Mark Blevis

A belated happy new year!

I took a refreshing vacation from most of my online activities over the last week and a half. The result is I haven’t yet participated in the usual year end wrap-up new year posts. I’m not sure yet if I’ll take the time to jump in on those or if I’ll just get back into a new rhythm. That’s the freedom of blogging. I will extend belated birthday wishes to my good friend Whitney. Happy birthday!

Strangely, after a week and a half of no alarm clock and sleeping in, sometimes as late at 9am (craziness!), my body knew to wake up before my 5:30am alarm clock, today.

It’s customary to announce one’s resolutions at this time of year. Well, I’m not a customary kind of guy. Besides, I’m of the mind that resolutions are empty pronouncements of self-improvement. How may people, myself included, have kept health clubs in business from a fresh membership kicked off in January which has become lonely by the first week of February? Instead, I’ve shared my new year goals on this blog. This year, I’m embracing the my three words movement.

“My three words” are the pillars for the coming year and are intended to help put focus on personal and professional activities.

CREATE, CONNECT, LEARN

Why?

Create is all about creative projects and creativity as a whole. It speaks to process as much as product. It’s about content, music, ebooks, reports, podcasts, videos, etc… It’s also about personal and professional projects, creating noteworthy content and conversations that will satisfy me and resonate with others.

Connect is about building on relationships — that is, elevating existing relationships and establishing new ones. Personal and professional interactions should be meaningful, perhaps building new opportunities in the process. By the way, opportunities don’t have to be about money (though money could play a part). Connect should help pull together the pieces of my life puzzle to assemble the big picture of my thoughts and ideas.

Learn is the increase of knowledge from all of my projects, relationships, interactions, reading and viewing — all production/creation and content consumption. All of what I see and experience should inform my activies (create), relationships (connect) and other research and educational pursuits (learn).

And so begins a new year. Here’s hoping it’s a happy, healthy, successful and rewarding year for all of us!