We are quickly closing in on the end of the first month of 2009...can you believe it? This is typically the time when New Year's Resolutions begin to crumble, if they haven't already. I hope that is not the case with you!
I know some people who are not fans of resolutions. I think they believe they are empty promises. They believe goals are better. I think resolutions get a bad rap.
Here is what dictionary.com says resolution means:
1. a formal expression of opinion or intention made, usually after voting, by a formal organization, a legislature, a club, or other group.
2. a resolve or determination: to make a firm resolution to do something.
3. the act of resolving or determining upon an action or course of action, method, procedure, etc.
4. the mental state or quality of being resolved or resolute; firmness of purpose.
Those definitions sound anything but empty to me. A resolution to me looks to be a pretty firm goal. In any event, I think resolutions are a good thing. They are setting the bar high at the beginning of the year...or at any time of the year.
Zig Ziglar recently had this to say about the importance of setting your sights high:
In one of our major universities a professor of economics gave a test to his class. The test had several sections of questions, each of which contained three categories of questions. He instructed the students to choose one question from each section on the test. The first category in each section was the hardest and was worth 50 points. The second category in each section was not quite as hard and worth 40 points. The third category in each section was the easiest and worth only 30 points.
When the students had taken the test and all the papers had been turned in, the students who had chosen the hardest questions, or the fifty-point questions, were given A's. The students who had chosen the forty-point questions were given B's, and the students choosing the thirty-point questions, or the easiest questions, were given C's. Whether or not their answers were correct was not considered. Understandably, the students were confused and asked the professor how he had graded the exam. The professor leaned back and with a smile explained, "I wasn't testing your knowledge. I was testing your aim.
"I believe it was Browning who said, "Your reach should exceed your grasp, or what's a Heaven for?" Langston Hughes wrote, "Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die then life is like a broken-winged bird that cannot fly." Yes, we need those dreams or, if you prefer, a vision. Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived, said, "My people perish for lack of vision." Helen Keller was asked the question, "What would be worse than being blind?" She responded that it would be infinitely worse to have 20/20 eyesight and no vision than to be blind but have that vision.
In the declining years of his life, Albert Schweitzer was asked, "How goes it with you, Dr. Schweitzer?" The aging medical missionary responded, "My eyesight grows dim, but my vision is clearer than ever." Think about it. Develop your own dream, your own vision, and I'll SEE YOU AT THE TOP!
