First quarter of 2009 is already over. 50% of new year resolutions are given up by this time. Are you keeping up with your new year resolutions? Here’s how things are going at my end (updates and learnings combined) -

New Year Resolution – Learnings & Updates

• Read One Book A Week

  I had fun time doing this. While I haven’t been able to read one book every week, the average turns out to be just right (i.e. one a week). Luckily, 12 out of 14 were really good.

  Books I enjoyed -

  • Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us by Seth Godin
  • America’s Cheapest Family Gets You Right on the Money by Steve & Annette Economides
  • 52 Ways to Live Success…From the Inside Out! by Jeanne Sharbuno
  • Rich Dad’s Rich Kid, Smart Kid: Giving Your Children a Financial Headstart by Robert Kiyosaki
  • Warren Buffett Speaks: Wit and Wisdom from the World’s Greatest Investor by Janet Lowe
  • Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E Frankl
  • The Key to Rebecca by Ken Follet
  • A Matter of Honour by Jeffery Archer
  • The Sword of Shannara Trilogy by Terry Brooks(all four)
    • First King of Shannara (Shannara Trilogy, Prequel)
    • The Wishsong of Shannara (The Sword of Shannara)
    • The Elfstones of Shannara (The Sword of Shannara)
    • The Sword of Shannara
  • (I also read a couple of forgettable romances)

  Note: Reading one book a week becomes difficult if the size of book is huge and too easy if book size is small. A better goal would be to read 4 books a month or read x number of hours a week or x days every week.

• Lose 30 Pounds & Get Passionate About Exercise

  I am 7 pounds down. Yes, that feels great (light actually ).

  What worked (all these changes were made together) -

  • A cup of Ginger Tea in morning.
  • Replacing dinner with Khakhra (Crisp Indian Bread) & Chai.
  • Having dinner by sunset. To have fruit/a cup of milk if hungry later on.
  • Drinking 2 litre of water everyday (am almost there with every day).
  • Fast Walking – 30 mins
  • Good sleep

  What didn’t work -

  • Sunday fast. I got extremely hungry by the time it was evening. I now have milk & fruits for first half day. And have dinner a bit early.

  Next In Line -

  • Yoga In Morning
  • One Serving of Salad Everyday

  Note: I am a vegetarian & I rarely have sweets, soda, fried food and outside food.

• One Adventure – To Face Fear

  No adventures so far. But have started facing some small & silly fears like getting hair cut short, travelling alone etc.

  What I learned from facing fear -

  • The quicker you act, the better it is for you. The more time you give to fear, the more it evolves. Nipping fear in bud is the best strategy.
  • The experience of facing fear isn’t as bad as we think it would be. Sometimes, it isn’t that good either.
  • Facing fear once is not enough to remove fear completely. You will have to repetitively face fear to get over it.
  • Success in facing fear in one area, gives you courage to face fear in other areas as well.

• Master 2 Cuisines

  I absolutely love experimenting different dishes on my hubby . Lucky he, my cooking has been in his favour – no bad recipes so far.

  My learnings -

  • Master the basic gravy making process. You learn one gravy and you can easily learn 10 dishes in which use the same gravy.
  • Learn and apply over and over to gain confidence and get comfortable.

• Save & Invest

  It’s amazing what small changes can do for your finances. We slashed our monthly food & household bills to half.

  What worked -

  • Rather than buying in bulk for two weeks, we now buy food for three days only. Less food goes waste in our refrigerator this way. Less waste = more money.
  • We have reduced eating outside.
  • Reduced number of days/times we rent car (We don’t own a car. So we simply rent one usually on weekends).

  Note: We got lot of Indian snacks and household items like soap, toothpaste, toothbrush etc from India. This is a huge money saver.

• A Habit To Stay In Touch

  A trip to India was icing on cake. I got to meet and socialize a lot. However, because of this, there wasn’t a need to focus on working on the habit of staying in touch. Now that I am back in US, I have started working on this with some pretty basic stuff – connecting with atleast one friend/relative a week.

How are things going your end? Even if you have broken your resolution, you can re-commit to your goals and start working on them. After all, ‘a new year resolution’ is just an excuse to start making goals and work towards what you want in life. You can do this anytime you want.

photo : arazas