New Year Resolutions: To be or Not to be
New Year’s Resolution – To Be or Not to Be
January 1, 2007
On December 30, 2006 I drafted an excellent article that I was going to post to my Blog. I took great pains to write it as objectively as possible – it was not just good, it was excellent – a Classic. Unfortunately, when I clicked on “publish”, I got an error message, and the entire article was lost. I could not recover it, and I’m having trouble recovering from that loss. But, if you care to bear with me, I will try to recollect the wisdom of that article and save it to a document that I can preserve, and then post it to this blog.
I have toyed with making resolutions on the beginning of each new year probably as long as I can remember. At age 73, soon to be 74, that has been, for me, a daunting endeavor. Practically speaking, resolutions have a duration of a few weeks, and sometimes go for as long as a few months. Is it good or not-so-good to make a resolution – that is the question. Personally, I see no harm in it, I believe it is totally beneficial.
All resolutions are to benefit and/or improve ones-self. Some people may disagree with the concept of making resolutions (that will probably be broken) by saying that after you have “broken” the resolution, you can just add that failure to your other failures. Not so! If we are to better ourselves, we must perpetually make such resolutions. With the opportunity afforded by the beginning of a new calendar year, we can in theory begin a new life for ourselves. It is purely a psychological thing.
I was brought up Catholic and I attended a Catholic elementary school. We were required, usually, to go to confession every Friday during the school year. In those years we were required to tell our “sins” to a priest and ask for forgiveness. It was a daunting experience and one designed to make us examine our conscience and refresh our memory of the things that we had done wrong since our last confession. The benefit was that we were taught (and convinced) that when we walked out of the confessional our souls were as pure as the wind driven snow. We were starting out, at that point, with a brand new fresh soul which we could keep pure or mess up at will. No doubt about it, that snow white soul did not last long, but I remember all too well how refreshing it was to walk out of the confessional knowing that I had a fresh new start on life. There was a lot of embarrassment before going into the confessional, and also while we were in the confessional. This is good. There is no gain without some pain. Unfortunately, today, the Catholic church no longer requires telling one’s sins to a priest – now you simply “reconcile” with God by meditating and being sorry for the sins you have committed. Personally, I don’t think that that arrangement “cuts it” at all. In fact, I believe that the elimination of “confession” in the true sense, that is, confessing your sins to a priest (and bearing the embarrassment), has been one of the chief causes for the Catholic Church to go downhill in attendance, membership and devotion.
One of my resolutions this year is to be more attentive to furnishing articles to my blog. I have been admonished by a number of people because I have not published more articles. In response to those people, especially Steve Pasetti, my Connecticut computer Guru, I will make an effort to be more diligent and produce more articles in this blog. I believe that my readers also enjoy viewing some pictures that I have taken and I will be posting some pictures both here and also in my web albums. I have recently posted some pictures of our Christmas decorations and they can be seen at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/CharlesNardonester
My other resolution is to eat less. The winter is a very difficult time to lose weight, but if I can take one day at a time (beginning January 2nd), I think I can make a start. Especially if I maintain a daily journal and track my weight.
Happy New Year, and don’t hesitate to write me with your thoughts – especially about what I have expressed here. I cannot put my e-mail address in this Blog as it will result in spam.
January 1, 2007
On December 30, 2006 I drafted an excellent article that I was going to post to my Blog. I took great pains to write it as objectively as possible – it was not just good, it was excellent – a Classic. Unfortunately, when I clicked on “publish”, I got an error message, and the entire article was lost. I could not recover it, and I’m having trouble recovering from that loss. But, if you care to bear with me, I will try to recollect the wisdom of that article and save it to a document that I can preserve, and then post it to this blog.
I have toyed with making resolutions on the beginning of each new year probably as long as I can remember. At age 73, soon to be 74, that has been, for me, a daunting endeavor. Practically speaking, resolutions have a duration of a few weeks, and sometimes go for as long as a few months. Is it good or not-so-good to make a resolution – that is the question. Personally, I see no harm in it, I believe it is totally beneficial.
All resolutions are to benefit and/or improve ones-self. Some people may disagree with the concept of making resolutions (that will probably be broken) by saying that after you have “broken” the resolution, you can just add that failure to your other failures. Not so! If we are to better ourselves, we must perpetually make such resolutions. With the opportunity afforded by the beginning of a new calendar year, we can in theory begin a new life for ourselves. It is purely a psychological thing.
I was brought up Catholic and I attended a Catholic elementary school. We were required, usually, to go to confession every Friday during the school year. In those years we were required to tell our “sins” to a priest and ask for forgiveness. It was a daunting experience and one designed to make us examine our conscience and refresh our memory of the things that we had done wrong since our last confession. The benefit was that we were taught (and convinced) that when we walked out of the confessional our souls were as pure as the wind driven snow. We were starting out, at that point, with a brand new fresh soul which we could keep pure or mess up at will. No doubt about it, that snow white soul did not last long, but I remember all too well how refreshing it was to walk out of the confessional knowing that I had a fresh new start on life. There was a lot of embarrassment before going into the confessional, and also while we were in the confessional. This is good. There is no gain without some pain. Unfortunately, today, the Catholic church no longer requires telling one’s sins to a priest – now you simply “reconcile” with God by meditating and being sorry for the sins you have committed. Personally, I don’t think that that arrangement “cuts it” at all. In fact, I believe that the elimination of “confession” in the true sense, that is, confessing your sins to a priest (and bearing the embarrassment), has been one of the chief causes for the Catholic Church to go downhill in attendance, membership and devotion.
One of my resolutions this year is to be more attentive to furnishing articles to my blog. I have been admonished by a number of people because I have not published more articles. In response to those people, especially Steve Pasetti, my Connecticut computer Guru, I will make an effort to be more diligent and produce more articles in this blog. I believe that my readers also enjoy viewing some pictures that I have taken and I will be posting some pictures both here and also in my web albums. I have recently posted some pictures of our Christmas decorations and they can be seen at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/CharlesNardonester
My other resolution is to eat less. The winter is a very difficult time to lose weight, but if I can take one day at a time (beginning January 2nd), I think I can make a start. Especially if I maintain a daily journal and track my weight.
Happy New Year, and don’t hesitate to write me with your thoughts – especially about what I have expressed here. I cannot put my e-mail address in this Blog as it will result in spam.
posted by Chas Nardone at Sunday, December 31, 2006
1 Comments:
Hey, a new post! It's about time! :) Happy New Year!
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