I’m starting over today.  Today is not the first of the year, or even the first day of the week.  It’s not anything in particular.  It’s just where I’m choosing to begin.

See, here’s the thing, Downtown Dad and I lead a pretty interesting life, with blogworthy adventures practically every day, (Thanks for pointing this out to me Max!) and I totally take that for granted. Additionally, I’m an articulate person with an established blog, and access to the Internet on 4 devices that magically put an “add new post” screen, along with reference to the world’s knowledge at my fingertips.  …so as Timmons says to Dunbar in Dances With Wolves… “why don’t (s)he write?”

Why? Because I’m lazy.  OK, maybe lazy is not the right word.  How about I’m a procrastinator?  That’s closer, but if we’re being honest, I think I just have a real problem sticking with anything – a problem with committment.  I lack discipline.

Up to this point, I find something that inspires me, something I want to start, or change, then with a head of steam (or more often than not, a belly full of liquor) I shout from the rooftops (the rooftops, being this blog) “OK world, here I am with all my brilliance, watch me on my journey to…(fill in the blank)!”  And then the shine wears off, and I’m too busy, or too tired, or I’ve bitten off more than I can chew on my journey dejour, or I’ve had a soul sucking day and then, I don’t follow through, but worse, I don’t write.

This is true in other aspects of my life as well, like sticking to our diet/healthy eating/beauty detox plan.  I drink my hot lemon juice instead of coffee, I have my glowing green smoothie for breakfast, I choose salads over sandwiches for lunch.  But as the day wears on, my resolve wears down, and I end up in front of the TV with a bottomless glass of wine “because I deserve it.”  Therefore, Downtown Dad has lost 35+ pounds and 5 inches off his waist, while I   have plateaued   have lost 10   can’t put the wine glass down  have not.

I bought the book Unstuck, and a Wreck This Journal with the intention of giving myself inspiration to write every day.  I signed up for a Coursera class on Innovation, Creativity and Change, to kick my stagnant brain out of it’s doldrums.  As a result, I wont lie, I’ve got 50 inspired ideas dancing around in my head at any given moment. Plenty of them blogworthy.  But sadly, they fade away because I can’t focus on any one of them long enough to capture it.  And still, I don’t write.

So, one day, while I was not-writing and scrolling through Facebook, I clicked on a link to a blog where this guy named Randy Scott Hyde was starting a 30 day writing committment to cure his depression, based on Shawn Achor’s Ted Talk.  OK, I don’t suffer from depression, but I am searching for enlightenment, or is it contentment? Oh yeah, discipline… no wait, structure …oh look, a squirrell!  Whatever spin you’d like to put on it, Randy’s blog inspired to make my own writing committment.

Based on the structure that Shawn has neatly narrowed down into 5 daily tasks,

• Meditate
• Identify 3 new things you’re grateful for
• Do one random act of kindness
• Journal about one good thing that happened
• Exercise

and on the discipline that Randy has modeled, I propose a 30 day experiment

• For 30 days I will do every one of the 5 tasks every day.
• I will write a blog post about my experience with each of the 5 tasks every day.
• I will be honest.
• I will not give up.

A couple of those things scare the bejiggers out of me.  A couple will require herculean effort.  A couple of them turn out to be recurring themes that I’ve been telling myself to do in my Franklin Planner daily task list for years.  Key phrase there – “telling myself” emphasis on myself.  Well, this time, I’ve told someone besides myself, people I work with, and more importantly, I’ve told Downtown Dad, and now I’m telling you, so that makes it real.

I’m determined to not let another day go by without starting over.  This song by John Lennon has been running through my head the whole time I’ve been writing this, and inspired the title.

I know I’ve said this before, but please follow me on my journey, and keep me honest.