mid-year resolutions

With the countdown to New Year's Day approaching, I am asked - as well as many others - if I've made any New Year's resolutions. I don't usually have a specific something that I want to do and I figure if I am like the majority of Americans, I am just going to stop doing whatever it is I resolved to do within the first 3 months anyway. So I usually formulate a loose resolution to keep doing the good stuff that I already do, but with more passion and vigor and if there are bad habits that I've crept back toward (like I used to never drink carbonated beverages...ooops) I strive to drop those and get back to the good stuff. Sometimes a specific thing here and there will pop up and I'm usually pretty good about doing it, but it comes in waves.

Well, you might ask what the new year has to do with me right now on the Monday in July. I'll tell you! I was at work the other day and I was just thinking how much of this year I have wasted. I've wasted money on things i didn't need, I've wasted time being lazy and not being productive, I've wasted my attitude on things that aren't worth getting upset over, and I've wasted my frame of mind being less than satisfied with doing what I am doing in the location that I'm doing it in. Now a lot of this comes down to patience and my lack thereof (if I haven't told you before, I think my life's lesson is in patience. Sometimes I feel I've mastered it. Other times I am pure novice).

Last year, my voice teacher and mentor, Mrs. Halbert, came and saw the show I was in - and that I am currently still in. She was so impressed with how my friend and schoolmate Mallory G. and I had grown as performers, whether it be in dance, physique, vocal ability, or stage presence. We spoke of the job that we were doing and what was next. She said that as good as the money is and as stable of a job as it seems, it might be good to do another contract and stay a 2nd year. I remember thinking in my head "you've got to be kidding! There is no way that I will let that happen." Well, she was right and here I am. I wasn't able to line anything up at the end of my 1st contract and they still needed a boy - and hey - I'd rather work in my field than out of it. So here I am again. Contract/year 2. Is it ideal? No. Will there be a contract 3? H NO. :) Am I thankful for what I have and have I gotten over the initial disappointment? It has taken a while, but yes. There are the pros and the cons of living and working where I am right now, but I am learning through experiences of my own and experiences of others that there will always be the pros and the cons - the goods and the bads. I've let the bads weigh me down and that is where all of the waste that I was referring to comes in. It's time for the goods to take that place.

I've missed my passion for living life to its fullest, making new friends - and growing those relationships, having new adventures, taking advantage of the good things that I have, and always striving for more. That's my mid-year resolution. Waste not, want not :)