Planning for Success: Achieving Your Resolution

The New Year has rung in. I have made a New Year’s resolution. I resolved to maintain and improve my spiritual life. But a resolution without a plan is merely hope.

Plans are simple; they are pre-meditated choices. Pre-meditated choices, made before the choices must be made.

Resolutions are nothing more than a hoped-for result.

Planning is the anticipation of choices which move me closer to that result. For example, I resolved to stop drinking. This hope became real when I planned. I paused and imagined my life ahead; I saw that some social events would include drinking; I could see myself feeling pressure to drink with friends. Seeing the problem in advance, when I was sober and calm, I could rightly choose. My pre-meditated choice was not to drink. There are no guarantees; at the future moment, I might drink. But with a pre-meditated choice, I was a step closer to my resolution of abstinence.

Resolving to maintain and improve my spiritual life, I imagined life ahead and could see the value of morning meditations. But I could see myself staying warm under the blankets and deciding I did not need to meditate that day. Seeing the problem, I could choose in advance. When I was serene, committed and awake, I could choose to get up and meditate every morning. No guarantee, I could still stay in bed. But I was a step closer to my resolution. I had chosen; I had planned.

Hope without a plan is ephemeral; it can be blown away with a breeze. It has no mass, skittering around, leaving no trail; it can disappear, and no one would notice.

A plan gives resolved hope both weight and mass; it is less ephemeral, no longer skittering around with every breeze. It leaves a trail and will not disappear unremembered.

Planning, I see where my actions will take me. I can pre-choose.