'tis the season for resolutions! How will I use this year to become a better, different person? Lynn (Len) 2.0? Sign me up, baby!
But alas, it is well-documented that I'm not a patient person.
I'm a pacer, a leg-shaker, an interrupter, a constant phone-checker. I hate waiting, or, really, the lack of control involved in waiting.
It runs in my family - we've been known to ask for the check before the entrees come, and plan an exit before something even begins. What time does this show end? Why did I even get tickets? To essentially show up and wait for it to end?
By the way, I can't wait for this post to be over.
This is probably also why I am not a good listener. I want to listen. I care about what you have to say, really I do, but let's get this show on the road already, so we can continue to go, well, nowhere.
I feel like I've been going a whole lot of nowhere recently and I'm in a really big hurry to get there. I can't be bothered to finish an entire article, project, workout, night's sleep, thought. All starting somewhere and ending nowhere. The only thing I've finished recently is a donut. And, let me tell you, it was good.
Now, don't get me wrong, at work, I am a star at starting and finishing things. So, before you rush off and tattle to my boss, it's my personal life where it all falls short.
Pretty much the only thing worse than starting something and not finishing it is thinking about all of the things you started and didn't finish and how, if you had actually finished those things when you started them, if not the first time, but the tenth time, they would be off your plate, and well, done, and you could move on to the next things.
But where's the fun in that?
Sometimes I think about having been on a diet since I was 8 years old. If my math serves me and I'm being a little kind to myself, that's over 30 years on a diet. Do you mean to tell me if I had actually lost weight 30 years ago I could have spent the past 30 years of my life doing something different? Like curing cancer? Or becoming the first white middle aged lady rapper? Or finding out what all the fuss was about with Breaking Bad?
Gretchen Rubin writes about how all of our bad habits and patterns actually serve a purpose and if we can identify the purpose, we get closer to the root of change. For example, if you eat a candy bar every afternoon, it's maybe because you hit an energy slump every day at that time - you hit on a solution for it, congratulations you!, but how can you come up with a better solution?
Now I want a candy bar. No, must finish post.
Where was I? Oh right, so what does all of this starting and not finishing mean? For me, I think it's fear. Fear of finding out that I'm not perfect. I know the fact that I'm not perfect is shocking and mind blowing to many of you so, if you feel the need to take some time to eat a candy bar and reflect and come to terms with this revelation, feel free to take that time for yourself now. I'll wait.
Wait, you're done already? You're sure you don't need more time? Ok, whatever.
You know, maybe I never finished learning to play guitar because I'm no Carlos Santana or even Charo. Maybe I can't dance, swim well, paint, ride a horse, run a marathon, cook a proper dinner. Maybe I keep gaining and losing the same weight over and over because I'll find out that, under all this, I look perfectly average, maybe even worse than average, and not at all like Gisele.
Even worse, maybe all the things I've blamed on my weight really had nothing to do with it after all. Maybe they're thanks to other things that I also need to work on. Man, you mean I'm not done?
I'm tired just thinking about it. When do I get to be done?
Oh, I know: Never. It's all a little overwhelming.
I tell myself, I don't want to be perfect. Perfect is boring. But IS perfect boring? Or is that what imperfect people tell ourselves? I guess since no one is perfect, we'll never know.
But what's the flip side? A constant, lazy, circuitous quest for imperfection? If they give out medals for that, I'm definitely in the running for the gold. I'm like the Michael Phelps of imperfection. Quick temper? Borderline hoarding tendencies? Underachieving bank account balances? Check, check and check. I'm getting to imperfect at lightning speed.
Love yourself just as you are, they say. I call bullshit. I'm not sure that's always great advice. Hitler, you be you, I got you brother, never change. No, no, no.
Sure, we can have compassion for ourselves, and not beat ourselves up, but I don't see any problem in wanting to be a better version of yourself. Not for anyone else, but for you.
The problem is, how do you identify those things that you really can and should work on without subjecting yourself to crippling judgment? I'm not really sure.
I feel like I've spent the past year in a place wanting to move forward but really marching in place, marking time. And what I can say about that experience is it doesn't help anybody.
So as 2015 starts, I have a whole new list of to-dos, many of which are carry overs from, the, well, last 20 years. Some of them have evolved into more realistic goals over the years. Like, maybe "Get a body like Gisele's" is now more like, "Get a body like Kirstie Alley's after she lost the weight the 15th time - no, not when she lost it with Jenny Craig and went on Oprah in the bikini and had those weird control top pantyhose on with the seam- but that time right after Dancing with the Stars before she gained weight again."
This, my friends, is what we call progress.
And at least I finished this post. If nothing else this year, I can say that.
Happy belated new year, friends. May you end this year a slightly better you than how you began it - whatever that means to you.
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