Go Ahead... Stuff your Face this Holiday Season

I have heard this so many times that I figured it is worth a thought... "It's the holidays. I am going to put on so much weight," or "I gotta join the gym... after the holidays to get back to my pre-holiday weight."

Really?

So basically what you are saying is that you will mess with your physical being, your energy, and your metabolism because you have the need to stuff your face.

I understand it is hard to control yourself when its all there in front of you, when there are chocolate baskets everywhere around the office, when people are in happier mood and tend to bring in more snacks than usual (translation: left over stuff they don't want their families eating), when a vendor sends that basket of fine Godiva goodness, and since your boss can't take it home, they put it out for the team. But where's your control? Where's your "I probably should not eat the entire bar of chocolate after a full lunch" instinct.

Don't have one? Fine. Here are some tips:

If You Really Wanted It...: Admit it. If it wasn't the holidays, and you were craving chocolate, you'd just go and buy a chocolate. And you'd enjoy it more. You have the access and the means. Sure, it will cost you $3.99 to get that giant bar of Godiva (Source: Godiva), but if you are craving it, it will become a treat. And since you will be spending $3.99, you will think twice, and will look at the nutrition factors (and realize that each serving is 220 calories) and hopefully not buy it.
Yes, the one in front of you is free, but free doesn't mean you have to put it in your body. But hey - go ahead, eat the whole thing. Then go out and jog to burn it off (it generally takes a 150 lb person 27 minutes of jogging to burn 220 calories... jus' saying).

Drink Water: Water makes you feel full. And water helps curb cravings. And water is good for you. So drink water. Take a sip - it will do you good.

Eat Before you Go: Going to a party? Eat at home. Yes, it is counter intuitive, but when you eat at home, you will think about what you are eating, you will not (hopefully) stuff your face with deep fried foods, and hence end up eating healthy. When you get to the party, you won't be starving, which will help you curb your intake.

Don't Follow the Crowds: People go to weddings and parties, and line up for food. As if, that's the only opportunity they will get to eat any food for the week. Chill out. Nurse that drink a little longer - when you have been standing in line for a longer period of time, you tend to over-fill your plate. After all, who wants to come back and stand in line again?
Stop it. You are not a pirate out for loot - there's plenty of food. And even if you don't eat much at the party, you will eat better and in a more measured way when you get home anyway. So chill, relax, enjoy your drink, and let the crazies attack the food.

If all else fails and you just end up eating till you are ready to throw up, don't pretend like you care about the calories. Don't say stuff like "oh man, this is so bad. I really shouldn't be eating this" while stuffing your face. Just eat it. Enjoy it. No regrets. You can always up the pants size.

Wolf in Sheep's Clothes - Agile-ish Waterfall? Or is it Waterfall-ish Agile?

There is a great misconception out there about what Agile is, and what it can do. It is mainly because of those who want to use the terminology without understanding the essence of Agile. They say "we do daily Stand Ups", but there is no format - and it is a status call; it lasts 45 minutes; no one is standing up; they are following a project plan; not all stakeholders are present. That's not a Standup - it's just your typical status meeting. Nothing wrong with that - just call it what it is. They say, we have 2 week sprints, but more often than not the length of the sprint is changed, a slice of work is not considered from end to end - the traditional Waterfall SDLC phases of design/development/testing are broken out across the 2 week time periods. That's not Agile, and it's not a Sprint - it is just the Waterfall timeline broken out to 2 week check points. Again, nothing wrong with that - just call it what it is. Do waterfall well, and you will see success. Methodology doesn't drive success - proper execution of the methodology does.

Many do this because there is pressure from sr management to bring "change". Someone at the top wants to "transform the company", and they heard about "Agile" from a friend or at a seminar, and now they are an "Agile expert". They push the agenda down, without providing enough resource for the transformation to happen properly, and expect people to "figure it out". So what does the middle management do? They Google "agile" or "scrum", read the first article, and start "rolling it out". Rename the status meeting to "stand up" - done! Everyone gets a bonus. Problem solved.

I exaggerate - but you get the point. In the wake of this "transformation", the turnover goes up, and we chalk it up to people's inability to deal with change. The projects fail, and then the naysayers come out "see, told ya". After several thousand dollars of soft and hard cost to the organization, and several years wasted, the organization is either left with this morphed version of waterfall, or "agile" is abandoned because it's 'not right for the organization'. 

Agile can be potent and can transform your organization to become more effective in delivering results, more efficient in predicting outcomes, and your products more relevant - if done the right way. If your company does not have the resources, or does not want to go through the change, the true change, just fix waterfall or any other methodology you are following. It will be less expensive, and overall, more effective. And you won't lose your talent in the meantime.

Good Luck! 

Meeting Agendas... How to Organize Around It

So you have setup a the meeting. Congratulations. Now what?

To conduct an effective meeting, you need to have a clear agenda. And not just in your own head, but a published agenda that everyone is aware of, and agrees to. 

A meeting is considered organized if we create some reading materials and send them out in advance, expecting everyone to be adults and prepare for the meeting. Now let's do a reality check - how many meetings does a person attend on average? Let's talk stats for a minute -

According to a 1998 MCI study (yes, that says 1998 - it was a different world back then - for those of you who were born and around), each day in the United States there are 11 Million meetings (Source: https://e-meetings.verizonbusiness.com/meetingsinamerica/pdf/MIA5.pdf). On a side note, how many meetings do you think we are having now in the U.S.? Senior Managers spend up to 23 hours a week in meetings (that's more than half a work week). So, all this leads me to the topic at hand - how do we get the most out of our meetings. What is the one thing we can do to take a step towards a better meeting environment?

Many times we send our materials, send the agenda, and expect people to show up prepared. We get mad when they don't, and blame how no one cares. Sound about right?

The invitees have fallen victim to the 'feed me' syndrome (commonly found in little kids). You don't have to be a powerhouse at the company to make sure people are prepared for the meeting. As the organizer of the meeting, you have to not only be organized yourself, you also have to help others get organized.

So what should you do?

When you send out the required materials, call out the sections specific people need to pay attention to. For example, if you are discussing a requirements document, there may be a sales section, marketing requirements, software architecture requirements and UI requirements. The marketing representative invited to the meeting only really needs to read the marketing section. They may want to glance over the sales section and the UI section so they know where the product is heading, and how the sales strategy ties into their marketing strategy, but that depends on how much time they have available and how much they can contribute to the other sections.

If you break down the reading materials and tell each of the invitees the sections they need to review, you may get more cooperation. Otherwise, they will see a 50 page document and decide to never have enough time to read the whole thing. This will result in people showing up with no background and no prep, and you will end up having a meeting about the meeting. You will eventually run out of time, and people will walk out frustrated, and the age old cliche of 'have  a meeting to have the meeting' will hold true. 

Just setting the agenda isn't enough. It's the first step.

Let's take the example I outlined above - if all you say is "review marketing, sales, technical and UI related requirements and answer questions to get final sign off", you have already lost the battle and set yourself up for 3-4 sessions with a bunch of folks who are showing up just because.

Try this on for size as the agenda:

---

Problem Statement: Requirements are in the final stages of review - final sign off needed by all stakeholders. 

Time frame: Development team is ready to execute on these requirements in 2 days (xx/xx/xxxx)

Action Items:

Everyone: Review your sections as outlined below and send me questions or bring them to the meeting.

John (marketing): review sections 1 and 2 (pages 3 through 10).

Note: you may want to read section 5 for sales requirements but not required.

Jason (sales): review section 5 for sales requirements. May also want to review sections 1&2.

Terri (UI): Reviews designs in section 8, the problem statements of each of the sections outlined in the document.

---

This will help get everyone organized, and considering the short amount of time everyone has running between meetings, they can focus on what matters to them. They will thank you for pointing out what they should be focusing on, they can read their relevant sections.

To be sure, follow up once (without being a pest) and ask everyone if they need any help or if anything was unclear. It shows you care about the topic, care about what you are calling everyone for, and care for their feedback during the meeting.

Ofcourse, after the meeting send minutes and any follow up items.

Organizing the Organizer... Meetings! Meetings! Meetings!

Having proper meeting etiquette is extremely important. It shows your professionalism, your commitment to the topic at hand, and your commitment to the company and to the person who has setup the meeting. Depending on who the meeting is with, and what your role is, you should be prepared accordingly.

If it is a meeting with a client at their location, get there early. Just getting there 15 minutes ahead of time allows you be relaxed and be in the proper frame of mind to participate. It may also let you do the greetings and introductions up front in a more relaxed environment, which in turn lightens the mood and sets a positive tone for the meeting. It also gives you time in case there is a problem - and a problem could be as simple as you spilling something on your shirt and needing to purchase a stain remover. Or needing to go to the bathroom. Or drinking some water to compose yourself. 

If you are presenting, get there even earlier - perhaps allow for 20-30 minutes. Now the courteous thing to do is to let your host know that you will be there 30 minutes earlier to setup so they are aware and ready. You may need to hook up your laptop to the projector, setup the table/easel/find markers/distribute print outs etc. Imagine if you got there with only 5 minutes to spare, connected your laptop, and the cable doesn't work? You will start stressing out, and stress others out, leaving an overall bad impression and perhaps losing a client or at best, showcasing that you cannot manage your time. You may need time to find the IT guy to help you. As a side note, what's your backup plan?

If the meeting is internal, some people are laxed about getting to it. People are fashionably late by 5-10-15-20 minutes. I have seen the meeting organizers handle this in many different ways - some close the door to the conference room and do not allow anyone else to come in after a 5 minute grace period. Others walk around frantically, looking for the missing participant(s), while some others ask to pay a penalty of $1 or something minimal as a token and acknowledgement for being late. Some others just sit in the conference room and wait... and wait... and wait. Is there a prescribed way to conduct a meeting? Ideally, everyone's there and the meeting starts on time, but that seldom happens. 

  

Source:CondeNastStore


I have personally tried all of the above with varied degrees of success. The most effective way I have experienced is to setup a reminder for the meeting in the invite (10 minutes works - 15 minutes is too long), and basically start on time. If someone comes late, do no recap the meeting and keep going. If someone is critical to the meeting and you want to make sure they are on time, check in with them 10 minutes prior so they are reminded.

And then there's the other side of the spectrum - the meeting-nazis. The meeting organizers who stomp around in anger yelling at people to join their meeting. Or worse - being passive aggressive. There is no cure and no recourse. Just decline if you can, and try not to laugh at their inability to keep their composure. Oh, and good luck!

Journey with My Dog

I saw this coming. I knew one day it will happen that you will be ready to move on, and I will be left behind. I didn't know when and how it would happen, I didn't know how old you would be, I didn't know if it it'd be upon my shoulders to make that decision. I also didn't know how hard it would be for me, Amrita, and the rest of the family. 

Sikhi speaks of moving on, of letting go, of not getting attached, and I wish I had that in me, but the reality is, you are never really ready. It took me several months of preparing myself mentally to be this close to letting you go. I know time heals all, and I am sure you are in a better place already... but you are my first. And firsts are always the hardest and leave the most impression.

So as I cope with your passing, I also want to apologize. I didn't know what to expect out of our relationship. Just like all first relationship, my expectations were too high, my contributions too low. I thought all I had to do was to get you, and then we'd work things out from that point on. I thought my love was enough. We connected, and we shared, but I also feel guilty for not letting you live to your full potential. I feel like I couldn't/didn't train you properly. It wasn't because of lack of trying, but because I didn't know how. And it stunted what you and I could have done together - besides the beautiful memories I have of you, I wish there was more. Somewhere along the journey, life got in the way. Too busy working, too busy with events in life, too busy with whatever - and I lost my bearings. There was a period of time when I did not pay attention to you as much as I could have. I am sorry.

Every time I saw you, you had the same excitement in your eyes. You came and sat next to me, no matter where I was; You sat outside my bathroom as I showered, you would get so excited to see me that you'd shoot out of the front door to greet me, but since you couldn't contain your excitement, so you'd run around and do laps around the backyard. You slept at the foot of my bed till the last day, and you gave me so much joy. Your love was pure - unconditional - limitless - and your affection was warm, and caring. I think it is safe to say that even though I owned you, you owned my heart.

I still remember the day you entered my life - July 3, 2002. Amrita called me and told me about the surprise - I rushed to the airport to pick you up, took you to CT to have you meet with Amrita, and then took you home. You were so scared - after all, you had flown in from Africa. I bathed you, gave you a tour of the house, fed you and gave you your first chew toy (desi style). You fell asleep in my arms... and I fell asleep with you.

We spent many years together - you saw me go through all the stages of my life, and above all, you knew who I would end up with (even before even I knew it). You brought me and my wife together - you played a bigger role than you could ever know in why her and I stayed together. You practically rejected anyone else I brought home, except her. 

You stood guard, majestic as always, whether it was me sitting in the backyard drinking chah, or while my kids played, or while I slept in the basement. I knew you were always there, always ready to protect me and my family. I knew nothing could get past you, and that I could sleep in peace. You knew who was important to me, and went to extreme lengths to protect them. You also knew what I enjoyed, and always either participated in it, or patiently waited for me to be done. You woke up with me, no matter how early or late I slept, and you didn't go to bed until I did. You sat outside Babaji's room, listening to hymns and meditation, enjoying it peacefully and waiting patiently. You LOVED eating parshad - and were caught several times trying to steal it, not only from the table, but also from our hands. 

We celebrated so many events together - Amrita and my birthdays, your birthdays, mom and dad's birthdays, anniversaries, weddings and kids' birthdays. You were such an important member of the family that you even got Sagan when Amrita and I got married, and you were the first one in the family to know that we were having a baby. You accepted and protected my kids the same way you did me, and no matter what my kids did to you, you, being the older and wiser one in the family, never said anything. I remember Ajaivir trying to poke your eye out one day, and all you did was to nudge him away and change the spot where you were sitting. 

You fulfilled one of my oldest desires - for as long as I can remember, I had always wanted a dog. And not just any dog - a big dog. I just didn't know much about the breeds, about the types, so when I someone else in the family with a Rhodesian, I researched further, and my heart was set. Still I didn't know where to get a Rhodesian, and it was still a bit of a dream, until you came along. That dream became a reality when you entered my life. 


In you, I saw a reflection of me. Deeply loving, fiercely protective, loyal to the end, and unconditional and unassuming. From you I learned many life lessons, and I learned about my own self. For many years you were my constant companion, and knew just how to help me get through life. We would sit and without having the need to talk, you gave a sense of comfort. I hope I did the same for you.  

When you got old, barely able to stand and take care of yourself, I knew it would be a matter of a few weeks before I had to make the ultimate decision - probably the hardest decision I have had to make in my life thus far. I wish I could tell you how much I love you, how much you have meant to me, and how you impacted my life in a positive way. I just hope that I was able to do the same for you - that I was able to provide for you, and able to love you the way you loved me. 

Amrita and I drove you on the fateful day, August 25, at 6:30 PM, to the vet, after having done ardaas, and reading Keertan Sohila, asking for your soul to be sent back to this world in human form, so like the rest of us, your soul also has an opportunity to ask for mukti (salvation). I kept your old tired face in my lap for one last time, caressed your wrinkled forehead, and gave you one last hug. We walked together, through the sunset, you turned and looked at the world one last time, and then we stepped into the cold room. I came out with your leash, your collar, and a broken heart. My mind knew it was the right thing, but my heart was screaming. It has taken me several days to even finish this post, and it will take me several weeks if not months to get back to normal.

I will reminisce about our good times and I will remember our adventures; 

I wish you well my friend, and i wish your soul all the good I can offer, and I hope that in this cosmic journey, we meet again. Until then...

Performance Evaluations - An Opportunity, Not a Burden

As a Manager, going through performance evaluation season and having to do your regular job while writing and reviewing evaluations can increase the demand on already limited time availability. Many a managers try to speed through this phase, to 'get it over with', and miss out on a huge opportunity to connect with their employees. This is the time where you are sitting face to face with your employees, and reflecting back on their (and hence your) successes as well as opportunities for growth. Appropriate time must be spent to provide feedback and agree upon a course of action for the future. As a manager, the best thing you can do, the best service you can provide to your team members is to be Objective, Organized, Concrete, Constructive, and Honest.

Being Objective: Take the emotion away.
Your employee rubbed you the wrong way, you have a disliking towards someone, you hold a grudge because they disagree with you - all these need to be objectively analyzed, the emotion squeezed out, so only the 'lessons learned' stay. For example, let's say in a meeting your employee, in front of your peers, contradicts you and you did not like that. Look at that situation objectively - did you bring that employee up to speed with your perspective prior to the meeting? Did you provide reasonable explanation or attempt to table to conversation within the meeting? Did you have an offline conversation with that employee in the past to allow them to voice their disagreement in private rather than in an open forum? If there is a behavioral pattern, has that been discussed prior to doing their review? Is the employee even aware that you have an issue or concern regarding the behavior/demeanor/approach?

Take the emotion out and have an objective conversation with them based on observations, not inference. Outline what the issue is, and propose a gameplan to help improve on the issue.

Being Organized: Arrange your thoughts & feedback in bullet points.
As a manager, delivering reviews can be stressful, but think of the person sitting across from you who is anxious and nervous about what could be in their review. Writing a review is hard - and it should be. It should involve you, as a manager, thinking through and giving credit where credit is due, and providing structured feedback where the person can focus on over the foreseeable future. If all this gets hidden in paragraphs of text where the content is not broken out by topics, you can almost guarantee that as soon as the person walks out of the meeting, so does the information provided on the review. Bullet point everything - it will help you keep your points succinct, and allow your team member to focus on each point and discuss those one at a time.

Concrete-ness: Provide measurable concrete examples for each bullet point in each area.
Don't be vague like 'he worked on several projects and launched them'. Outline the projects they worked on and what made them successful (or not). For example, 'John worked on the website development project, negotiated and documented requirements, and managed the development and release aspects to deliver the project to meet the marketing campaign slated for the month of June, increasing the revenue by 40%'. Specific data points provides the employees with something to reflect upon, and it memorializes the successes (and failures). If someone's error rate is high, instead of saying 'her error rate reported is too high', say 'her average error rate is 25%, which is 10% above the team average; It is recommended that she attend the following training courses to reduce the error rate...'. Metrics are concrete, irrefutable, and provide direction for the employees.

Constructive: Don't be negative.
It is easy to be negative. It is easy to say how someone is bad at something, but what are you, as a manager, doing to help them? Are you mentoring them? If, for example, a PM is frustrated with the Product Manager and it is impeding the success of the project, you can note that observation in the review, but also outline what can be done to resolve the issue. Perhaps a pointer is to articulate that the accountability of the project's success relies on the PM, and that you will sponsor certain classes where the PM can learn the human side of project management. If there is no plan being offered by you to help your employee, they will see the review as an opportunity for you to tell them that they suck. That's not your goal.

Honest: Do not sugar-coat.
Be open and honest. If you sugar coating issues your message will get lost. Be open to discussing the points you outlined in the review, and if you realize you made a mistake in certain metric, be open to changing the review and don't take offense to it. The review should be a vehicle for a dialogue, not a king telling its subjects what they did.

Be the manager your employees deserve - consultative, collaborative, and provide guidance and mentorship without being overbearing. A performance review is an affirmation of the success, and a recap and formalization of areas of improvement and goals for the next review cycle. A review is the best way to communicate your intentions and expectations, so as a manager, take it seriously.

Expectation Setting - Kids

Kids take a lot of patience out of you - they are constantly active , constantly seeking something to do, and when they can't find constructive things to do, they become destructive. We as parents are always trying our darnest best to guide them in the best way possible towards the best and most engaging activities. Yet, most of us have a hard time keeping up and let's be honest, sometimes we have to resort to some tactics that our idealistic alter ego would frown upon, like letting watch TV, or use the phone to play a game or watch a video.

There are days I have thought of removing all the TVs from the house to force everyone to find other things to do - but I fear that at the time when my wife and I need peace and quiet the most, where we would have otherwise used TV as our last resort, we would not get it. Also, I know I will definitely miss the TVs and may resort to spending more time in front of my computer, further isolating myself from the family. We have tried limiting the time we allow our kids to watch tv, but it has had limited success in my opinion because it becomes a constant battle between us, the parents, and the kids. They fight for  "2 more minutes" or "1 more episode".

Recently I discovered an approach that has yielded the most positive results thus far - I started giving more control to my older one. But the control comes with a logical conversation about expectations. 

Before he turns on the TV, we talk through and get comfortable with how long he will watch tv for. We both agree on the length of time for which the tv or the phone will stay on - It could be 'until I am done with your joora (top knot) and dastaar (turban)', or '20 minutes from now when the clock reads 6:45'. We talk through our expectations - he expresses his concern if he thinks the time is too little, or if he can finish the show he starts, and we come to an agreement. These agreements depend on the time of day, the activities following the tv/phone watching, how much of a break we (the parents) need, how cranky the kids are... Among other things. Just this simple conversation has turned a once contentious snatching and abuse of the poor remote control into a constructive conversation about getting to an agreement and sticking to that agreement. It also teaches them how to negotiate - not a bad thing in this aggressive world.

Does he still try to look for wiggle room in the pre-negotiated terms of tv-watching - Yes. Do I want him to always push my limits - yes. 

That's the fun of parenting.

Loyalty in Workplace

Everyone has different motivations at work. You have to define what yours is, and where your loyalties are - and depending on the position, that decision may come sooner rather than later. If you are an analyst (Business Analyst, Project Lead, Project Manager, Systems Analyst, Developer, DBA etc. fall in this category), it is easier to lay low and out of the lime lite. There may be some jockeying, some power plays, but mostly you are protected by the fact that your management is doing enough of that. You may be a casualty of war, but not necessarily the general or even a soldier. This quickly disappears as you start rising through the ranks and enter the middle-tier management, or the senior management roles. Even if you are on the outskirts of a conflict, being in those positions will force you to eventually get roped in - and that's because your word matters. When you say something, people act or react. The power you hold allows you no flexibility but to force-choose a side.

So when you are surrounded by this type of environment, where should your loyalties be? Who should you be "in bed with"? Is it the camp that is portraying itself to be the next successor? Is it the camp that is projecting they have the ultimate upper hand? Is it the camp that seems to have alignment with their superiors? Is it the camp... you get the idea. There are so many damn camps sometimes, that its even hard to choose.

Ultimately, your loyalty should be to your work and to your work ethic. There is no person, no leader, no department and no single entity or being that represents your "work" wholly and solely. Your "work", be it operational, be it BD, or Sales or any other area within the organization is represented by executing on the vision of the company you are with. The vision is abstract, and hence has an entity of its own. The vision can change, and so should your strategy and approach to execute on the newly defined vision. This defines your work ethic.

Sikhs in United States Military - Reaction

Fox News reacted. They don't like anyone messing with their good ol' USA. They got experts, and political strategists, they even have black people now, you know, to show they are diverse. They all got together behind the message of "shouldn't change the military dress code to accept Sikhs", "if they want to serve , follow our code", all the while showing pictures of Taliban and other Muslim terrorists in the background. Wow Fox - Jon Stewart is right - you are the true spin masters, sitting on the bullshit mountain.

If you look back in American history, when "American" meant 'being white', and black people had to struggle to get their rights, struggle to share the same seat on the bus, struggle to enter the military, I am sure there was some other 'fox news' equivalent out there, opposing, digging in their heels, and rallying bigots behind them.

Let's look at their arguments:

1. Beard and mustache hinder usage of gas masks and other equipment.

Really? So Sikhs have been in the military for hundreds of years, without using proper equipment eh? And if it is the case that somehow our military's design was so narrow minded so as not to consider a mustache, wouldn't that be a design flaw?

2. It impacts morale and cohesion.

Oh right - wearing a turban is where we break cohesion 'cause obviously teamwork is defined by shaved faces. All these experts should really take some therapy from team building experts (aka the Military). A unit lives together, goes to battle together, protects each other and lay their lives for each other. That's how cohesion is built. A black person or a Sikh for that matter, is not why cohesion or discipline is broken.

And if you look at the history of Sikhs (you know, use google maybe?), you will see Sikhs have been a military class from the very beginning. Heck, our forefathers were born in the field. No kidding. And there was a Sikh who was part of the U.S. Military during WWI. No no, that's not a mistake - that does say world war 1. His name was Bhagat Singh Thind (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhagat_Singh_Thind). 

In allied forces, thousands of other Sikhs laid their lives and World War II saw even more participation. Here's a link where you can read all about it (http://www.sikhroots.com/sikh-literature/history/3014-sikhs-in-world-war-ii).

Oh and I forgot their last argument - 

3. But we are a bunch of bigoted naysayers unless ofcourse it is a republican move.

Right.

So, feel lucky U.S. army that you are getting warriors who have 'fighting for the righteous' in their blood. Here's a few more stories of Sikh bad-assery -

http://www.badassoftheweek.com/21sikhs.html

http://www.badassoftheweek.com/maibhago.html

Rejoice.

2014: Resolution

It's isn't about doing big things - 'cause only if making resolutions made us do big things, most inventions would have happened in January / February timeframe. It isn't about working out, or eating less or praying more  - 'cause those are lifestyle changes, and if you couldn't do them in November, you certainly aren't going to have a Divine intervention in January (it was less than 2 months ago - really). So, thinking about resolutions, I couldn't come up with something I could truly commit to and strive for. So here's mine: my resolution for 2014, is to get to 2015. That's it. It's that simple. 

If I get through 2014, keep my shit together, spend some acceptable time (acceptable to me, that is) with my family and kids, (oh and see my brother get married), I have delivered 100% on what I set out to do. 

So there it is folks - just commit to get to the next year in this crazy world without losing your shit.

Happy New Year!