By Miles Merwin

It’s that time of year again. Tradition says it’s time to make some resolutions on what you want to accomplish for the coming weeks, months, or year. So how to decide what’s important, and how to keep those resolutions from getting lost among all the other things to think about?

Resolutions can be very short term or stretch out over a whole year, especially those items from last year’s list that I procrastinated long enough to not get done. Yeah, some of the stuff in my workshop needs cleaning and organizing. If I exercise more, maybe I can put on a bit more muscle. Or I can spend the whole year working on ways to overcome annoying insomnia. Etc.

Then there’s the issue of how to organize this long, or short, list of resolutions. If you’re really centered, you can keep them all in your head. However, I’m a person who likes to make lists on paper, and not just at the beginning of the year. My lists can shrink or grow as time progresses, as I get some items checked off, or decide there’s something else more pressing at the moment. What I end up with are lots of little scraps of paper on the desk, bulletin board, bedside table, etc.

Or you can go digital and keep your resolutions and lists constantly at your fingertips on all your devices and out there in the “Cloud,” which never seems to forget, even if you do. I have a bit of the digital method mixed in with the analog.

Perhaps in the end it’s best not to overthink this whole New Years resolutions thing too much. Might be best to be content with making a few simple ones. And I might just accomplish some of them when the time is right.