With the New Year starting, tons of people decided what their resolutions would be for this year. By now, chances are they have already forgotten what these were and have gone back to their bad habits. If not, they might do so in coming weeks. Then again, it’s possible some rare individuals will make lasting changes in their life this year. I suppose we should strive to be these individuals.

Then again, life changing resolutions are so much work to keep up with. Isn’t it possible that people see to big and sabotage their own chances of success by choosing objectives to far out of reach? Or it might simply be that despite their best intentions, they never put in the real amount of effort needed to succeed. We all wish for the best, but what we really need to do it make it so.

For my part, I made a few simple resolutions. Some will demand great effort and others will be more fun.

First of all, I am going to transform my spending habits. If I ever want to own a house, or even an apartment, I need to calm down on the spending. This one won’t be easy, but I’ve already improved greatly since last year, so I know I can go an extra mile this year.

Secondly, I am going to start training at the gym again. I will go with friends two or three times a week (during work hours, no escaping it) and will also start a martial arts or boxing class with my husband. Both these activities will be a good opportunity to spend time with people I love and get healthier at the same time. And it doesn’t hurt that my new training shoes are pretty flashy.

My third resolution is to work more frequently and with more discipline on my master’s degree. I am fantastic at working on 4 contracts at the same time, but whenever I don’t have a deadline and have to work on my own projects, I am a little too inefficient for my liking.

And, finally, I have decided to post less often on this blog. How is that a good resolution? Because I have decided I want to post articles of greater quality. Although it’s fun sharing about everything I find interesting and funny, I simply can’t read papers and write about anthropological research on a whim. Anthropology posts require lots of work. Lots of work demands a lot of time. And last semester, I invested a lot of time on posting three times a week, sometimes more, and rarely published an anthropology post I was really happy with. So let’s see if I can change that this semester.

I look forward to this new year and I wish you all the best!

– The Geek Anthropologist