The Year of the Dragon

I've just set a goal for 2012.  Simplify!  I need to simplify my life, get back to my down-to-earth roots, and live more humbly.  Doing this will make subsequent SMART goals easier to set and achieve.   To make this life change sustainable, I am taking baby steps; one or two goals at a time.  My first two goals are crucial, so I am laying them both out today:

1.  Put the phone away when I am with my son.  I read an article this morning on CNN.com describing a Standard University study on children's social development when they spend too much time using technology and multitasking. The gist is that kids who interact with people mostly through (or while using) technology have a diminished capacity to successfully communicate with others, to understand people's emotions, and to know how to deal with people in general.  Basically, they are little sociopaths.  I use technology and multitask CONSTANTLY when I am with my son.  My actions not only slight him, but set a very poor example, as well.  The time we spend together in face-to-face interaction (not his face to me, my face to my phone) is crucial to his social and emotional development.  Starting today, I vow to do better.  When I am with my son, NO PHONE (unless I'm looking up movie times or some other necessary information).

2.  Be a more conscientious consumer.  Of food.  Of media.  Of information. Of anything I let into my and my son's life.  We are inundated with crap (in food, in media, in information, in general).  We just need to cut the crap.  I have started being more careful about the food I buy, buying more fresh/natural products and leaving foods filled with chemicals on the grocery store shelf.  I am preparing more homemade foods.  Eating more vegetables and less meat.  For all my attempts in the past to get him to eat vegetables and healthy food, my son only likes junk food and fruit (but fruit does not a meal make).  He hasn't touched a vegetable in a VERY long time.  As an alternative to letting him starve, I have acquiesced to his fickle tastes (letting him eat macaroni & cheese, PB&J, hot dogs, and cereal for most meals).  Starting today, I am revamping my efforts to get him to be a good, healthy eater.  Furthermore, I will make smart choices about how we spend our time, the movies we watch, games we play, and things we buy.  Only good things in, please.  Everything else must go.

That is it for today.  My next goal: stop being wasteful.  I'll tackle this one next week.