It’s 2011! Yay! New Year’s Resolution, Anyone?

Someone once wrote that the reason people never stick to their goals or resolutions or what-not is because they never write up realistic ones. So when the going gets tough, as it inevitably would be when you come up with almost-impossible targets such as “stop eating junk food for good” or “find a boyfriend who looks, acts and sounds like Justin Bieber, but is Muslim”, then that list will just end up being shoved among the piles of newspapers that you keep reminding yourself to recycle, but promptly forget the moment the cries of “Paper lama! Old newspaper! [Insert Chinese characters here]!” fade away from your street every morning.

For example, I always promise myself every year that I will stop skipping classes. Needless to say, by the time the third or fourth week comes round, I find myself crushing that promise into remnants of the remnants of debris. Hence, some adjustments. Rather than:

1. I will stop skipping classes

I will instead make it more realistic and change it to:

1. I will stop skipping classes so regularly, that my heart beats faster than a galloping llama when my lecturer even mentions the words “warning” or “barring” or “letter” (not necessarily in the same sentence, either). Instead, as Mr. Mazlan put it succinctly, I will plan my absences well. In fact, I shall keep a “skipping diary” to avoid losing track of how many classes I’ve missed, to avoid receiving unpleasant letters to my house, my mahallah and my department. *Pauses to reminisce over the semester in Nilai when I slept with warning letters under my pillow. Good times*

Another resolution that I keep making every time the new semester rolls in is:

2. Get 4.00.

So deceptively brief and simple-sounding, you wouldn't begin to fathom the amount of blood, sweat, tears and other body fluids one must shed to even come within breathing distance of that elusive digit. Unfortunately, throughout my years studying in UIA, the closest I’ve ever gotten is 3.95 – and before you start hurling rotten tomatoes at me, let me just add that it didn’t even count because it was a short semester and I was only taking a grand total of THREE subjects. So, after some amendments, it shall now be:

2. Get high enough each semester to graduate with First Class Honours

Far more manageable, as it allows room for maybe two or three A minuses.

Yeah.

*Facepalm*

Anyway, the last one I’ll share with you is so typical and cliché, it’s downright embarrassing. Yeah, you guessed it.

3. Lose weight

Honestly, though, I don't really give a fig about how much I weigh. It’s the time and energy I spend trying to suck in my protruding belly to fit into KakAmnah’s (pre-pregnancy, mind you) pants and stop myself from envying fit people, that grates my nerves. So it’s because of this nonchalance and half-hearted concern that I cannot be bothered to go jogging alone after Subuh, or stop eating junk food when I’m PMSing. Hence, I’ll change the resolution to something really simple, that will benefit my health in the long haul:

3. Stop ordering sweet drinks along with my meals. Even if “someone” offers to belanja. Water cooler water should suffice. Percuma jugak tu.

Now that’s a lot more concrete. An added benefit is that I won’t have to experience the fury of ordering Milo Ais only to find they’d given me a cheaper knock-off version, i.e. Radix Koko at Evoke i Cafe. Tastes more like corn than chocolate. Don’t you just HATE it when that happens?

So. Anyway. If you’ve got a whole drawer full of unfulfilled resolutions, why not give it a go? It’s just a matter of changing the downright impossible ones to something you know you can manage – with some effort.

However, if your goal really is to find a Justin Bieber lookalike for your boyfriend, I have nothing to say except: SHAME ON YOU