September Resolutions

Well, August was kind of both a success and a failure. After one week of hanging out with family a lot, we then had another week of hanging out with family a lot--this time, my husband's side. And it's still going! Things aren't going to slow down around here until school starts. It's been fun, but I'm ready for a routine again, I think especially for the sake of my resolutions. I did my best with August, though, and that's what counts.

I'm really excited for this month because I've decided to focus on Intellect. It's the first month of school, and I want to make a great start. But I also want to be motivated intellectually outside of school.

Here are my resolutions:

1. Start school assignments the day they're given out. 
Too often, I wait until the last minute to start an assignment. If I get in the habit of starting things right away, even if I don't finish them, I'll stay one step ahead.

2. Go the extra mile. 
Extra credit, extra reading, extra study, whatever it is--I want to do just the little bit extra that will put me ahead of the game.

3. Look for new knowledge. 
If I read about or hear about something that doesn't really interest me, a lot of the time I'll just let my eyes glaze over and forget about it immediately. I want to appreciate learning new things and recognize that there are no uninteresting subjects, only uninterested people.

4. Read the news every day. 
College students are sometimes really uninformed about current events, and I'm certainly no exception. I want to read the news every day, even if I only read one article, just to know what's going on in the world. On campus they give out a free copy of the New York Times every day, which is fun to read (not that I read the whole thing!) but I could also read news online or even the student newspaper. I want to mix it up a little bit so I get local news as well as national and international. (I'm voting in my city elections this year and I want to stay on top of that, too.)

5. Write every day. 
This is fast becoming one of my most important resolutions. I added it at the last minute to August, and it turned out to be a big success. Now I'm adding it to September, too. It can be really hard to write every day when I have a lot of other things on my plate, but even if I'm just writing in my journal, it will count. I'm also going to count my book blog now, because I'm trying to do a better job with it and it's kind of my main project.

So, those are my official resolutions! It's kind of a lot, but August turned out to be almost too easy--not that I did everything every day, but when I did, it didn't feel like as much of an accomplishment as it did when I got all the check marks on a day in July. (I don't know if that sentence made any sense at all...) Also, I like the mixture of very specific goals ("read the news every day") and more open-ended goals ("go the extra mile"). I like having both--if they're too specific, then I get nitpicky and frustrated.

Here's to September! I'm excited!