Happy New Year!

Happy new year!  I hope everyone’s 2008 is off to a great start.

I went to bed early last night at the lame hour of 10:45 PM, but was woken up by fireworks at midnight.  All I had to do to watch them was lean forward in bed and look out the window, which was pretty cool.  The lazy man’s new year’s.

But, in fact, the year got off to a productive start.  I’m back to waking up early every day (including weekends) and tracking my goals with the Seinfeld method, which I found to be surprisingly helpful last fall in maintaining productivity.  I just started using a free web-app inspired by the Seinfeld hack called Don’t Break the Chain that looks like a nice tool to keep track of goals and provide some visual back-up.

As for making resolutions, I haven’t really done that for a few years, partly because I prefer Steve Pavlina’s idea of doing 30-day trials.  I also like Anomie’s approach to the new year, which focuses more on tangible, practical goals than grand lifestyle changes.

As I did last year on this holiday, I’m sharing a poem I saw on the wall in Penn Station in New York:

Temporary Well Being

The pond is plenteous
The land is lush,
And having turned off the news
I am for the moment mellow.

    With my book in one hand
    And my drink in the other
    What more could I want

But fame,
Better health,
And ten million dollars?

– Kenneth Burke

Here’s to being content in 2008!