» NOs, Loves and Auto Insurance

You pledge your love on Valentine’s. You express your gratitude on Thanksgiving. And on New Year’s, you make resolutions. Some people keep their resolutions, but let’s be real here, most people forget about them by the end of the month. Either way, three weeks of dedication toward a personal (sometimes ridiculous) goal is worth a discussion.

I asked around the office, asked a random dude sitting near me on the plane, and did some research (by research, I mean I “Googled” it), and have come up with a list of completely arbitrary New Year’s resolutions. Here they are, in no special order.

1. Get in shape. Eat healthier. Or in one co-worker’s words, “Get back to my birth weight.”
Yeah, you saw this coming. If you listen to the radio, you heard it coming too. All of those get- your-butt-in-shape-before-the-summer radio spots can intimidate anyone. Apparently, this is an annoying resolution for those who actually go to the gym no matter what month it is. Real gym-goers suddenly have to wait in line for the treadmill and watch January gym-goers struggle to figure out how much weight they can bench. Oops.

2. Take a picture a day.
With the hundreds of photo apps (What’s up, Instagram?), vision board apps (That’s for you, Pinterest), and just social networking in general, there’s a whole lot of photo sharing going on out there. Those channels of inspiration make this resolution easier and give all those photos a miniscule amount of more purpose. Smile for my resolution.

3. One blogger vows to “not take life too seriously, but remember how random it is, and take the right precautions (like auto insurance).”
Hmm. If you decide to quit your job and become a roadie just to find yourself staring at your totaled car in the middle of nowhere, you’ll know it’ll all be OK, because it’s 2012, and you have Geico.

4. Learn to say no.
People-pleasers live a tough life. While their congeniality is admirable at times, it’s often just unnecessary. No, you don’t have to ALWAYS be the one to run the last-minute errand that isn’t for you. You don’t have to show up to ALL five events that you’ve been asked to attend in one weekend. People will still talk, laugh and eat without you there. You might miss out on some things, but you’ll also catch up on sleep. I applaud this resolution.

5. Do what you love, and do it often.
Make a list of 15 things you absolutely love to do, then actually make time to do those things. Please don’t share this list with us. We’d like to keep this a judge-free zone.

Here’s to 2012, a potentially prosperous year full of NOs, loves and auto insurance!