Naively Optimistic for a Better 2012

I know, I know...I'm a few days late for a new years blog post. I'm a bit of a lazy blogger. I have also yet to write down any definitive resolutions.

I just hope, at this point, that 2012 doesn't hurt as much as 2011. Not just for me and my family, but for a lot of people. It seems to have been a horrible year for most people I know.

My 2011, in review:

• Had a good paying job, hated it but needed it.
• Wife gets extremely sick and has to have expensive surgeries.
• Got fired for not making sales quotas. I'm not a salesman, btw.
• Was denied unemployment so wracked up more survival debt.
• Got a new job that I like but pays very little and has crappy hours.
• Wife has more health problems.
• Got another new job, slightly better pay and hours than the other, but since I have to work both to make ends meet, it still sucks. I love this job, btw.
• Continue to work 2 jobs, for about 15 hours of work per day.
• To tired all the time to care about anything. I stop exercising. I start eating more to stay awake. And I get addicted to caffeine.
• I get fat again.
• 'Cougar Town' got cancelled.
• Still can't survive to we have to file bankruptcy. Everyone thinks we are doing just to be ass-holes. But we had no other options. Really.
• Brother-in-Law dies.

Now, I have to say that there have been some good things this year. I do have a job I love, where I get to play around with computers all day long. My kids are relatively healthy and happy. And they're doing well in school. A sister-in-law got engaged (not the same one that lost her husband). We have had a great holiday with lots of family time.

Now, in the spirit of blogging on the fly, I will now set my New Year's Resolutions as I write them. How's that for effective goal setting?

So, without further ado, and without any fore-thought whatsoever, I present you with:

Ben's New Year's Resolutions 2012

1. Lose weight. Again.
2. Break caffeine addiction.
3. Get into a house, with a yard.
4. Make enough money for Tauni to be a stay-at-home mom again.
5. Learn to play guitar. For reals.
6. Run a marathon and qualify for the Boston Marathon.
7. Write a novel. (my 2013 resolution will be to get it published)
8. Spend more quality time with my wife and kids.
9. Repair damaged relationships with certain extended family members.
10. 100% Home Teaching.

There are probably a few more things I should add to that list. Maybe I'll do some mid year resolutions to round it out a bit.

Am I the 99%?

I have debt. I have lots of debt. I have soul-crushing amounts of debt. I lie in bed at night stressing it. It affects my relationships through lack of sleep and an over abundance of stress. I work 70 hours a week just to drown more slowly.

I guess I am part of the 99%.

But then, I wonder...

No one forced debt upon me. All if it is in direct result of decisions I made. Although, some of it was taken on with certain plans in mind, like career opportunities that are no longer possible. Some was taken on because I had an extremely sick wife, and doctors like to be paid. Some was built up slowly over a long period of unemployment, and then another, albeit shorter one, a few months later.

I guess that makes me a hybrid.

I have debt that I naively assumed. I didn't understand where it would lead, and I was fooled by false promises. My fault.

I have debt that life circumstance forced me into. I saw no other alternatives, and I still don't.

Am I angry at the system that facilitated my financial ruin, like those 'occupy' people? Yeah. Hell yeah!

But...

I am angry at myself, too. I'm angry at myself for not learning more about the consequences before signing. I was short-sighted and greedy and gullible.

I suffer and my family suffers. I have been a burden to my loved ones.

It's my fault. Not solely my fault. But I'd say at least 60% my fault.

I think one of the major problems with people today is the inability to take responsibility for their decisions. You have to place blame where blame is due.

The Art of Self-Compulsion

The lessons and discussions in church this morning got me thinking. And this post will be putting those thoughts to paper.

If you are reading this, whether you are religious or not, I how you stick with me. This post is about mankind, not religion or God.

We were taking about prayer, specifically about praying for our Heavenly Father to place specific opportunities in our lives. And it occured to me: what we are really praying for is to be compelledinto those opportunities.

For example, when we prayfor help being more humble, what we are really asking is for Him to make us humble. I think it is human nature to look fire someone to do the hard part for us. In some ways I think atheists have an advantage in this regard. They believe that there is no one there to help them, and so they are more motivated to act.

Now, I do believe in God. So, I do find myself sitting around waiting for asked-for blessings to start raining in on me.

But, this is wrong. Religious our not, atheist or Muslim, Jew, or Christian, you have to work on yourself. And for yourself.

Ok, now I want to leave theology behind and talk solely about people. I hope you're all still with me (is it funny that I pretend to have readers, our just sad?).

So, how do we, as the post title suggest, self-coerce? Or self-motivate? How do we move ourselves forward in lieu of waiting for others to do out for us?

I think that self-improvement is important to just about everyone. But I think our own motivations often slide around, between self-gratification, self-improvement, and sometimes even self-destruction. Actual selfless-ness is pretty rare, if not completely foreign, for most of us.

I'm rambling. Sorry.

Let's get back on track with an example. I want to learn to play the guitar. I've even made some really good starts in teaching myself. But, after years of owning a guitar, and all of the materials that I need to learn, why can I still not play guitar? Truthfully? I think it's because it takes actual effort on my part and no amount of waiting for someone to do that work for me if going to work. I can't just pray for it and suddenly rival Slash.

So what other personal improvements am I waiting for someone to do for me? I have no job. Maybe someone is going to just approach me and offer to hire me to do my dream job for an absurd amount of money. Yeah, I'm sure that's how it will happen. Or, maybe, if I go out there and do some searching along with my praying, I'll find something, an opportunity of some kind, to support my family financially.

I guess I don't really know what my point was in all this rambling nonsense. Maybe just that we need to stop waiting and start doing. Maybe this has just ben a whole lot of chewing myself out. I know I needed it.

Funk - Invictus

So...I've been in a bit of a funk. Not the self-destructive kind that I have plagued myself with in the past, but still a funk. I have felt demotivated and discouraged, and above all, tired.

I need a success. I need a little glimpse of glory to spur me forward and shake off the chains that are pulling me down.

I need a victory. Specifically, I need a victory at work. A big one. One of the save-my-job-or-get-a-new-one kind of victories.


In honor of my special needs I am posting my favorite poem. And, for the record, it was my favorite long before they made a movie named after it.

Invictus

OUT of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance	5
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,	10
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:	15
I am the captain of my soul.

I have, always loved that poem, since the first time I read it.

If you read this, respond with an inspiring poem of you own.