Just made them up. I have no plans to keep them. Since I made them up, I have added a few for others, like the US government.Why not?
Personal Resolutions
1. I will work-out every day. I can't do anything about how my mind feels, but there is something I can do about the body.
2. Get a hold of myself. Complain and travel less. Find peace. And when travelling, find the road less taken and stop to really see things. Don't rush through life like it is one long plane trip.
3. Accept the things I cannot change, even if I wish I could change them. Life is not fair. I am often wrong. You are often right. I cannot argue about everything.
4. Love unconditionally.
5. Work hard at things I can change and need to change.
6. Shop less. Retail therapy is not a good substitute for 1 and 2 above.
7. Read more books. Go out less. Spend more time with myself. Listen to more music.
8. Stay optimistic. don't let hope go.
9. Genuinely feel happy for you. You deserve all the happiness in the world. Feel happy for everyone in my life even if their happiness affects my self-interest. See 4. Everyone has a right to pursue their own happiness.
10. Try not to be selfish.
Resolutions for America
1. We will not humiliate the Middle-East in 2007. We have done enough to create enemies for a thousand years. It is time to stop.
2. We will work to get universal health care for our children and find a way to make college affordable. We will spend less on wars and more on education.
3. We will not execute former heads of state, even if they were bad dictators on holy days and in the most humiliating ways. There is an exeption to this rule: We will do whatever we want if we have the balls to execute our own current heads of state for war crimes on Christmas eve.
4. We will try to hold ourselves to the standard we expect the rest of the world to hold up to. We will grudgingly admit that others deserve a modicum of respect as well.
5. We will let other people be. Allow them to live out their lives as we do ours.
6. We will also let our own people taste what we say is all around America: freedom. I remember it from a long time ago, I think we have moved it since to Guantanamo. We will bring it back.
7. We will not go to bed with deplorable dictators and call them allies against war on terror. And while we are at it, we will no longer call it War On Terror. We will call it what it is: War of Terror.
8. We will stop calling a spade a club and hope people will not notice. They do.
9. We will let gay people marry. It is none of our business who marries who as long as everyone plays by the rules. There are bigger fish to fry.
10. We will be honest about OUR true intentions. It is OK, they already know. Admitting it feels good.
Resolutions for India
1. We will learn English before we join the profession of journalism. "Corporates" is not a word. We will stop referring to the business world as "India Inc." We will edit our newspapers better and stop publishing pictures of has-been paunchy socialites in tight clothes and feel good about the country. We will stop nominating Shah Rukh Khan as the person of the year.
2. We will stop pretending that the poverty and dirt around us do not exist. We will acknowledge the "other" 80%. Even if they are inconvenient to us for the stories we want to tell others.
3. It is OK to be honest. Even if it is hard. They already know. For starters, we will tell the world who the "real" prime minister is.
4. For once, we will stop talking about Pakistan peace process. There is no process, there is no peace. See 3. We don't love our neighbor. So stop sending fruit baskets across the border.
5. We will get serious about population control. It is fun to talk about Tata busying steel companies in the UK and the birth of new airlines. But we will get serious. We are not going anywhere without going back to the basics. Population control, drinking water, access to basic education and rural employment. Whatever happened to these?
6. We will try to improve governance. We will whip the skins of the backsides of the politicians who are criminals. We will stop electing gangsters. We will send Lallu back to the back of beyond where we will make him clean toilets.
7. We will stop moralizing on sex. And on "western" values. Let it be. Let people figure out what is best for them. While at it, we will simplify our arcane laws on all moral issues.
8. We will acknowledge that reservation is a fucked up system to address the social ills.
9. We will hold all religions to the same standards. better yet, we will become more secular and ignore them altogether. We will arrest criminals regardless of why they did the things they did.
10. We will stop trying to be a mini-USA. We don't yet need American approval to sneeze.
