New Year, New Attitude?

Here's wishing a joyous and prosperous New Year to all!

Now to the meat of this message...what is it about a new year that invokes the desire to begin anew? As if we can stop being that undesirable individual, with all our flaws, extra pounds, procrastination, and any of the litany of our past faux pas, to become a new and improved us? What, indeed? As if by some miracle we can take this day and turn it into a fresh start. Eat some collards and black-eyed peas for luck, set goals and resolutions to not be us any longer, since we are obviously lacking, and need to improve! Do we find nothing but disdain for self, so much so that we are compelled to become something which we are not?

At what cost, this striving to be perfect? To have the bodies we and others can admire; to be healthy and fit? To have the minds we want; sane and unencumbered by stress? To give more, to exercise more, to eat better foods....It's obviously unattainable, this search for betterment, since year in and year out, we seek this "truth" only to find that we are utter failures, and in the end, we are what we are.

You've heard it a million times, you cannot change people, they have to want to change themselves. So true, and even when an individual deigns to attempt change within himself, her old habits will come creeping back in, the hard fought weight loss creeps back on and you are fat again! An ode to niceness becomes a glimmer of a ghost of that altruist within us, and our demeanor reflects what we have always known...nice is as nice does, though crab apples are hard and bitter until they ripen. Really, a new year does not give me any indication that I have ripened...so why bother with resolutions that will fail? When do we know when the time has come....when we are ripe enough to find success at resolutions?

With this in mind, I have resolved to make an effort to write in this blog, day in and day out. Something, anything, just for my own peace of mind. Writing is catharsis, and a way to de-stress and a way to stress myself out beyond belief. I will love grandly as I can, and will make no excuses for being me. I'm absolutely wonderful, in case you don't know it, and if you look deep inside yourself, you will find that you too are an awesome and wonderful person. I have no aims to lose 5 pounds, nor to get up and exercise, or attempt to change my evil ways. I will not pretend to stop looking on with disdain towards many of my fellow human beings. No, I have no such delusions set for today.

Today is my day to write. That I can do...and if I fail to keep up the charade, who will stand up and take notice?