2014 Road Map, Not Resolution

I am the anti-resolutionist. I don't do resolutions. They are too easily broken despite good intentions. I need more than the ticking of the clock from one day in December to the next day in January to undertake life changes. However, this year, I do need to make some big changes, mostly to do with the amount of stress in my life (which is mostly due to my job). I began thinking about Less Stress as resolution shorthand for 'leave work at a decent hour and don't try to do it all'. But then my never-ending creative longings spoke up and said, "Write a book! Create beautiful art! Sing! Play violin! Play guitar!" 

Hmmm. How to meld those two diametrically opposed needs: less stress on the one hand, all the creative stuff on the other hand (both of which come after my job)?

I created a Wordle. In it, I wrote the picture of what I want for my life in 2014. Turns out, less stress and my creative endeavors aren't necessarily diametrically opposed. It's a road map, not a resolution. It's a visual for the overlap of creativity and less stress. And I can return to it for direction when I am getting lost.

It's going to be a good year.

Permission to Read

I am the anti-resolutionist, as you may know from this blog post. It's ok. I've been called worse. I was waffling about what changes, if any, I'd like to make in my life.

I have decided. January is now officially my Permission to Read month. After work, and things a person must do to keep home and hearth from completely falling apart, I have given myself guilt-free permission to . . . read. Just read. Happy sigh.

This sounds rather anti-climactic unless you know my secret: as a child, I used to fantasize about being locked in the library all night, or ecstasy - all weekend! Just me and tons of books. I love their smell, I love their feel, I love the worlds they spin around me. I adore a well-turned sentence. I took books camping, babysitting and spent much of my elementary school years surreptitiously reading my own books hidden by the cover of whatever school texts I was supposed to be reading, or half-hidden in my desk. And sadly, it has been several years since I have felt I had the time to read for pleasure.

This Permission to Read month will do several things for me: 1. make me a better writer and sharpen my brain just by reading others' well-turned sentences and plots; 2. bring me sanity, relaxation and pleasure - all of which are much needed; and 3. give me some breathing space to think.

That's my rationalization. But really, it's all pleasure.

Less Is More

I won't even pretend. You exhaust me with your yearly tributes to the Roman god, Janus, a.k.a. New Year's resolutions. I am now strictly avoiding all articles and blogs that tell who has vowed to write two novels this year, start three different blogs to help writers, artists, entrepreneurs (take your pick), run five miles every day, develop 25% more products to sell, market to four more media outlets than they currently are, re-do their kitchen and/or bathroom and be the one to solve the current deadlock dilemma at work.

All of those things are well and good, but if I try to do any more than I am currently doing, I'm pretty sure my head will explode in a little blue, powdery puff of smoke. There are so many more things I want to do, so many more things I feel I should do, yet I have the distinct impression I am burying myself in my attempts to do more, more, more. I am buried under a mountain of more. More hectic, more projects, more stress.

At what point do I really understand that 'less is more'? I need to go to bed at 7 p.m. for a week and just read. I need to spend time in the woods and just listen. I need to sit and just breathe. I need a break from the chronic media barrage that is so loud it blocks out what is real. I need time to love and rest. I need less.

And before you say that I am turning 'less' into a resolution - I'm not. I may manage to do it, I may not. I'll be happy if I do; I won't feel guilty if I don't. But it's on my radar as something I need to keep tabs on.

I may send in my picture book to publishers with a nice query letter this year. I may pick up where I left off on my novel. I may concentrate more on writing than photography this year. And I may stop putting so much time into designing products for my Zazzle store. Or I may not. The important thing is that I don't have to pay tribute to Janus with my conscience.

If you are interested in the full David Orr quote, it is from his 1992 book Ecological Literacy: Education and the Transition to a Postmodern World. The full quote is, "The plain fact is that the planet does not need more successful people. But it does desperately need more peacemakers, healers, restorers, storytellers and lovers of every kind. It needs people who live well in their places. It needs people of moral courage willing to join the fight to make the world habitable and humane. And these qualities have little to do with success as we have defined it."  I have just taken a small snippet of his words in my image above, and obviously, the most impactful words in his full quote are that the world needs people of moral courage willing to join the fight to make the world habitable and humane. This is a growing part of my career life and one I embrace.

Happy 2013.