The Best Kept Secret Blog - Anti-Resolutions
Despite being the reigning Queen of New Year's resolution making, I just can't seem to muster the gumption to do any goal setting for 2009. Even things as simple as "Eat more vegetables" or "Floss daily" don't get me going.
While some of you won't see this as a big deal, for someone like me, whose middle name could be "Reinvention", it's perplexing.
As I sit here pondering what's caused this apathetic state, I realize I've been disappointed one time too many. Despite years of listening to the experts, gurus and pundits and believing in The Secret, S.M.A.R.T. goal setting techniques and daily affirmations, I'm still a middle-aged woman who shops too much, carries five extra pounds and can't seem to give up her red wine habit.
I think it's high time to throw in the towel and acknowledge that maybe none of this works.
In fact, I'll go one step further and save the rest of you some time by offering up some anti-resolution guidance.
1. www.TheSecretIsBS.com
It takes courage to even write this, let alone believe it.
Every time I glance at these words or repeat them in my head, I imagine thunder and lightening and fire and brimstone raining down on me.
Yes, it's good to be positive and grateful but come on! It doesn't always apply.
For example, let's see you try telling a Mexican immigrant who makes $14,000 a year picking strawberries in southern California to ask the Universe to give him back the $720,000 house he lost in the sub prime debacle and you'll have a thing or two raining down on your head - primarily expletives in Spanish.
2. Make up your mind about the red wine controversy.
This was a year of mixed messages on whether or not drinking a glass of red wine a day is a good thing or a bad thing. The jury is still out and individual women must weigh the pros and the cons.
Drink red wine and decrease your risk of stroke and heart disease.
Drink red wine and increase your risk of breast cancer.
To this I would also ask you to consider the following:
Drink red wine and increase the odds of a calm, harmonious family life.
Drink red wine and decrease the odds of ranting at your husband and kids that possessing breasts and a vagina does not uniquely qualify you to clear the dinner table and pick up dog poo from the back yard.
3. Diets Don't Work
I don't care that Marie Osmond lost 40 lbs. on NutriSystem. As anyone who is even vaguely aware of the Oprahsphere knows, her Oprahness has gained Marie's 40 lbs. and has crossed the 200 lb. threshold.
And this is despite having a personal trainer at her disposal, a staff chef who can whip up roasted flax seed any time of day or night and a host of flaky friends like Marianne Williamson and Eckhart Tolle who encourage Oprah to figure out what she's really hungry for. (I suspect it's a side of fries with gravy though Oprah claims it's work-life balance.)
While I'm all for healthy eating and regular exercise, I encourage you to never underestimate the benefits of chocolate and the number of calories burned by reaching for the a cork screw.
Last January I made myself neurotic trying to live up to all my New Year's resolutions. This year I'm taking a moratorium from New Year - New Me goal setting. Check back in a year and I'll let you know how it's gone.
My hope is that I'll be better off for it - a healthy, vital middle age woman no worse for the lack of big goals. My biggest fear? That Oprah's 40 lbs. (previously part of the Osmond clan) will find their way to me.
