It's August 1st and it's crazy that July is over. July was an action-packed month and unfortunately August will not be. My bills are through the roof so I find myself grounded at the house with no money to use for exciting adventures. It's a wrestling match just to find enough money to go out to eat. And Wisconsin? Yeah, the trip that I wanted to take--well, the trip I still WANT to take--won't be happening because all the money I saved up (and then some) went towards fixing my car (three times it had to be taken to the shop this past month; perhaps it's outliving its usefulness?). As I launch into the new month, there are three goals I have for myself:
Lose 5 more pounds. This would put me at 140#. My original goal was 142# and I'm three away from that. I'll need to really start running if I want this one to become a reality. I look decently skinny (at least compared to a year ago), and I'm glad for that--but I'm still not content. Some people say being discontent is a bad thing. Sure, it can be, if we just take that discontentment and let it fuel our resignation, sitting on our asses in the dust and wailing about our own miserable state-of-being. But it can be a good thing, too: it can prod us to make changes, to pursue contentment; to embrace risks and dangers and adventures, to push ourselves beyond our hypothetical limit. It can make us curse and sweat and scream and bleed, and it can make us actually accomplish something, however insignificant it may be. Anyhow, my goal is to lose about 1 1/4 pound a week. That should be pretty simple if I stick to the regimen (in reality, I could be to 135#, but I doubt that will happen).
Quit smoking. I tried to quit last month and failed. This month I'm going to try again. As I told my best friend Jessie, "I think the problem is that I can't imagine life without smoking--if I were to quit smoking, it would demand a reorientation and reconfiguring of everything. It'd be like dismemberment." And when I tried to quit, that's how it felt. But I'm going to try again. I've been doing imaginative exercises in the effort to see what my life can be and become without smoking involved.
Write a book. Specifically, that book on repentance. I'm almost done with the second chapter; it's around 30 pages long. Quite a hefty chapter, but foundational to understanding repentance. I have about ten chapters planned for it, broken into three sections, and I have tons of notes and ideas and thoughts to convey onto paper. Hardly anyone will read it, but it'd be a nice accomplishment. The gospel's demand on repentance is not taken as seriously as the gospel's demand on faith, when in reality the two go hand-in-hand. And for those who say that faith is more important than repentance, I remember the ancient Jewish saying that repentance is the first--not the second--half of faith. Anyways. I'm going to try to finish the book, and meanwhile I'm pondering a book called "The Myth of Destiny" that, well, has the potential to be liberating, depressing, and will probably piss a lot of people off (if I write it well).
Lose 5 more pounds. This would put me at 140#. My original goal was 142# and I'm three away from that. I'll need to really start running if I want this one to become a reality. I look decently skinny (at least compared to a year ago), and I'm glad for that--but I'm still not content. Some people say being discontent is a bad thing. Sure, it can be, if we just take that discontentment and let it fuel our resignation, sitting on our asses in the dust and wailing about our own miserable state-of-being. But it can be a good thing, too: it can prod us to make changes, to pursue contentment; to embrace risks and dangers and adventures, to push ourselves beyond our hypothetical limit. It can make us curse and sweat and scream and bleed, and it can make us actually accomplish something, however insignificant it may be. Anyhow, my goal is to lose about 1 1/4 pound a week. That should be pretty simple if I stick to the regimen (in reality, I could be to 135#, but I doubt that will happen).
Quit smoking. I tried to quit last month and failed. This month I'm going to try again. As I told my best friend Jessie, "I think the problem is that I can't imagine life without smoking--if I were to quit smoking, it would demand a reorientation and reconfiguring of everything. It'd be like dismemberment." And when I tried to quit, that's how it felt. But I'm going to try again. I've been doing imaginative exercises in the effort to see what my life can be and become without smoking involved.
Write a book. Specifically, that book on repentance. I'm almost done with the second chapter; it's around 30 pages long. Quite a hefty chapter, but foundational to understanding repentance. I have about ten chapters planned for it, broken into three sections, and I have tons of notes and ideas and thoughts to convey onto paper. Hardly anyone will read it, but it'd be a nice accomplishment. The gospel's demand on repentance is not taken as seriously as the gospel's demand on faith, when in reality the two go hand-in-hand. And for those who say that faith is more important than repentance, I remember the ancient Jewish saying that repentance is the first--not the second--half of faith. Anyways. I'm going to try to finish the book, and meanwhile I'm pondering a book called "The Myth of Destiny" that, well, has the potential to be liberating, depressing, and will probably piss a lot of people off (if I write it well).
No comments:
Post a Comment