As most of you have probably gathered, I am-- despite all efforts-- a pessimist. January is a tough month for pessimists. We read your peppy statuses about leaving last year behind and focusing on what lies ahead and we...to be honest, we cringe.
You are led by Bible verses like 2 Corinthians 5:17: Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
We sit in our recliner, watching the news and get all King Solomon on everybody: What has been will be again; what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. [Ecclesiastes 1:9]
Let's face it. It's hard to have a fresh start when it appears that your surroundings haven't been desperately sprayed with Febreeze. Like put on a blindfold and go to a meat factory Febreezed.
These unfortunate enigmas continue to plague your yesterday, today, and tomorrow:
1. The Gym Bo [Bimbo]: Whether it's 2007 or 2013, GymBo will continue to haunt your resolutions. No high school basketball shorts for this fashionista. She glides on the elliptical like an African gazelle and her ponytail only bobs up and down, like a perfectly timed Whack-a-Mole at Chuck E. Cheese. She looks at you with a combination of pity and deep satisfaction in her perfection.
2. The Walgreens Whack: You know how you wanted to be more patient in 1998? Well, man who doesn't understand why the lady can't double his coupon at 11:30 p.m. is still around. Oh they won't take his coupon? He'll show them and buy his toothpaste using 3 different payment forms while you sit there hiding two boxes of Tampax. And he can't believe they don't take the bags out to his car.
3. Man vs. Food: Calorie counters sound so awesome in January. Then it's March and you're going, "I don't give a flip what kind of rice this is! It says a cup of dry rice is less calories. Maybe I'll eat it dry. No, no, I won't. I'm getting a cheeseburger."
4. Informed Insanity: We're all going to be more informed and passionate the next year. Then you scroll down your Facebook newsfeed. And you see that passion is separate from information all together. And that people like guns... a lot. And that if someone can scrap together a poorly-written post about how evil Wal-Mart is, they are automatically an expert on entrepreneurship and the economy.
5. Quality Time: I'm going to put down my cell phone more. I'm going to turn off the TV and read. Then you'll read the same paragraph four times and decide that it's easier to vicariously not think through the Kardashian family. And when that weird dude in the waiting room wants to talk to you, you begin to play Words with Friends...anything with friends as long as you don't have to be present.
Despite my "Why isn't there more milk in my glass?" perspective on life, I can say that goals are attainable and a new year really can be a "new" year. But realize that the battles will be there waiting for you.
So pick the elliptical on the other side of the gym and avoid Walgreens late at night.
"We cannot change our past. We can not change the fact that people act in a certain way. We can not change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude." - Charles Swindoll
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