One of the definitions of “intention,” according to Google, is “the healing process of a wound.” That is goddamn heart-warming. Like Google knit a tiny sweater for my heart.
Goals are for children wearing shirts with the name of the local watering hole written across the back of them. When I set goals (LOL WHEN LINDSAY WHEN DID YOU DO THAT) what I’m actually doing is making a list of things I think I SHOULD be.
- Skinny (duh)
- Good at stuff
- That’s it
It doesn’t work. Obviously. My socks leave little dents where they cut into my ankles, for one thing.
I almost never have a clear picture of HOW I want something to work out. And I don’t really, REALLY want things very often. Which is probably why goal-setting, which I think requires clarity and some kind of plan, isn’t something I personally find very useful. I’m not trying to carefully plot out the twenty-nine steps I need to take in order to reach some specific place I’m not even sure I’ll want to be in by the time I actually get there, PLUS, what if a tree falls on one of the steps. What if that happens. It happens, friends. Trees fall.
Anyway so “setting intentions” seems to be much more my speed, since it’s essentially what I do anyway. Want the thing, be open for the thing to happen, accept whatever actually happens. Right? I don’t know I skimmed exactly two articles on this and then took a nap on my lunch break and the Diet Coke hasn’t hit my bloodstream yet.
(Pretend there’s a pretty banner here that says “November Intentions,” made by someone who knows how to use an editor other than Microsoft Paint.)
- Quit smoking. I’m actually on Day 3 already. So what happened was, on Friday I went to happy hour at work for once AND THEN went home and got ready AND THEN stayed out all night dancing AND THEN got up early and made second breakfast. (First breakfast is always the egg sandwich lovingly prepared by the man at the corner store who side-eyes the eyeliner on my chin when I wander in at 6AM looking for puffy Cheetos.) So THEN because I am an elderly lady I went right back to sleep until it was dark outside. (I’d planned on dressing up for Halloween on Saturday night – that’s right, I’d planned on going out two nights in a row. HA! HA HA HA! HA!) I then spent the rest of the weekend watching horror movies and playing “How Many Versions of the Quesadilla Can I Think Of and Ingest?” A lot, is how many. A lot. So because I did not leave my apartment all day on Saturday and only for the briefest of moments on Sunday (to get my face waxed and play on some swings), I didn’t smoke because I don’t smoke indoors because I’m not a heathen and also because I wouldn’t get my security deposit back. So I thought, meh, maybe I’ll just quit. So that’s what I’m doing. It’s terrible, but not as terrible as smoking, I guess. Also I’ll probably be very wealthy now, so. That will be nice.
- Keep not eating meat. I’ve been doing so good! I ate chicken once, because Diego made tinga at work and brought home the leftovers and made me tiny baby bite-sized tostadas. BABY BITE-SIZED TOSTADAS. Kill me. I just need to be better about remembering to take my iron (remember how I told you I was elderly), and at replacing whatever else is in meat that I’m not eating that I need to be eating in order to not feel light-headed when I stand up too fast.
- Journal. Now that I take naps at lunch instead of wandering around with a ham hock in one hand and a pack of Marlboro Reds in the other (DON’T CRY FOR ME, I’M ALREADY DEAD), I can maybe also work in some journaling time. This will be important, since not smoking seems to be increasing my life expectancy while DRASTICALLY shortening that of certain people who sit within a ten-foot radius of me.
That’s it. Aren’t you jealous that I’m going to become such a better person by the end of November? Because that’s my other intention, to make everyone jealous. BECAUSE OF HOW SKINNY I AM.
