2012: DIY

Happy New Year! Are you all set with your resolutions? Did you already bail on them? How many Pizzalicous Pringles leftover from your New Year’s Day Hangover did you eat today? None? Then you’re already ahead of me. Go, You!

Every New Year’s Eve, we make up a theme for the coming year. Recently, 2010 was “The Year of Execution” which sounds morbid, but it meant that if you had a good idea, you had to follow through with it. That one was probably the most useful, if the least rhyme-y, of any of them. For 2011 we tried to get cute and say “Twenty-Eleven: Just Like Heaven” which it most certainly was not. In fact, 2011 kind of kicked my ass.

I’m really hoping 2012 will be a better year. But this time, I’m not just going to wish for a good year, I’m going to MAKE it a good year. At least that’s the plan.

This year, the theme is “Twenty-twelve: Do It Yourselve.”

Last year, combined with all my other years, has given me new perspective. You can hope for a good year, or a good day, or whatever, and sometimes things are going to be awesome! But the shit is never going to stop coming, that’s the thing. Shit is just going to keep coming at you, for your whole life. Sometimes, there will be shit on top of shit, and it will seem like way too much shit for one person to handle. You might have to go through some shit that no one should ever have to go through. Some of it will be the worst shit ever! And some of it will just be annoying shit, or shit that pisses you off. But that’s just how it is. It’s such a common thing that they barely even bother putting it on bumper stickers and t-shirts anymore: Shit happens. To everyone. You sure-as-shit can’t stop it.

But you can control how it affects you. And by “you” and “you”, I mean “I” and “me”, because I don’t want to get all preachy at you. To me, “Twenty-twelve: Do It Yourselve” not only means making the life I want, but also taking responsibility for how I let (the inevitable) shit affect my life.

I know this isn’t a new concept, but it is a tough one to put into practice, and I’m going to try my best this year. It isn't going to be easy, because you pretty much have to do it right when everything is shitty! That's when you really have to be mindful, and say “I accept this shit is happening right now, but I refuse to let it mess up the rest of my day/week/year/life.”And that is some zen shit.