Happy 2008, Everyone!

I’m not normally a fan of resolutions. They’re just added pressure that I typically don’t feel like dealing with. This year, though, for one reason or another, I feel compelled to make some. The plan is to keep them as general and time-insensitive as possible, but I’m an idealist and a dreamer, so they’ll probably end up being far too lofty for my own good. Nevertheless, here goes my list of resolutions:

Dematerialize.

I have a ton of stuff. Too much stuff. And it’s just that: stuff. My room is 30% wires, 30% clothes, 30% books and other reading materials and 10% miscellaneous nonsense. There’s just no need for it. Considering I’ve only spent a collective 2 months in my room in NJ this year, there really is no need for me to hold onto a lot of the stuff in it. I obviously don’t need it if I can go 10 months without it. The only problem is that a good portion of it is sentimental-type things. Trophies from high school, mementos from different adventures, and the like. I can’t bear to part with some of it. I’m finally getting to the point where I’m ready to ditch some of my old HS t-shirts and things, but how I’m going to tear myself away from a lot of the other stuff remains to be seen.

Focus.

This may seem kind of obvious, but I’m relatively unfocused compared to my former self. I used to be able to handle a million things without letting a single one slip. I still can for the most part, but I’m finding that now that many of the things I have to juggle require a great deal of effort and attention, it’s more difficult to handle all sorts of auxiliary responsibilities on top of them. Part of this effort is my decision not to T.A. any courses this semester. Considering I’ve T.A.’ed a total of 8 or so courses in the last 3 semesters, this is going to be a huge time saver for me. It should hopefully give me time to focus on things that I’m even more passionate about. I’ve done a good deal of focusing myself this past semester and I intend to continue on that path. It’s been such a relief to remove myself from a lot of clubs and things that I was only attending out of obligation rather than sincere interest. I’ve always been involved in billions of things at the same time, but I think I’m at the point where I’d like to focus in on a few and really devote myself to those.

Explore.

This seems kind of contrarian to the above resolution, but I think they work quite well together. The time I’ll free by focusing will allow me to explore new things. Explore also means to take some risks and try things I wouldn’t otherwise do. I did this my senior year of high school and it was incredibly rewarding. I hope to do this again and step out of my comfort zone. My comfort zone has expanded a great deal since high school, so finding something that I’m not comfortable doing is getting to be more and more difficult, but I think I’ll manage to find something that fits the bill.

Improve.

I have a lot of random skills that have been laying dormant in these past years that I’ve really missed. I miss playing the violin, volleyball, and soccer. I miss being really good at coding. I’m kind of falling behind in that respect and I’d really like to catch up to speed again. I’ve always wanted to learn to play the piano and to dance. I want to step out of my design comfort zone more often and make things that don’t scream “Jenn made this” all the time. It’s one thing to have a signature look, it’s another be to stuck in a design rut. I want to rediscover my “master of time management” self and get reacquainted. I want my photographs to be of National Geographic quality. I want to rediscover the wonders of pencil and paper, both in terms of writing and sketching. We’ve been apart for far too long. I want to get back to my former level of Spanish fluency. Most of all, though, I want to improve my followthrough. I want to make all of these goals into a reality.

So that’s my mission for 2008. 2007 was my best year ever in terms of the success of this blog and my posting frequency. I’ve posted 96 times so far this year, beating my all-time high of 57 in 2002. I’d like to think they’ve been better quality posts and posts worth looking back on. I hope to up my game even more next year.

Thanks to everyone who has been following along with my adventures this year and even more thanks to those who made those adventures possible. I hope you’ll stick around for 2008. It’s been a pleasure sharing my life with you this past year and I look forward to sharing what’s to come. If 2007 is any indication of what my life is going to bring, it’s going to be one heck of a ride!

Until next time…
Cheers!

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