Hello, dear Blandfill readers. This is a slightly more serious post, I suppose, so you’re in for a treat!
I’d like to talk a little bit about “resolutions” that I think I’d like to adopt in my life. These are sort of like New Year’s resolutions, but different in two ways. First off, I think that 01 January of every year is a little too arbitrary to be meaningful, and it seems like overall it’s a pretty atrocious way to attempt self-changes (at least statistically speaking: Wikipedia says “Recent research shows that while 52% of participants in a resolution study were confident of success with their goals, only 12% actually achieved their goals.”);  and secondly, it’s common for New Year’s resolutions to be pretty specific: “Work out more”, “lose weight”, “get better grades”, “spend more time with family”,  ”get more sleep”, et cetera, and I’m not super interested in small specific changes.

So, Tom, what the heck are you talking about?

I’ve more or less alluded to this in previous blog posts (such as, in chronological order, pursuit, advance, funny, ‘trospection) but college has really helped me confront myself and my beliefs and such – not so much politically or religiously, but personally and emotionally. Living at home with my family was a sort of painful box for me; not because of anyone in particular’s fault, but because of my overall situation; and though I numbed to the pain and managed to “be good at stuff” to whatever extent university admissions folks think is important, it’s only since I’ve come here, living without my family, with my roommates, in a new community, that I’ve been able at all to address bigger questions.

I’ve been thinking about ways I’d like to change myself, become better, perform self-improvement — whatever the hell you feel like calling it — and the following “pieces of thought” (they happen to be cartoons) struck a chord in my mind.

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