Resolutions of a kind

Monday  in mid-morning  Mystie

I don’t make a habit of making new year’s resolutions. I don’t feel that the new year obliges me to do so. I make enough resolutions in every season and for any reason that one specific time to do so seems unnecessary.

Still, I realized I did have some resolutions rolling around in my head that hadn’t yet made it onto paper — or the ‘net. So, why not use this occasion of the new year to commit them? Because it’s so cliche, that’s why.

Still, I’m going to do it. Matt says it’s too late for them to be new year’s resolutions. December resolutions, January resolutions, summer resolutions, baby resolutions, I don’t care. :) Here they are:

**1. Pray every day.**

I’m not too good at taking time. I’ve grown and have noticed sanctification in this area, but it’s time for some serious focus to be placed on it. I’ve said it before to myself and to my husband, but now I’m serious. Of course, I was serious all those other times, too. Yet, growth can be slow, but if it’s steady, it’s still growth. My new tactic is to utilize the primary quiet time I have alone — bathroom time. Yes, the non-mothers are grimacing and the mothers are saying, “What? That’s alone time?” But I have started actually shutting the door on my children and so far they haven’t torn the house down in those solitary two minutes — or the bathroom door. Really, my main realization is that it doesn’t have to be half an hour, 2 minutes here and there is actually closer to “pray without ceasing” than one half hour chunk.

**2. Teach myself and the boys the habit of picking up as we go along.**

I’ve been doing this with the boys as much as I can, but I realized it not possible to teach it to them much more without actually practicing myself. So, it’s time for me to get better at picking up as **I** go along so that they see it as normal behavior.

**3. Eat in moderation, lose the sweet tooth, and drink lots of water.**

Rather than any weight goal, which would fluctuate in post-partum, pregnancy, and nursing times, I really need rather to focus on habits and use my head. I just read French Women Don’t Get Fat: The Secret to Eating for Pleasure; there’s slight glorification of the legislation-loving culture, but still she advocates using common sense over radical diets or even radical exercise. It was quite refreshing overall. So, my resolution is portion control, cutting sugar for awhile to lose the taste and cravings, and drink 4-6 32oz water bottles a day.

**4. Read one book a month from our personal library.**

I’ve looked at reading lists, especially with all the classical education reading I’ve been doing, but it seems silly checking out piles of books from the library when there are shelves full at home that I haven’t read. I think one book a month is highly realistic and still allows room for a book or two from the library. I also want to start cataloging our own library while that is still an accomplishable task. But that’s not on my resolutions list. That’s a task I’ll get in the mood for and plug away at as the desire hits here and there, but it’s not essential at all, so I am keeping myself from making it a priority, as my organization-loving passions would love to have it.

**5. Post about a book I’ve read at least once a month.**

I think real learning is crystalized with application of knowledge, and one great way of application is writing. You put in your own words and thereby claim the knowledge you learned. You clarify your thoughts on it by having to make them into complete sentences. You gain practice in using the language in an educated way, which is nice after a day of speaking with a three-year-old. Really, the goal rolling around in my head for months has been to make at least a short post about **every** book I read, but one a month is more realistic and highly do-able.

There you have it. These are the main things I want to work on this year. Spiritual, dietary, cleanliness, and educational; it turned out to be well-rounded and I didn’t set out with that goal in mind. That’s happy. :)

This entry was posted on Monday, January 8th, 2007 at 10:44 am and is filed under Lady of the House. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.