New year's resolve: change

    This year, my only resolution is to change.

    I've made my share of resolutions, goals, and ambitions, and so my relationship with such things is firmly in the "it's complicated" category. I may talk more about that later, but for now, let's admit that change is what we can expect from the world, and trying to stay the same is what we can expect from ourselves.

    I want to find myself open to the things that are coming. In order to better do that, I'm adopting the practice of changing something about my life every week. Nothing permanent, just a temporary adjustment to see how life looks from a different angle.

    Some of my friends will probably swear off of chocolate, meat, or soda for the entire year. But I don't know enough about myself or the future to make that kind of decision in good conscience. Further, that abstinence will only reveal one dimension of life, one angle of experience. By changing many times, by allowing those changes to be a variety of experiences, I hope to see things in a much more nuanced light.

    At the same time, I am not focusing on abstaining. There are many ways to change yourself, one of which happens to be depriving yourself of something you want. But adding something to your life is change too. The culture of self-abuse that clusters around achievement and experimentation types serves to hide the fluidity and breadth of human life, and I've tried hard not to fall into that easy pattern.

    So here is the list of things I will be experimenting with, filled out as I come up with them:
    Week 1: Drink no soda.
    Week 2: A world without coffee.

    ...the rest will be updated as we go. :)


    I'm not going to ask you to adopt such a practice with me. But I am going to ask that whatever happens this year, you resolve to change. That is what it means to live.