It’s the end of 2013 and that time of year when FB and Instagram becomes populated with everyone’s photo-collages and year in review of statuses; when everyone publicly lists their year’s worth of life’s milestones while ending with some variation of a statement about how they “can’t wait to see what the new year holds in store.” It’s also that time when everyone reposts one or more of the 5 million articles written by someone giving their “best advice” on what to/not to do in setting new years resolutions.
I won’t lie. I’m tempted to write such a list and make such a photo-collage because I’ve definitely done some things I’m very proud of and hit some important milestones. But I’ll resist, at least for now, and attempt to do some more inward reflection–something that’s often lacking in our outwardly expressive generation.
I will, however, give an update on this month’s personal challenge. I stuck to my plan of doing the same number of reps each day as the (date x 10). I did pushups days 1 -10, jump lunges days 11 – 20, but I only did abdominal exercises days 21 – 25, but added in doing 100 pushups every other day. The last few days of this month I focused only on successive pushups. I set an overambitious goal of 100 pushups, and while obviously I wasn’t going to reach it, I did manage to finish proud. This afternoon I pumped out 40 (real) pushups without quitting. And then a few seconds after I did quit, I felt so silly that I didn’t get to 50, that I dropped down and did 10 more. So this will be an ongoing personal challenge of being able to complete 100 without stopping.
Since I’ve already been giving myself personal challenges that are about 30 days or so in length, I think I’ll just go ahead and make this a thing. No New Year’s Resolutions, but monthly challenges instead. But they have to be realistic. Not that one shouldn’t aim high, but knowing the limits of your attention span and your energy, especially when working full time, is so necessary to maintaining your own sanity and sense of accomplishment. So Goodbye, 2013 and all its challenges and achievements. Hello, 2014.
January 2014:
- Practice portuguese at least 4 hours a week
- Finish 4 books on my shelf
- Get to 60 successive pushups
like black butterflies 