Resolutions 2008

So I have finally decided on my New Year’s Resolutions for 2008. After spending 2007 without having a drink of alcohol, I feel like I need to do something at least as difficult this year.

To recap, my resolutions last year were:

1. No booze (Check!)
2. Write on my blog every week (Not so much!)
3. Make a concerted effort to meet my future wife (Maybe?)

For 2008, I’ve decided on the following:

• Health
  1. Flexibility: be able to touch my toes (seriously)
  2. Fitness: bench press my weight 3 times, do 60 situps in a minute, and run 5K in under 25 minutes
  3. Eating: finish half of what I cook for meals and eat out only once per week
• Wealth
  1. Contribute regularly to an RRSP
  2. Consolidate my remaining debt and eliminate 33%
  3. Buy less expensive/used items as much as possible
• Wisdom
  1. Only check Facebook once a week
  2. Take notes when reading important books relating to my masters
  3. Make time to catch up with family and friends

Oddly, of all of these, the Facebook one will be the hardest to keep. I’ve been thinking about them over the past couple of weeks, and every time I feel the urge to Facebook, I remind myself that I will have to learn to say no. But I don’t want to. It is an urge that goes far beyond any urge I ever had to drink alcohol.

Facebook is an amazing phenomenon. Despite its repeated, inexcusable privacy debacles, not only has it survived, but Microsoft recently spent over $200 million dollars to buy a 1% share! It is such a time vacuum that many professional workplaces have blocked it from their computers. In other words, they don’t trust that their employees will be able to resist it long enough to complete their work-related duties.

If you don’t think this is a serious addiction, note that there are already two websites ready to setup 12-step plans once people realize they can’t kick the habit.