New Year’s Resolutions and other Horrible Ideas by Connie Vines

New Year’s Resolutions.  Everyone makes them; everyone breaks them.

Need additional stress in your life?  Then go ahead and make resolutions for 2020.  Proclaim your intent to friends, neighbors, co-workers, and even strangers you might encounter on the street.  Tell everyone so he/she can remind you, about mid-February, that you’ve fallen-off-the-rails—or worst yet, you never made it to the station.

While I’ve had my share of failed resolutions over the years (I’ll share those later in my post), I compiled a list of ‘what were you thinking?’ resolutions.

• Quit Your Job.  Calling your boss up on New Year’s Eve and leaving voicemail that you quite your job is one of the worst New Year’s resolutions you can ever act on? Why? Firstly, your savings account is probably looking rather unhealthy. Plus, after the holiday seasonal hires are looking for new jobs, meaning competition for that position you want is going to be tougher than ever.

• Join A Gym Straight Away. Joining a gym straight away doesn’t necessarily mean you’re going to stick to it. Studies have found that 60 per cent of gym memberships go unused and that by mid-February gym attendance has subsided back to the pre-Christmas levels. Instead, sign-up for a gym class, or walk with a friend (human or furry variety) in the early morning or in the evening.

• Travel.  Booking a one-way ticket to some far-flung exotic destination. Great; what about your house, your pets, your job, your partner, your debts? The list goes on and on. Although traveling is great, booking a flight as part of your New Year’s resolution because you hate the monotony of your life.

• Join A Band.  Just because the likes of “insert name of your favorite band” started their epic career in a garage, it doesn’t mean you’re going to follow a similar path.  Bad, very bad idea.

• Find Someone to Marry (in real life).  Yes, I know I write romance novels with always end with a HEA. However, ‘finding someone to marry’ and ‘falling in love’ are not interchangeable terms.  Even if you’ve had your parents nagging you to settle down all Christmas or you’ve been paraded in front of what feels like a hundred happy couples at numerous festive parties, then your desire to find someone to marry might be higher than normal. Yet, love strikes when you don’t expect it. So, don’t try to plan to find “the one”; give it time and you’ll find someone when you least expect it.

My failed, or repeated fails, of past New Year’s resolutions.

• Weight loss, of course.  I’ve joined and rejoined this popular program several times—always with limited results.  The past several years I’ve utilized Pinterest to save ideas and recipes.  I also downloaded “My Fitness Pal” application.  It’s free and I am able to scan, track, and sync with my Fitbit activity tracker.

• Go to bed early.  I’m a night-owl (or a closet vampire). Mid-night is my early-bed-time, never mind that I must bound-out-of-bed at 5:45 AM each week day.  My primary doctor asked me ‘how much sleep to you get each night?’  I hedged, “how may hours should I be sleeping?” He responded, firmly, “at least 7 hours.”  “7?” I was shocked (I come from a long-line of night owls) and confessed, “6 hours. . .maybe.”  He stared me down and ordered me to get at least 7 hours.  When I returned home my husband asked me what the doctor said.  I replied, “He told me that I failed sleeping.”  Unfortunately, my husband found this extremely amusing (he’s an early to bed and get-up at 5:00 AM type of person—he even cat-naps). 

• Which leads me to. . .going to bed by 10:30 each week night.  Sounds like 7 hours sleep, doesn’t it?  If I fall asleep at 10:30 PM (snort), I’m awake for a couple of hours, usually 2:00 AM – 4:00 AM.  However, on Friday and Saturday I stay up late writing and go to bed in the early AM.  I did purchase a satin sleep mask (think: Holly Golightly in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s) for my writing nights.  Of course, my dog (Chanel) tries to pull the mask off and my husband ignores us both. The mask does help.  Sometimes, I even sleep 8 hours.

Are you making resolutions for 2020?  Or do you have a few fails you'd like to share?

Remember my novels are on sale 75% off at Smashwords until January 1, 2020 --saving money and reading a wonderful story written by a BWL author is a great way to start the New Year!

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Best Wishes and Happy Reading,

Connie Vines

"What woman doesn't love a cowboy?"

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