A new year is upon us. While I’m vehemently against typical New Year’s Resolutions as they are proven to fail, I do think it’s great to review your past year, be thankful for the progress you made, and recognize opportunities to make the year ahead even better.

Focus on What You Can Control

There’s plenty of uncertainty ahead (as always), but when we focus on what’s in our control, we make the best of whatever situation we find ourselves in.

This is a well known piece of wisdom, but I think it goes beyond the obvious application. For example, those who set New Year’s Resolutions unknowingly break this rule. Taking on a too ambitious goal means that instead of focusing on what you can control, you’re shooting for the moon and hoping you figure out how to get there along the way. This works fine for spontaneous travel, but not for behavior change.

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.”
― C.S. Lewis

I’m going to buy one lucky subscriber a Quest 2 AND the game I discuss in this article ($300+ value). Read on for details.

Getting fit and healthy is generally perceived as work and avoiding temptation, respectively. But it doesn’t have to be this way! There is no better way to improve your fitness and diet than by finding ways to make it not only painless, but joyful. I’ve recently discovered two ways to do that, one for fitness and one for diet.

“Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds that you plant.”

– Robert Louis Stevenson

Robert Louis Stevenson wrote Treasure Island, my favorite fiction book. It’s the famous swashbuckling pirate tale, that made famous names like Long John Silver. Little did I know, he apparently had some good nonfiction quotes, including the golden one above.

Uncertainty saturates reality. Just ask the 2007 New England Patriots football team, who went undefeated (18-0) throughout the regular season and playoffs only to lose to the New York Giants in the Super Bowl. But also think about that from the perspective of the Giants, who barely made the playoffs, and won every game as underdogs in the playoffs. They couldn’t see or expect success until they had it.