StickK It

Today, I went to my first yoga class in months. I splurged on a "new member" special for two weeks unlimited classes-- it's a deal as long as I go more than three times. I spent a hour and a half practicing deep breathing, stretching, and lifting my own body weight. I spent the rest of the day being proud of myself.

Finally, no more being down for not sticking to my resolutions!

And the great thing is, I know that I'm going to follow through on this. At least for the next six weeks. I made a contract.

That's where www.stickk.com comes in. I think of it like the stick behind the donkey, when the carrot isn't working. I make a resolution, set the rules, and plug in my credit card. I asked my boyfriend to be my referee, and every Saturday he and I report back to the website. If I don't report back, or I admit that I haven't exercised enough, or he reports that I haven't exercised enough, I lose my $10 dollars (it goes to charity). If I was really smart, I would have made it something like $100 a week, because let's face it, with the amount I'm paying to go to yoga, I can afford to lose $100. You can also choose who to donate to, an "anti-charity," that is something you really, really don't believe in (something you will work hard to avoid giving money to) or a person you really hate (someone you will avoid giving money to). Does it work? The website says it does. Here's their take:

Let's imagine you can't stop eating candy bars. Try committing to eat 3 or less candy bars a week, and penalize yourself $100 every time you go over. Essentially, that fourth candy bar will now cost you $100! Would you eat a $100 candy bar? 

We offer financial contracts to let you choose the cost at which failure is simply not an option. Bottom line, everyone has a price. What's yours?

Here's the thing: that candy bar, if you eat it every day, will cost you $100, in the long run. Just like not exercising will cost me, and not quitting smoking will cost Joe Schmo. What's cool about this website is, it's translating the costs of the future, both financial and personal, into the present. In other words, I am willing to put $60 dollars on the line now (which in college terms might as well be equivalent to $100) so that in ten years I don't have to spend that money on health issues and unhappiness.

Plus, this gives me the ability to quantify peace of mind. Like the website says, everyone has a price. I know now that it takes $60 to goad me into getting off the couch. Well, $60 and knowing that if I lie about it I'm taking money away from charity.

Half-Empty or Half-Full?

The Art of Re-Framing, is really just another way of saying perspective. Half-empty, or half-full. Why is it so much easier to say half-empty? Probably because we're thinking "in about two seconds, I'm going to pick up the glass and the water's going to be gone." It takes a lot more energy to stand up, go to the kitchen, and re-fill the glass, if you catch my drift. It's so much easier to be negative and not even realize it. After all, the glass is half-empty-- we tell ourselves we're just being realistic.

Last night I had an interesting conversation with my boyfriend-- and I realized how hard it can be to see perspective for what it is. After all, to the untrained eye, personal perspective is synonymous with reality. The tragedy is, if one's perspective is skewed towards the dismal, one would always see reality as grim and, well, dismal. But if that's the case, how are we ever supposed to be happy?

That's when I realized what an odd person I am. I don't believe it's ever possible to see "reality." The concept of reality, as we understand it (what's absolutely, unequivocally "true") cannot possibly be perceived by an individual. Everything we look at, everything we think about, remember, and imagine, is tinted by our past (who we are inherently, who we were raised to be, and who we became by chance and circumstance). We don't see anything as it is because we're too busy seeing it the way we think it is, or the way we think it should be. We create our own reality by merely being ourselves. But, unless we take the time to actively pay attention to the way we think, we don't notice it at all. In other words, we're all looking at the world through tinted glasses (rose or otherwise), but we all believe we're seeing 20/20 without a prescription.

The only way we're going to be able to tell what tint we're seeing is by talking to the people around us and trying to see what they see. I came to this conclusion awhile ago when I realized that most of the people I talked to didn't see the problems with everything. It was a bizarre realization. For a long time, I was convinced that everyone else was ignorant and foolish. Then, it occurred to me that if most people didn't see problems with everything that maybe there weren't problems with everything and I didn't need to worry so much (wow, this is making me look stellar). Anyway, the point is, now I'm trying taking time to notice my perspective. I'm working to re-frame my initial reaction to things. And I'm hypothesizing: sooner or later I'll find that how happy I am depends solely on how I perceive myself and the world around me.

Big Decisions

Sometimes being happy involves making big decisions. It's a chance to re-evaluate your priorities, step back, take a look at your life. Where should I go to college? Who should I marry? Should I buy the iPhone 4G?

I sat at home all day today in complete disarray. It comes out tomorrow. My entire family is getting one. My boyfriend is getting one. But I-- the sad little girl with the First Generation iPhone-- the girl who is told "get a new phone" every time she walks into an Apple store-- has not pre-ordered her new phone.

Should I? It's $200 more for me than the average person upgrading. I'm splitting the cost with my parents. I frantically went through my budget (luckily, I've been updating it faithfully every Sunday). Yes, I can afford it, barely. I would have to wake up around 3 am to run to the Apple store to wait for it to open at 7. I would have to skimp on food, and summer outings. But... I would have an iPhone 4G. The iPhone to kick all other iPhones in the toosh. The iPhone with the facetime application, two cameras, a retina screen (whatever that means)...

And then I started thinking. Would that really make me happy?

Absolutely. But you know what would make me even happier? Sleeping past 3 am.

Is that completely crazy of me? I can't decide. Part of me is still tempted to set my alarm and decide when it goes off (almost 3 hours from now). Part of me is telling myself I can stride into the store tomorrow afternoon and just order a phone to pick it up later in the month-- who cares about instant gratification, I get sleep. And part of me is saying, save your money. Buying a new phone will be a rush for like, an hour. Maybe a day, or a week, at most. But with $200, I can buy experiences that will make memories that will last forever.

I still kind of want the phone, though.

Tuesday: Energy

It's only Tuesday and I'm already exhausted. I want to say that I don't know why-- because technically I shouldn't be exhausted... Technically I got about 8 hours of sleep last night; I spent today working from home, in which I spent two hours watching It Could Happen to You in between writing coverages; technically, all I've been doing are relaxing things. So why am I exhausted?

I think it's because I'm exhausting myself. Last week I didn't write at all, and it was one of the best weeks I've ever had in my entire life. I was in the office being helpful, brainstorming, thinking... I felt like I was on fire. I had energy. Now-- I feel like I can only think about my failure from last week. How I'm going nowhere with this screenplay I'm writing. How the pressure's piling up. How I have coverages to write.

And then, I'm not doing them. I write these resolutions, and I DON'T DO THEM. I don't know why. It's the not doing that's exhausting. The constant stress of feeling like I'm failing myself. I'm realizing that this is status quo for me. This constant feeling of being overwhelmed by things I don't want to do, by things I feel incapable of doing... This constant feeling of inadequacy, is what I have been struggling under for most of my life. And, what a surprise-- I went to a high powered private school on the track to an Ivy League college. My parents spent a great deal of money on me and it was always clear that I was an investment.

I am an investment. It's such a fucking insane idea to live up to.

In order to pull my life back on track, write my screenplay (or at least the outline), and find happiness--I need to stop thinking of myself as a commodity. I need to chill out and stop being so hard on myself. Oh, and I need to stop writing angry blogs.

Rally

When faced with complete failure (i.e. I have not written in my blog, or logged any of my resolutions, or really striven to keep then) I have two choices:

1) Give up.
2) Rally, and try again.

Hm. Since I'm writing this, you can probably guess which one I've decided on.

Last week was actually quite awesome. I can't say this project isn't working, it just isn't working... to my satisfaction. I can do better. It all starts with... SLEEP. Last week was terrible (resolution wise) because I was woken up at 6 am every morning by my neighbor's water heater. I tried to "make the best of it" and be "grateful" but at 6 am that's simply not possible. Tomorrow I'm going to go to the mall and invest in noise canceling headphones.

So, the goals for the week:

• Blog regularly.
• Work on my screenplay--have a 3 page outline by Friday.
• FOCUS on my relationship. If there's one resolution I've absolutely failed, it's that one. 
• SLEEP/Relax. Meditate. Do SOMETHING to get energy during the day. Exercise if possible. 
• Do coverages. It's work I've haven't had time to do, and when I get home I've been too tired/avoiding it and it's guilting me.
• DO NOT PUTZ. Be efficient with what I do. 

Let's see how this week goes...