WELCOME 2023!!

You Better Shape Up or Ship Out!

It’s that time of year again when the evergreens and holly, the turkey and dressing, the family and friends have all seen their day and the next big thing is the coming new year. For some, it can’t come fast enough, for others, that door needs to open slowly and with great caution. For some, this is a time of great reflection and organizing, for others, it’s an explosion of newness and hope.

However you enter the new year, it is upon us and with it, a time stamp for assessing what is important. I had the opportunity this week to sit down and start planning what the new year might mean for me. Thinking about it, I don’t believe I have ever done that before, at least not so very deliberately. After about an hour, I realized that I needed to place some assumptions on my activity, some limitations, some reality. That’s where it got serious. Actually writing down some of these assumptions I realized how life has taken some unexpected jogs and turns and how these may not have been optimally met.

The exercise forced me to do some self talk that was hard but necessary. Ever since I retired, I have been living, basically, without a schedule. I have met events as they come. Sometimes a flurry of activity is required to meet expectations but what the heck, I’m retired, right? My dad would have called this “Flying by the seat of my pants”. And he would not be happy with me for doing this.

An unscheduled life is not a good thing. Without a schedule, one’s life just rolls away with time killing, worthless activity. Much of this activity takes place in a chair. And, for me, this cannot continue.

I had a sweet little business before the pandemic but with the virus came a lot of confusion about how to continue. So I didn’t continue. Before the pandemic, I had a sweet little dog who made me walk 45 minutes each day. When she died, I quit walking. I won’t say how many pounds I have gained or how difficult it has become for me to just move around, but it is not good. After the election of 2016, I developed a great interest in politics which drove me to read, to study, to assess the state of my country and the world around me. But with this focus, came the realization that my country is now run by a crime family; my vote no longer counts because voting fraud is rife in this country; WWIII is on our doorstep, a fact ignored by western leaders around the world as the U.S. continues funding war in Ukraine at unbelievable levels. And the resulting disappointment is unsettling and alarming. And this is just the short list.

There are some things here that are completely out of my control, but not all. So the thinking and planning and assessing continued. What do I want? What is important? How do I want to spend my time in 2023?

For one, I will schedule time to get my business back on line. It won’t be easy because I have to re-vamp the entire website and bring it up to date. In addition, I have to re-assess the product line and keep it fresh. I have to do a few things relative to standardizing shipping costs and ensuring that the online credit processing works flawlessly.

I will also plan to allow for the spiritual in my life which has been sort of “on the fly” recently. I will schedule it.

Other positive influences will also figure heavily in the schedule. Music, reading, anything to keep my mind active will be on the schedule. And we will be getting a treadmill. Our other treadmill broke a few years back. We will have another one in 2023 and my time on it will be part of the plan.

Oh, and all that political stuff. That may be out of my control, but I can validate the craziness at least by writing about it. Substack is a great platform to expose the seedy underside of the world. My heroes need more exposure too. Whether Saint or Sargent, I love heroes and will write about them.

I’m not done yet. I don’t know what else is to come but the planning is not complete. I am not exploding on to 2023 nor am I being extra cautious in opening up that door. But one thing I do know…whatever I do in 2023, it has a greater chance of being planned and deliberate than the “stuff” I did in 2022.

However you burst onto the 2023 scene, I hope it is spectacular. I hope 2023 is everything you want it to be.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!