planning

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New Year Same As The Old Year

Meet the new year – will it be the same as the old year? 

New year same as the old year

Back in 1971, The Who had a hit song called, “Won’t Get Fooled Again”. If that sounds familiar it’s because the song was used as the theme song for “CSI”, the original Crime Scene Investigation show on TV.

But there is a line in the song that came to my mind when I was thinking about the new year. The line is “meet the new boss, same as the old boss”. I thought to myself, “Here we are at the beginning of a new year, same as the old year.” 

Or will it be the same as the old year? 

That is certainly up for debate at this point since we are only a couple of days into the year. But there are signs that could give some credence to that line.

We are starting 2022 much like we started 2021. We have high numbers of covid and a push to get everyone to get a shot or booster. People are still encouraged to isolate, keep distanced, wear a mask. These measures all have a great impact on how we work, how we socialize, how we spend our free time. 

As we begin this year, we could wonder if we will be in the same place at the end. Or will there be some differences? 

There are some things that point to a different year ahead. The major virus threat right now, Omicron, is a much weaker variety than the previous versions. Maybe these variants will just get weaker and weaker. 

Whether this year will be the same as last year seems right now to be dependent on covid. Getting back to The Who’s song, “Won’t Get Fooled Again”, those lyrics might be something we should consider. 

At the beginning of a new year, will we fall into the same patterns, same responses we did in the past year, or will we choose to do some things differently to forge a new path ahead?

We all know the definition of insanity is “doing the same things over and over, but expecting a different result.”

To start a new year that won’t be the same as the old year, I need to determine to do something differently. And that requires some thought, planning and purpose. 

This year will be much like last year if we don’t put some thought into what might make this year different. If we don’t, we will generally just follow the pattern we had from the year before. … Sing it with me “Same as the old year”.

What I will do during the first week of 2022 is take a review of my last year, note what I did and didn’t do, and then plan to do some new things or further some things from the year before. I won’t choose too many because I have found that when I do that I get bogged down and don’t accomplish them.

This year will be different because I have a plan.

Here’s the thing: When I plan for the year ahead, I seek what God has planned for me. God’s plans never fail, so if I want to be sure I accomplish something different in 2022, I will need to consult with Him. 

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: I’ve use a specific guide to aid me in my planning process. If you are interested in a copy of it, let me know in the comments below.

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My Life Is In Flux Right Now

I’m in a state of flux right now. Though it’s early in September, and I’ve had a long planning session for the upcoming year, I still feel a little out of sorts.

My planning went well and I came away from that week with some solid tracks to run on. But when I sit in my office, I don’t feel settled.

The reason for that? – my office is a mess!

During the summer we had a huge rain storm. The church basement flooded and we had to have a company come in to help clean up the mess.

I was away on vacation at the time; my office was locked and there was no need for anyone to go in it.

So when I returned after being away for several weeks, the first thing I noticed was the damp smell and then the ceiling tile that had fallen down.

There had been a leak in the roof and it had soaked through a ceiling tile, which had fallen down beside a bookshelf.

The amazing thing about it all was, though the ceiling tile was still soggy wet, the leak never touched any of my books.

I was sure happy about that, but it left me with a bit of a mess and forced me to make an even greater mess.

I took all the books off the shelf and put them in piles around my office. I then moved the bookcase out from the wall so that someone could examine the situation and put the ceiling back together again.

Well, things are moving rather slowly and my office has been in the same state for a couple of weeks now.

… And that’s why I feel so unsettled in my office.

It’s that same feeling you have when you’ve moved into a new home and you have boxes everywhere. You’re excited to be in the new place but you don’t feel right until all your stuff is where it is supposed to be.

I’ve been meeting with people in another room because my office chairs are being used to support three foot high piles of books.

I also have a bookcase that is standing in the middle of my office.

My office feels more like a storage space than an office. It’s not conducive to focussing on work.

When I look up from my computer, I often wonder if one of the piles of books looks like it’s leaning a little too much. I start to imagine it as the leaning tower of Pisa.

I really hope that I don’t need any of those books. If I do, I’ll be forced to play that block game Jenga with them … and I’ve never been particularly successful at not toppling over the stack of blocks.

I think the sooner my office can get put back to normal, the sooner I will start to settle down for the fall.

Here’s the thing: Many things can come up in life that cause you to feel unsettled – a health issue, job pressure, a move or even a flood. There may be nothing you can do to get life back in order, leaving you tempted to completely lose focus. However, you can keep order in your spiritual life by spending regular, quality time with God. If you do that in the morning, it will start your day off right, even if other aspects in your day are still in flux.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What has got you feeling a little unsettled? Leave your comments below.

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I Need An Alternate Routine

My routine has been working for me for a few months now, but all that is about to change.

Back in December I developed a new plan for eating (read here) and exercise (read here). It’s been working for me and I feel great. I have more energy, and physically I’m able to play my sports at an increased level.

I’ve really enjoyed this run; I don’t want to see it come to an end. But I need to make some changes and I have a week to figure it out.

I took a week of vacation and we opened up our cottage for the year. But in doing that, it took me away from some of the routines that I have made over the last few months – mainly my exercise routine.

I’ve been trying (successfully, I might add) to do at least 30 minutes of exercise a day. I’ve been playing hockey two, sometimes three times a week and then on the days I don’t play hockey, I work out at home.

There I have a treadmill, a bike on a trainer, and a rowing machine.

On my week away, however, I’m not playing hockey and I don’t have access to equipment other than my bike.

For the summer I can ride my bike, but there will be some rainy days. Because I ride dirt trails, if the trails are too wet from the day before, biking is then also out of the question.

So what am I going to do at the cottage to keep up my exercise?

I can walk, which would make Lily happy because she would love to go on more (or some) walks with me. But for that to be exercise I will have to walk at a fast pace, certainly not the way I walk around a mall.

Some people run, but I have bad knees so that’s not an option for me. I’m at a bit of a loss.

I feel like I need to be a MacGyver in this situation. You remember the TV show, don’t you? He could make things happen even when he didn’t have the proper materials or equipment. MacGyver would rig something up to get the job done.

I need to figure out something I can rig up for those rainy days, and as an alternative to biking every day of my time away.

There is one other thing I need to consider. When Lily and I went shopping to get groceries for the week, I had my eye on the candy aisle the whole time.

For me, vacations or being away is synonymous with snacking. It’s what I do!

I had a very difficult time not throwing a few chocolate bars and bags of candy in the grocery cart.

I can see that the only way forward, the only way that I will succeed, is to have a plan before I go and then to stick to it.

Here’s the thing: Planning is important for accomplishing your goals, but you also need a plan for when your plan doesn’t work. That is exactly the same when it comes to temptation. You need a plan to live right, but you need an alternative plan in place for when temptation comes. Make a plan today.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What alternative plan do you have for temptation? Leave your comments below.

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The Future Is Not What You Might Think

I’ve seen the future and it doesn’t look too bright. … Of course, that may have been because I saw the future in a dimly lit movie theatre.

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I don’t go to the movie theatre all that often, and even less to a matinee, but my wife and I were on vacation and we decided to do a movie and dinner.

Shortly after seating myself in the high-backed, swivel chair with my armrest ready to be loaded with a 40 oz cup of coke, I saw the future. Maybe it wasn’t my future, but it was definitely the future!

I started to notice that the people sitting around me were all quite a bit older that Lily and me. And as others came in, I noticed it took them a long time to walk up the stairs to their seats.

Some of them stopped half way to take a breather, others used the handrail like they had just dropped off their walkers and were in need of a little support.

There was some guy behind me who was rustling a bag of something that he probably smuggled into the theatre. I’m sure he couldn’t hear the constant noise that bag was making but  it was definitely not music to my ears!

At that point, it dawned on me how much we had paid to get in. When it seemed like we were only being charged for one ticket, I had questioned the cashier on the price. The girl assured me that it was cheap Tuesday.

I started to put it all together. I never really knew who went to matinees before; I had thought they was mostly for kids’ movies. I suddenly realized that it’s seniors who go to matinees – and not just young seniors, it’s those who are in their seventies and up.

The cashier must have taken us for seniors and charged us the seniors’ rate for cheap Tuesdays.

And now you too know the future: some day going to a matinee will be the normal thing to do.

It’s practical because there are no lineups and there are lots of seats to choose from. Movies are loud so no need to turn on that nasty, bothersome hearing aide. And you get out in time to have dinner at the seniors’ residence or at least before the evening rush at the restaurants.

The whole thing was an eye opening experience. It was the first time I came out of a movie theatre squinting because I’d just spent a couple of hours in the dark and the sun was still high in the sky.

It wasn’t a bad experience; in fact, some day I can see it being all the rage.

Here’s the thing: When we look to the future, we usually look ahead 5, 10, 20 years from now. We imagine and plan for what might be or what we want life to be like. But when we look that way, we miss the future we should be focussing on. In the book of Colossians, chapter three and verses one and two, it tells us to “set our hearts and minds on things above.” We often limit our thinking, planning and preparing to what’s coming ahead in this life. But God wants us to be thinking, planning, preparing and living with our whole being focussed on what’s above – on heaven. So in your future planning, think of things above as you prepare and live out your days here below.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What do you usually focus on when thinking of the future? Leave your comment below.

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How a Plan Would Have Improved My Day

Maybe it was the weather that made me lazy, but I sure needed a plan last Saturday. I felt like I accomplished nothing, like I wasted my precious day off, like I frittered away the day.

plan

That doesn’t happen every day to me because most days of the week I make a plan. I have things that I want or need to get done and so I put them on my reminder list or right into my calendar.

Some people can keep it all organized in their heads, but I need to write it down. I like to see it and check it off.

Saturday was different for me; I wasn’t motivated to do anything. Well, I was … I wanted to go for a bike ride but the rain put an end to that dream, and with it any motivation to do anything else.

It was like I was thinking, “If the weather’s not going to let me go biking, I’ll show it. I’ll do nothing instead.” I didn’t actually think that, but in hindsight that was what I was doing.

I spent my day getting lost in the new iOS for my phone and iPad. I’d look at the time every once in a while and shake my head, but then go back to the nothing I was doing.

There were a couple of things I did during the day but they weren’t things I scheduled. They were things that others scheduled for me, and they didn’t give me a sense of accomplishment.

All I really needed to do was to spend about ten minutes writing a few things down and that would have changed the pattern of my whole day. I would have gone from floating through the day to having some kind of purpose.

Having a simple list of things I wanted to work on or complete would have also changed how I felt about my day. I would have progressed through it instead of being annoyed at how the time was advancing.

I can’t figure out why I would keep doing something – in this case nothing – that I didn’t like doing and not do something about it. (I hope I didn’t hypnotize you with that sentence!)

But that’s what lack of planning does – it keeps one stuck in the past/present while time is still moving. It’s like for me, time was standing still, but in reality time was passing me by.

I could say that I was tired and I needed a day of nothing, but why, at the end of the day, didn’t I feel good about the nothing I did? No, even planning one or two things would have brought me fulfillment.

Here’s the thing: If you’re not planning God into your day, either connecting, growing or serving Him, you will float along in your relationship, stuck in the past/present with Him. Time will keep moving while your relationship will be standing still. Simply thinking of how to include Him in your day is all you need to improve your day.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: How has planning made a difference in your life? Leave your comment below.

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How To Avoid Multiple Bosses

I find that having an idea or plan of what you want to get done in your day is important, but scheduling that plan is crucial if it has a chance of happening.

Most days I have a plan and put it in my calendar with specific times to it. I do it so that someone else – even someone who walks in off the street – doesn’t become my boss for the day. And believe me, that can happen to me so easily!

accountability

Saturdays are different. I do have a vague plan, but I rarely write it down. It’s really just a collection of things I would like to do in the day and in no particular order.

That lack of planning creates a bad scenario and that’s exactly what happened last Saturday. I got up, spent some time with God and wrote a blog. Those two things are pretty much a lock on Saturday mornings. I don’t have them written down somewhere, but as soon as I sit up in bed little neurons in my brain touch together which produce that end result.

When I was done, I looked outside, the sky was overcast, and I thought to myself, “It looks like it could rain at any time. I should go for a bike ride soon so that I don’t miss my opportunity.” I should have gone right then, but I wasn’t scheduled.

In no time, I kind of got sidetracked with other things I hadn’t planned on. By the time I finished those, my wife, Lily, announced she wanted to check out a new store downtown that friends had just opened. I could tell I needed to postpone my bike ride. Going to this store was something she really wanted to do, so I said, “Let’s go.”

We had a good time together checking out a new olive oil shop in town. I had no idea there were so many varieties of olive oil and vinegar. It was endless, but the raspberry vinegar was pretty amazing!

With visiting our friends’ store ticked off the list for the day, we just needed to swing by the bike shop, pick up a tube and then I could get home and get biking (my big plan for the day).

We had been in the bike shop for about 10 minutes when I looked outside and saw it was raining. The one thing I wanted to do that day wasn’t going to happen.

I had done other things: I wrote a blog, went to a store with Lily, fixed a flat tire on my bike, watched the hockey game, had wings for dinner, and worked on a computer issue for my mother-in-law. I did stuff, but for some reason because I didn’t go for a bike ride, I felt like I didn’t accomplish anything. My day was a disappointment.

Setting a time for that bike ride would have made the difference. It would have forced me to put times and time frames to the other things, and it probably would have gotten me on the trails and left me feeling like my day was a success.

Here’s the thing: When it comes to spending time with God or serving Him in some capacity, if we only plan on it but don’t schedule it, it probably won’t happen. And even if it does, it will be very hit and miss at best … you will have other bosses who’ll make sure of it.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: When is it a difficult task for you to schedule things? Leave your comment below.