close second and maybe Capetown

Well, it’s the beginning of the year and I want to put out some resolutions that I plan on sticking to for the duration of the year. I have the intention of focusing on habits instead of goals. If I change my habits, then quite possibly I’ll meet my goals.

Listed in priority order.

• Focus on my spirituality and less on religion
• Read 3 books
• Learn Spanish
• Watch less tv
• Be positive, regardless of the situation be positive…make the situation better not worse
• Control my temper…be quick to listen, slow to speak…2 ears 1 mouth
• Pay off all my credit cards…I paid them off once, gotta do it again
• Let me try this again…do not purchase any clothing!…except boxer briefs
• Interview celebrities for my blog
• Finish 3 screenplay
• Investigate 3 places I would live abroad (Bermuda, South America and Capetown)
• Maintain 15% body fat
• Focus on wealth building not money
• Be happy!