Lyn Ching-Pascual: New Year’s resolution... again?

I still barely speak my ancestors’ language.  I park myself on the couch when off work, and sweets tend to end up in my stomach more than the fridge.  Needless to say, I have failed time and again to follow through on my promises to myself. Why?  Not that these are not doable because they are.  I have always believed that if other people can do it, so can I. But procrastination is my friend, has been so for many years, so much so that what should take me days turn into weeks, maybe even months.   Of my resolutions, the most common is exercise.  Everyone wants to start the year right by becoming fit.  Which explains the spike in gym applications first month of the year and the lack of it at the end.  It is so much easier to say “I want to work out” than to get dressed, get in the car, drive to the gym and lift weights.  I should know, I’ve had 15 years to struggle with it.  As a solution, I bought a second hand treadmill from a known gym a year ago.  The first few days were great.  I told myself I no longer have an excuse as proximity is no longer an issue.  So I ran…a lot.  But it takes awhile for change to register on the body especially in your 30s and I was never the patient sort.  So I stopped cold.  They say it takes 30 days to create a habit. I clearly failed to reach the 30th mark.  I still have the treadmill but the only one who uses it is my husband.   So my Solution  #1? Victoria’s Secret lingerie show. Watching it while running should be painful.  But then again, if I’m to aim at all, I should aim high right?  I know it won’t sustain my interest, but then DVDs abound.  Plus there’s always the park.  Now all I have to do is solution #2, find a walking partner and solution #3, enroll in Barre3.  Yes I know I am shaming myself if after writing this I do not follow through.  But then that is my solution #4.  Embarrassment can do so much to a person’s need to fulfill a promise.  And as of this writing, I am fully invested in pursuing all solutions.  But please do not expect me to end 2012 with the body of Giselle Bundchen, just a better and healthier me should suffice.  As I have said previously, it is not about losing weight that’s most important to me, it’s about walking up the stairs without getting winded and carrying my kids without breaking my back.  It’s about living and loving longer. As for speaking Mandarin, it has been a frustration not being able to fully understand the language I was meant to by virtue of blood and ancestry.  True, I grew up studying in a Binondo-based Chinese school surrounded by similar schools and fellow Tsinoys.  But most of us kids were not serious in learning and practicing the language.  And despite severe punishment from teachers (think four wooden rulers held together by rubber bands used on my palms, the number of hits being based on the tally of Chinese words I have forgotten). My grades got so bad that I dropped out of my Chinese classes in 2nd year high school.  Now that I am older I see my folly.  I believe Mandarin is as important as the English language.  I keep thinking I could have done a lot more, maybe progressed more in so many levels and pursued more jobs/businesses had I learned to use it.  Also not being able to teach my kids the language saddens me.   So solution #1 enroll in a language course.  A nearby school offers it so again proximity should not be an issue. Solution #2 practice with my kids. Right now my son goes to a Chinese pre-school and bit by bit he is learning words that I have long forgotten. Being re-introduced to it is a plus as I bond with him and my daughter who parrots Chinese words that her brother says. Solution#3 practice. Practice. Practice.   As far as resolutions go, mine sound easier and much fewer than most. But again 15 years have come and gone and I am still at the same place I started.  For 2012 though, with your help, I can hopefully and finally scratch these off my perpetual list and start a new one.  My question now is, what’s your New Year’s resolution?