Happy New Year!
I am just sitting here thinking about New Year’s Resolutions.
Realizing that I don’t really have any. Not the normal kind, anyway.
I’m not sure if I really believe in them. Oh, I’m sure that at times people make them, and then follow through with them, and that occasionally January 1st can be a great historical launchpad for an assortment of intentions. But overall, I think that if a person has to wait until the first day in January to begin to do something or to stop doing something else, well… the determination will probably fizzle out somewhere around Jan.10th or sooner.
I overheard a few of my nephews talking about this very thing over the holidays. See, they regularly go to the gym and workout a few times a week, all year long. Every year! But in the first few weeks of January they always notice an enormous surge in the amount of newcomers vying for time on the machines. These are the New Years Resolutioners. There seems to be an annual influx! My nephews know it is only a matter of time before the gym is back down to its manageable proportions! As for me, I am going to skip the part where I quit going to the gym by also skipping the part where I start going to it. Know what I mean?
I should eat more healthier. ← If anything, this should be my resolution. But no matter how great my intentions, my car will probably be in the Burger King Drive-Thru just as frequently in 2008, as it was in 2007.
I should really get a different job. ← But in all reality…
I should, I should, I should, I will, I will, I will….
Actually, all I want for 2008 is an ever-increasing desire to wonder.
What I most greatly want to [continue to] develop is an ever-increasing state of awareness. And I want my list of questions to grow, rather than diminish.
I want my level of understanding to increase in simplicity and in complexity, at the same time.
That may sound like a really silly New Year’s Resolution, but what I like most about it is that I can trust it.
I know that I will not only feel the same about it next Dec.31st, but will have done the thing, daily, between now and then.
I am perpetually awaiting
a rebirth of wonder.
-- Lawrence Ferlinghetti --
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6 comments:
A magnificent resolution Cip. May you have a wonder-full year!
Oh, Cip, I do like that resolution. And can you imagine NOT sticking to it? "Eh...I couldn't be bothered to be full of wonder about the world around me...so I just lived my year in a bored gloomy blur."
That would be MUCH worse that eating too many burgers. (Though I DO hope you at least cut down on those fat-filled monsters, sweetie! I want you to have MANY years of wonderment!)
To not have lost that sense of wonder (which we all possessed in childhood) is a gift.
That's a great resolution! It should be a pleasure to work on through the year.
Thank you all for NOT saying, "Cip, you are nutso!"
I wish you wonder!
Cip, you are nutso!
(Sorry, I just had to.) But you're also right.
Happy new year!
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