I'm making things happen

I HAVE never been one for New Year resolutions. Why make rules you just won’t keep? There are times like now when I feel for whatever reason that I am hitting a brickwall so it is time to change and adapt. Time to move on. Now I find myself making resolutions or maybe making promises to myself would be a more apt description.

So far I have come up with…

1. Get the hell out of this flat as soon as I can. We need out of here. I find it hard to believe that we have been living here for more than 10 years. When we moved in here I was a student, on the dole with a young child and it was the only place we could find. Or should I say one of the few places which would even entertain someone who ticked the boxes I did.

And as time went on the prospect of renting somewhere else never mind buying was out of my financial reach so we stayed here. And while it lacks so much I have made it our home. But now we need out. We needed out years ago. I want our own home. I want heating, running hot water, privacy, a garden (probably in my dreams), a washing machine. The Young Wan and I deserve our own home.

I applied recently for Affordable Housing and it was a disaster but that story is probably for another post. I will have to do the whole thing again because there is no other hope for buying our own home any other way unless of course I win the lotto. So the first stop is to sort out all the red tape and forms I need to do it all again.

2. Buy a quick pick for the lotto heading for €5m this weekend so that should buy me at least a small house in Dublin:) It could be me.

3. Take time off from work and just recharge, a lot. Part of these plans hopefully include a weekend away with old pals in Donegal, and following the Young Wan to Turkey for a week (who fingers crossed could be flying off at some stage over the weekend but its all very up in the air at the moment, or not:)). And of course whatever else comes my way is under consideration, weekends in Galway and Belfast are some of the contenders.

4. I am going to kick and shove myself out of the comfort zone I am happy to be in because I am not happy being there.

5. Rethink and reset my priorities and goals. It is always a good thing once in a while to have a mental clear out.

6. Start to try to save. I have actually saved some recently but it is probably more false saving as it is all earmarked for debts.

7. Walk to and from work often. I can so I should do it more. I only walk home once in a while and mostly because my auld camera finger is itching.

8. Give myself photography projects. I want to keep learning. Digital photography is still so new to me and it is so different from film. There is so much you can do with photoshop and I know some but not much. At the end of day nothing beats a well taken and exposed photograph.

9. I will actually watch and try out the techniques provided by the excellent Photoshop Killer Tips compiled by Matt Kloskowski of the American National Association of Photoshop Professionals which I download on itunes and put on the long finger to go through. I thought maybe I could check them out on my ipod nano. Of course I now know I cannot so the plan of learning all sorts of things about photoshop while on the bus went out the window. I can still watch them on itunes or with real player. There are all sorts of handy tips from what little I have looked at and I will watch them and learn.

10. I will start to read/plough my way through the pile of books I have bought more than recently. There are some books which I bought and put on that auld long reader finger and others I want to have and others which caught my eye or were recommended. However I got them, they sit there while I read and reread books that I really enjoy. I read every day so there is no excuse at all for this pile of books. So again with that comfort zone; note to self move on.

11. Leave room to add point 12 and 13, etc as I go along with this. Make it up as you go along certainly applies here.

If I don’t report back you know its all going well!

Like me this list is a work in progress. And I suppose I am not only making the late New Year’s resolutions that I said I never make but I am also spring cleaning my life and clearing out dead wood. I’m making things happen because I have to, no one else will for me. So bring it on.

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