Come on, Baby!  Let’s do the twist!

Today is January 2nd, and I am thinking about the List of Intentions for 2015 that I scribbled in my journal.  Being a process-oriented innovative type and not the get-‘er-done-and-check-‘er-off-the-list implementer type, there is nothing on my list with any defined or measurable outcomes.  In the past, I have tried to quantify resolutions into SMART-goal format — unsuccessfully so — as I gravitate toward quality experiences that are momentary and poof they are gone.

As I result, I do not make any New Year Resolutions.  I don’t say that I am going to kick butt at the gym and run for 10K 6 days a week, or that I am going to write 2000 words daily in one of my ongoing short stories.  I do say that I am heading to the gym or that I am going to write when the afternoon quiets down.  Perhaps if I were to quantify or to schedule such things, life would feel more accomplished.  Would I feel more successful?  I don’t know. I read once that it is better to schedule one’s priorities, rather than prioritize one’s schedule.  It is something to experiment with: schedule my priorities.

On my list for 2015, I wrote things down such as: Smile more.  Laugh at absurd moments that enter my life.  Meditate.  Exercise my mind and my body.  Play “Allegro” on violin and/or mandolin and do not slow down to lento in the more difficult passages.  Dance more.

I used to go dancing every weekend.  Friday or Saturday or Sunday night. . . or all three nights.  It was an important part of my physical, mental, and social life.  It still is important to me . . . I just don’t go to the bars anymore to get my dance groove going.

I woke up this morning with Chubby Checker’s “The Twist” running through the latter stages of my dream.   Then I found this awesome video, and it really made me smile.  And laugh out loud.  I felt so good that I felt prompted to tune my violin.  It was cantankerous due to having been moved into a new climate, but it is happily singing now.  I then spent some time meditating to further enjoy the morning.  Meditating always feels good.   When I completed my meditation, I found myself humming “The Twist.”  Then I replayed the video again.  Turned up the volume on my laptop and twisted with the awesome dancers on this video.  This definitely put me in a very happy place.  Back to one of my intentions: laugh at absurd moments.

What does this mean to me?  The power of writing.  The connection of writing to realizing my goals and my dreams.  After scrawling my “resolutions,” I was not consciously aware that I was following my morning’s “to-be-experienced” list.  When I wrote these things, I was thinking of a fuzzy concept to be wafted into my future 2015 — things that I enjoy doing or experiencing.

What I learned from this?  In the morning, make a short list of intentions that I would like to experience today.  Nothing definite or solid . . . just things that would be fun or fanciful or maybe even practical to see or to do or to be.  Then see what happens.  Write down wacky or unlikely things along with the more specific things with measurable outcomes like going to the gym or taking 10 photographs to document today’s awesomeness.

So, I guess this does create a resolution for me this year.  Be open.  Write things down in a dedicated notebook.  Look back at what I have written at the end of the year.  Start checking things off.  [This is beginning to feel like SMART goals!]  Be happy and celebrate the things in life that give me joy and that provide laughter.