I
have completed my first month of 2012 by following my New Year’s
resolution. I heard on the radio
recently that on average, people abandon their New Year’s resolutions by about
the 17th day of January.
I am sticking to this one for the whole year of 2012. I am not purchasing anything new for
myself that I don’t really need.
No new shoes, no new coats, no bathing suits and no new karate uniforms. If I need something, I am only buying
it second hand at the thrift store or on Ebay. It definitely came up a few times this month, but I just
asked myself, “do you really need this” and of course the answer was “no”! The point is that we waste
so much and I am trying to challenge myself to be more conservative. Of course I am saving myself some money
at the same time, so this is another “win/win” challenge.
Of
course the winter in New York is a great time to get a handle on over
spending. I am an avid snowboarder,
but I have to tell you I really do want those new bindings for my board that I
have had my eye on since last season.
The thing is, I have a new board and bindings all set up, and I am
actually thinking of buying new bindings to put on an old board my son gave me. All I have to do is just switch the
bindings over to the old board and that would take me about 20 minutes to
assemble. When I think about how
lazy that would be to waste the money on new bindings, I can’t believe that I
actually have considered purchasing a new set.
My
karate students all know about my challenge. We speak often about setting goals and taking our knocks
along the way. The other day in
class, we started a discussion on Wii games and how there are different games
that are physical and challenging.
The students said we should get a flat screen tv in the dojo, so we could
have a movie night and also a Wii game night. Great idea, until one student pointed out that Sensei
Michelle couldn’t make any unnecessary purchases in all of 2012 and that she
doesn’t really NEED that flat screen tv.
Constant
reminders of this challenge come up everyday. I can honestly say that the only purchases I made were for a
notebook and a day planner. I
guess those items would be hard to find used.
