50 Radical New Year’s Resolutions

This little post is a blast from the past from last year (with a few new updates!).  With so many good ideas, it’s always awesome to have inspiration for the year ahead.

…That you can do all year

I’m a huge fan of New Year’s resolutions.  In fact, I love making goals for myself and lists of things I want & need to do.  Too often people create these vast, limitless goals for themselves… and end up failing.

Why set yourself up for failure year after year?  No wonder so many people hate making New Year’s resolutions! No one wants to feel like a failure… least of all to themselves.

So here’s some starters on a to-do list… many of them are on my own list… Instead of intangible resolutions, here are 50 goals and resolutions for the New Year… some are thoughtful, some are playful, some are total trash! But what fun is life without a bit of trashiness, eh?

1. Adopt a furry feline or canine friend for companionship on your year of adventures. Promise to feed them only the best food you can, and shower them with love daily.
2. Donate 1%, 5%, or 10% of your income each month to your favorite charity.  I’m a big fan of supporting animal and arts related organizations, myself.
3. Start working out today! TODAY. Start before the New Year– that first week in to New Year will help you build momentum for the upcoming year.
4. Check your spending habits at the door– start a shopping ban, lower your spending limit each month, or write a wish list of items you desperately covet to keep impulse buying at bay.
5. Curb your internet time.  Are you as sickly addicted as I am? Make sure you’re utilizing the best of your time–no more aimless refreshing of Twitter 20 times a minute, no more keeping Gmail open all day long.
6. Challenge yourself to read more– self help books? Memoirs of fabulous ladies? Craft inspiration? Read a book a month. Read 5 a month.  Push yourself beyond what you’re already doing (or, if you’re like me… FINISH the books you start!).  Or pick up a new section of the newspaper and read it front to back.
7. To help you with the above–get a library card! Use it often. Scour their shelves for unusual and old movies, utilize their inter-library loan programs.  (This also helps kick those bad shopping habits!)
8. Pamper those beloved clothing items– take your favorite worn out boots and pumps to the best cobbler for repair. Take that amazing, super discounted designer piece to the super-talented tailor so it fits you perfectly.
9. Plan a trip with your bestie to New Orleans, Disney World, Las Vegas, or San Francisco–anywhere to get away to a fabulous city for some relaxation & girl time.
10. Kiss every man (or woman!), while you still can, like a Lady.  (-The Sounds, Like a Lady)
11. Set aside one night a month to go out and dance until you drop.
12. Enroll in those lessons you’ve been wanting to take– Tango lessons? Photography classes? Pottery? House-buying or small business management? Why wait?
13. Put on one accessory before you leave the house.
14. Walk in to a salon and leave with the hair you’ve always wanted but been to scared/worried/professional to get.
15. Buy yourself bedding that makes you excited to go to sleep.  Get a memory foam mattress or topper to make it heavenly comfortable.  Get an indulgent comforter. Pile your bed high with pillows.
16. Spent 30 minutes a day doing nothing. Alternately, meditate.  I’m too anxious to meditate, but some days I just lie on the couch with a song stuck in my head for too long.
17. Don’t be afraid to ask you partner, your roommate, your parents, your children for what you need– alone time, help around the house, 7 hugs a day (true fact).  It’ll make everyone happier in the long run!
18. Click unsubscribe– to everything you really just don’t give a shit about.  It’s so freeing.  You’ll be amazed at what blogs you forget about and what sale alerts you really don’t miss.
19. Don’t be afraid to hit “Ignore” on those Facebook & Foursquare friend requests! You’re entitled to space, even on the internet, where you aren’t accessible to EVERYONE.  Again– it makes you feel so much more free if you know your friends are truly your friends and you can write whatever you want around them.
20. Drive 2 hours North, South, East, or West– and get lost. Discover your own state, your neighboring cities and what may (or may not) be nearby.
21. Write up love letters about all of those famous men & women who inspire you–what traits they have, what admirable things they’ve done– and keep those in a notebook tucked away with you.
22. Start riding a bike to work regularly– tone up and reduce your carbon emissions.
23. Buy yourself a treasure trove of lady toys throughout the year… after all, doctors in Glamour magazine say you should orgasm at least once a week for maximum health benefits! What better excuse than a doctor said so (even if it’s in Glamour)?
24. Find 5 new fruits & veggies to love this year. Eat them regularly.  Some of my favorites are sweet potatoes, turnips, and asparagus!  Yum– I can’t get enough!
25. Write a list of shopping wants to help curb your impulse purchases and inspire you to buy those pieces you’re crazy in love with.  Mine include a dresser, a Michael Kors watch, and feather earrings!

    

26. Invest in a crazy beautiful piece you’ll love and use forever–whether a purse, a watch, a great pair of black boots, or the perfect blazer.
27. Donate your time– to empowering young girls with an organization like Girls, Inc., to helping women get back on their feet at a shelter, or toward socializing and loving abused animals.
28. Make time for your body: make sure not to skip your yearly gyno check-up.  Have a physical.  Get your eyes tested if it’s been 2 years or more.  Stop by the dentist (maybe he’ll hook you up with a free toothbrush!).  Splurge on regular massages.  Your body is one of the one thing you’ll have FOREVER. Treat it well not matter what your age.
29. Reacquaint yourself with the theater, visual arts, music.  See some Shakespeare (I’m a fan!).  Indulge in a musical.  Many times you can volunteer and see the show for free.  Attend a museum, or become a docent.
30. Spend some time with your family.  It’s amazing to me how we get older and, if you live in another city than your family, it becomes so easy to…not interact with them.  Call your grandparents. Make plans to visit for the holidays (and do it!).  I’m not tight with my family, so it’s all the more important to me to do it.
31. I read that when you do something for the first time with your partner, chemicals are released to trigger happiness.  So do something new with them.  Often.  It can be a new restaurant, a new sexual position, going to the zoo.  Make sure to remind them, “New adventures together!”   It gets you both excited and increases the fun of it.
32. Pick up a membership/season tickets– for 2 (or for the family). To the local art museum, the zoo, the aquarium, for a sporting event….and go often.  Make it your escape.
33. Finally quit comparing yourself to others. Stop holding yourself to their standards, expectations, and successes (chances are? They aren’t telling you about their failures).
34. Pay the toll for 2 cars behind you.  Buy a stranger a drink, or tell them they’ve got a sexy smile. Do something great for a stranger.
35. Clean out your closets. Sort through your books.  Instead of tossing or donating them, swap them.  Join up with a clothing swap group; join SwapADVD, SwapACD, or Paperbackswap.  Get new goodies out of it. Save yourself some money, and save the landfills a little space.
36. Take charge of your financial well-being.  Set up a savings account through a group like ING Direct and contribute a little each month.  Max out your 401K if you aren’t.  Open a Roth IRA or 401K if you don’t have either set up. Subscribe to some personal finance blogs. Hell, just setting up a budget and USING it if you don’t have one can make all the difference.
37. Send your mother, grandmother, sister, aunt, or any close woman relative flowers. Just because.  Buy yourself a bouquet, too.  (People think they’re overrated, but flowers have amazing powers attached to them.)
38. Go coupon crazy. Try to go without paying full retail. Shop for bargains, coupons, and discounts wherever you can. Revel in what you say, even at the drugstore or grocery store. (I’m a big fan of not paying retail–it allows me to buy more things!)
39. Find a mentor–whether in writing, blogging, styling, or in a subject like art history, finance, business management.  Pay it forward by becoming a mentor to someone else–whether it’s a child through Big Brothers/Big Sisters or a similar program or a fellow blogger.
40. Host a couch surfer. Or, like Ginger Corsair, offer your spare bedroom up through a site like AirBNB.com.
41. Eat at home more.  Take your lunch to work.  Try out new recipes.  Fill your body full of whole, homemade, good, & delicious foods.
42. Forgive someone.  Let it go of how they’ve hurt you, and give yourself permission to be at peace with them & your past.
43. Give yourself permission– to do what you want, when you want, and to be who you are, unapologetically. To be a Wild Woman.  To be powerful, strong, quiet, modest, comfortable with who you are.
44. Learn to sew– learn to reattach a fallen off button. To adjust your hemline.  Even minor repairs like this well keep your wardrobe in top shape.  For inspiration and help, I love the Wendy Mullin Sew U books–they’re great for beginners!
45. Buy faux eyelashes. Learn to put fake eyelashes on. Wear them everyday and everywhere for a week. Or longer!
46. Submerse yourself in a new genre or field–film, literature, music.  Learn about the forerunners in it, read the criticisms and theory (or wikipedia pages if you’re short on time).  Indulge in all the original gangstas.  Test out horror, romance, reggae, country, Medieval poetry, Feminist theory or queer studies, new wave/nouvelle vague (music or film? you decide!), Russian propaganda.  Love it or hate it at the end– at least you’re now a amateur expert!  Bonus points if you push yourself in to learning about something that makes you uncomfortable.
47. Read the major creeds and books of the world’s religions.  Do some reading on smaller religious sects.  Immerse yourself in philosophies too.
48. Invest in yourself–and your future. Get the degree you’re after.  Get certified. Buy the training course or e-books that will help you thrive professionally (and make you love your job more).  Take the plunge.
49. Say “I love you” everyday. To your partner. To your cat or dog and kids. Hug them, kiss them, and coddle them.
50. Wake up every day and say, “I’m fucking rad. This day will be great. I love myself, and I love my life.” Mean it. Believe it.

What are your plans for the New Year, sweet thing? Are you swearing off resolutions all together? Are you attacking 2012 with fervor and might?