Nope, not posting a New Year's resolution. Absolutely not.
Well, maybe, kinda.
Marking the Earth's full orbit of the sun in the frigid month of January seems a reasonable starting point to embark on new endeavours, or revisit some abandoned ones. Therefore, am I seated at my desk rebooting an old blog with hopes that it will become a useful and entertaining creative outlet.
2011 is in the books, and frankly, good riddance. From a personal standpoint, and for friends and family, it was a difficult year. That is not to say the coming year will be any easier, but at least for the moment we can imagine the turning of the calendar to represent a clean slate.
I believe that psychologically, the metaphor is a healthy one. Over time we begin to realize that our victories are just as fleeting as our failures. In both cases, when the dust settles we must start anew, hopefully carrying forward all of the lessons learned from those experiences.
Perhaps the most important lesson derived from any experience is to keep goals in sight, but expectations reasonable. Those proclamations of radical lifestyle change made at 12:01 AM, 2012, will probably be slapped down by 12:01 AM the following day. Then what?
When browsing through sound clips to put together for a New Year's eve broadcast at CJIM, I came across a funny but also profound observation from the 90's sitcom 3rd Rock From The Sun. In case you didn't already know, the show centred around a group aliens sent to Earth disguised as humans to study our culture. Google it, and you'll get the picture. The scene I came across contained a quote from the alien character Dick, who observed:
"I don't understand this whole hullabaloo about New Years. It's so arbitrary, the Earth makes one orbit around the sun right back to this random point, I mean the man who came up with this calendar thought the Earth was flat. Do you really want to be on his team?"
I suppose the underlying message is that really any day can mark a New Year. That's good news for any one of us whose January 2nd gym membership is a financial liability by the 2nd of March. Beyond that, it's useful to know that we can stumble along the way to self-improvement knowing that the calendar has no mystical power over us, other than that to which we ascribe.
So Happy New Year, whichever year your are starting, and whenever you choose to start it. I wish you health and good fortune, surely something we can hope for at any random point as we orbit the sun.
