My 2026 New Year's Resolutions
New Year's Resolutions are a better idea on paper than in practice. A year is a long time, yet also no time at all. Deciding to do something and giving yourself a year to do it gives you either enough time to drag your feet, or not enough time to accomplish your overambitious goals. You want to lose weight? Eh, it can wait until next week. Want to make a video game? I hope you started last year.
Maybe its better to think of resolutions as a list of aspirations rather than a checklist. Thatās what Iām telling myself, anyway. Better than admitting youāre lazy. Iāve crafted a list of somewhat feasible goals Iād like to at least start in the new year. You gotta admire that level of couching. 2025 was such a terrible year Iāll be elated if I achieve even one of these.
Read Better
I barely read anything in 2023 and 2024, only getting back into it late last year. Still, I only read 19 books in 2025. The problem isnāt necessarily the number of books I read, its the quality of my reading. By that, I mean I often started a book reading 20 or 30 pages, and then put it down for days or even weeks before getting back to it.
I wonder if this is some kind of book-specific form of ADHD. I donāt struggle focusing on tasks, if anything I too often get tunnel vision when working on projects. When it comes to books though, I can't seem to stick with them, even ones I enjoy. Thatās not true for every book of course, I finished Gate of Ivrel and Circe last year in three sittings each. Those were the exceptions. Itās why I quit reading for two years. I never made the conscious decision to stop, I never picked up a book in the first place. Getting back into reading though, that I had to make a concerted effort to do. Maybe that means I donāt like reading?
I want to spend 2026 not only reading more, but better. I want to spend every day reading a book, like I used to. I want to sit down and read fifty pages without wandering off to watch YouTube or whatever. I want to read a book in a reasonable amount of time, and not put it off for so long than when I do finally get back to it I canāt remember what was going on. At the very least, I want to read at least a couple of pages a day. If I canāt manage that, then maybe I donāt like reading after all.
But Seriously, Just Stop
Writing these blogs has taught me a lot about my writing. I seem to be at my best when Iām unloading a stream of consciousness and editing later, rather than writing to an outline. At least for blogs, fiction is a different story. I tried that with a short story idea and it ended up becoming a convoluted 20,000 word novella.
The blog also taught me that I am sexually attracted to the words ājustā and ābut.ā I canāt explain it than through some Freudian attraction. Every sentence is sprinkled with the splatterings of my passion for these two wordsā¦ okay, Iām going to stop this metaphor now.
I donāt know how or when I noticed, but when I did, I was flabbergasted, befuddled, and thunderstruck by the perfidy at which my minuscule vocabulary fruitlessly withered upon the creeping tendrils of ineptitude at the juncture of its most consequential function.
Iāve never been one for flowery writing; I put a book down yesterday after ten pages because it read like it was written by a high school jock in poetry class trying to finish an assignment five minutes before it was due. Yet (gottem) reusing words too often is bad writing, especially simple words like ājustā and ābut.ā Theyāre the telltale signs of a writer unsure of themselves, feeling the need to prop up their sentences with examples and non sequiturs, like when they suddenly bring up dropping a book by throwing child athletes under the bus.
Last year I got back into writing fiction. If Iām going to have any hope of selling my stories, I need to do a gooder righting, and putting all thees butjusts all over my wordy words is will be bad four me.
Write The Damn Book Already
Speaking of writing fiction, I started writing my first novel last year! By which I mean I spent about nine months planning it and not writing a single word of the actual story.
In my defense, I ingeniously decided that my first book should be a science fiction story with multiple planets and alien races, and a complex history involving humans leaving Earth and finding a new planet to inhabit. I needed that much time to plan the backstory, research and design all the technology, and devise how the aliens and planets all worked. In a previous blog, I talked about how difficult it was coming up with unique alien races. In fact, thanks to an extended holiday break (and now a bad knee injury I got yesterday) Iām still working on that aspect.
Itās also something of an excuse. Iām very nervous about this. I quit writing fiction for ten years before getting back into it last year. Iāve already failed as a journalist and YouTuber. Iām turning 34 this year, I work a crappy grocery store job, and I feel like Iām running out of chances to achieve my dreams and break out of this cycle. If I fail again, I feel like Iāll be stuck here forever. But the book canāt fail if it never gets written! Thatās how that works, right?
No, thatās not right. I canāt let fear paralyze me like this. I do need to finish planning two of the alien races and one planet, and I need to write a more detailed outline. Sooner than later, though, I need to start writing. I will be stuck in this crappy job the rest of my life if I donāt at least try.
No* AAA Video Games, No Hollywood Movies
After being unhealthily obsessed with video games for years, 2025 was the year of my intervention. The video game industry was alwaysā¦ whatās the word Iām looking for? Garbage? Filth? Shit? Last year though really felt like the beginning of the end. From massive billion dollar acquisitions and consolidations, the Saudi government taking over huge swaths of the industry, a huge push into genAI, more layoffs and studio closures, and worse games than ever, it was an awful year for video games.
Meanwhile, Hollywood is still Hollywood. Theyāre not quite going all-in on the genAI bandwagon like AAA gaming is, so thatās something, I guess. Yet conversely, while the occasional AAA game accidentally turns out great, I canāt remember the last time I thought a Hollywood film was better than āmeh.ā 2018ās Black Panther, maybe?
So Iām going to stop, at least in 2026. I want to see if I can go the whole year without playing a AAA video game or watching a Hollywood film. Well, mostly. Admittedly, I have a stack of AAA video games that have been gathering dust on my shelf for awhile that I want to finally get rid of. Itās only three of them, and I have a blog about them in a couple of days. Iām tired of them hanging over me, and finally clearing them out will be like cutting the last ties to AAA gaming. There are plenty of great indie games and foreign films I can spend my time on instead.
Watch More Foreign Foreign Films
Speaking of foreign films, this is something I need to do better at.
If you read my Best Movies I Watched in 2025 blog, youāll know I mostly stuck to East Asian films last year. The majority of films I watch these days are from China, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, and Taiwan. Pat on the back, gold star to me for being so diverse. I can do better, though. Thereās a whole world of great films out there.
Iāve had my eye on a bunch of movies for longer than I care to admit. Memories of Underdevelopment from Cuba, Rafiki from Kenya, Whisky from Uruguay, and No Bears from Iran are butjust a few of them. I can launch into a diatribe about how we in the West donāt pay enough attention to the rest of the world, or how the Global South is too often ignored. I wonāt, instead leaving those accusations lingering in the air while refusing to roll the windows down.
By not wasting my time on bad Hollywood movies, I should have more time to finally track these films down and give them a watch. From there, I want to broaden my horizons even more, and see what other wonderful movies I can find from other forgotten countryās film industries.
Eat Healthier
Currently Iām the heaviest Iāve been since before COVID, clocking in at 214lbs (97 kg). In 2019 I was in the best shape of my life, a slim(ish) 189lbs (85.7 kg) and eating relatively healthily. I could easily blame the COVID lockdowns, and I'd be lying. Its down to laziness and falling back into bad habits.
I get all my exercise at work, constantly on my feet walking up and down aisles. My diet, however, consists of garbage, of which I too often grab second and third helpings. I canāt remember the last time Iāve gone a day without eating meat. Iām not going vegan, thereās nothing wrong with eating meat. It needs to come in moderation though, and thatās a word I desperately need to learn when it comes to what I shove in my mouth hole.
I want to eat more vegetables, including more vegetable-exclusive dishes. If I can cut my meaty meals down to three days a week, and fill the other four days with veg dishes and fish I think thatād be a huge win. I donāt eat much junk food, the problem is that when I do I canāt stop myself from binging. So exercising self-control when I do eat some potato chips or candy is also something I need to work on.
Less Internet
During the holidays in late November and late December, there were stretches of days where I didnāt go on the internet once. I didnāt look at websites, didnāt log in to social media, didnāt watch YouTube, didnāt so much as check my email or texts. And you know what? Those were the best days of my year.
I had come to think I had mastered my internet time ā stick to decent social media sites, heavily regulate my YouTube and Peertube pages so I only see what I want to see, and only check out a handful of websites I trust. I realized even this was having a negative impact on my health. I was still seeing a lot of horrible stories. If youāve spent even a nanosecond on Lemmy and Mastodon youāll know those places love boosting horrible stories from around the world, especially what awful things Trump and Musk are up to on a daily basis.
Itās important to stay informed on said awful things your dictatorial government is doing, and whatās going on in the rest of the world, but you can overdose on that crap. Doomscrolling is absolutely real, and I, like most of us, did far too much of that in 2025. I hate conceding victory to Steve Bannonās āflood the zoneā strategy, but there is no effective counter to it other than logging off. The internet was built to suck up all of your attention, and more and more often, itās used as a tool to drive hatred and bitterness.
Iām going to be on the internet way less in 2026, especially social media. Lemmy and Mastodon will be dumping grounds for my blogs going forward, and Iām going to limit myself to using the internet once a day for about an hour or so.
Be Less Negative (But Still be Realistic)
For a variety of reasons, 2025 was the worst year of my life. Upon reflection, I think a lot of that was how negative I was. I let the awfulness of everything that was/is happening in the world poison me. I grew overly negative, cynical, bitter, and angry. That colored every interaction in my life, without me even realizing it.
I donāt want to be the bitter and cynical asshole I was in 2025. Thereās plenty to be bitter and cynical about, and its important to acknowledge that. But there are still some good things in life. Theyāre small in the grand scheme of things, and thatās okay. Sometimes you need to stop looking at the bigger picture all the time, stop worrying about that horrible thing happening on the other side of the planet for a few minutes and decompress. Donāt forget about them, but donāt spend every waking moment of your life worrying, either. That isnāt going to help anyone.
This pairs well with spending less time on the internet. Iāll have more time to do things for myself, like reading, writing, and āhanging outā with friends and family. Talking to people in-person is nice. Sometimes.
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