- Read a book (non-school related) every 2 weeks. Not necessarily a firm goal/hard cutoff of 2 weeks, but more so as a measure to prevent the brain-rot of being on my phone 7 hours a day (thank you Apple analytics for that terrifying statistic) and then being on YouTube/Hulu the rest of the time. Let's say 40 min a day, at least 20 min before bed.
- Work out 3 times a week (it doesn't have to be the intense 45 min long HIIT workouts you did back in your prime days (I hate that I'm 22 and I already feel like I'm already past my prime but that's a whole other emotional disaster box that I don't wanna open rn), but maybe just 15 min of maintenance so that I don't feel like my muscles are atrophying).
- Try a new recipe every month. For someone who loves food as much as I do, it's pretty pathetic that I only know how to make around 20 dishes well. Plus, the whole process of grocery shopping for new ingredients, making the dish, and eating the final product is very therapeutic. Maybe set this is a goal for the first Sunday of every month.
- On a related note, go to the Farmer's Market more often. Go after class on Fridays! (Aka go to bed early Thursday nights so the thought of lugging back 15 pounds of groceries doesn't make you want to fling yourself to the ground)
- Review notes more regularly (maybe every Wednesday before the seminar, sit your ass down and read through it all. What have I retained from 4 years at Western? Absolute NOTHING. @ MY 2 BRAIN CELLS: WE ARE NOT LETTING THIS HAPPEN AGAIN)
- Make an effort to talk to a new person/put yourself in a slightly uncomfortable situation more often. You can wax poetic all you want about how your parents not processing their trauma has made you the fucked up, the impossibly reticent/terrified-of-rejection person you are today for as long as you want, but at the end of the day, it's up to you to step up and actively change yourself. Plus, you've slowly come to realize that you have a freakish ability to remember faces/people's names. If you do something dumb, chances are people won't remember you/it!
- Spend more time exploring Boston and Cambridge alone. Feeling awkward all by yourself is a GOOD THING, you need to learn to live with that feeling (more than just learn--embrace and maybe even enjoy it). Also, I don't want to graduate without seeing all the cool places the city has to offer. Make an effort to go to more events! Enrich your life! School isn't everything! (And maybe this will give you more things to talk about with people. There's a stark difference between awkward silence and companionable silence)
- Do more things for the environment: stop eating red meat, stop shopping at fast fashion places, and just generally do more things to reduce my carbon footprint.
- Make friends outside of your program. After a break from them, it's pretty obvious that their presence is toxic for your mental health.
- Work on your essays a little bit every month instead of writing them all the week before and freaking the fuck out. By end of April, they should be done. As a birthday gift to yourself, they'll be edited and polished by the end of May and ready to submit.
- Sleep more (everything bad I do such as not working out because I'm exhausted, eating too many sweets because my sleep-deprived brain craves sugar, not retaining information because I haven't given my brain enough REM sleep, having bad skin/my UC flaring up, etc. is related to this). Every year I write this, and every year I fail, but I'm still determined to make a valiant effort at accomplishing this.
dec 31 2018 ∞
dec 31 2018 +