#113. Another Resolution Speed Round

Resolutions: Because the first solutions didn't work!

Jan 06, 2025

Hi everyone,

Happy (???) new year! I know how calendars work, but I also think that today is officially the beginning of 2025. I’d really been enjoying this liminal period between “the holidays” and “the year.” It’s been nice to not have too many firm plans during the time when it wasn’t quite a holiday, but no one was going to ask me to do anything annoying. Maris and I watched Thelma (loved it!!!) and rewatched the whole first season of Severance (loving it again!!!) before the new season starts. (If you’re a Severance fan…or a Party Down fan…or a Parks and Recreation fan, you should read Rachel Syme’s New Yorker profile of Adam Scott, which is great!)

NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION SPEED ROUND

2025 novelty glasses with the number OVER the actual frames. Weak stuff. — Come on, we’re not even trying anymore.

This week, I’m doing a rapid fire round of pep talks for people’s new year’s resolutions! Not that you have to have a resolution! Or that January is the only time you can make changes in your life! But you all know that already! So let’s goooo!

(For the record, my new year’s resolution this year—as it is every year—is to be a more thoughtful, available friend as well as a more looming, intimidating enemy. But I’ve added the resolution to focus more on creative projects I can make without permission and less on stuff that requires someone else’s sign-off.)

My resolution is to find love in 2025.

Here’s something I just came up with off the dome: Love, actually, is all around us.

*touches earpiece* Oh I’m hearing there was an entire movie about that concept that’s like 2/9ths good. They should make a version of Love Actually where you get to only watch the couple of interesting and fun stories and don’t have to see the other ones. Step up, science!!!

For real, though, there are so many ways to find love! You can love your family. I mean, maybe that’s not true for every “you” but it’s a place to start. You can love your friends. You can fall in romantic love. You can make a big thing of pasta “with love.” You can scream “I love this song!” when you hear a song you like, even if you were the one who put that song on the playlist.

Looking for love when you’re dating is so hard! Because it often involves meeting a stranger and being like: “Okay…should we hang out with each other’s parents in six months? We’re really vibing, but will we want to eventually combine bookshelves???” (NOTE: My wife and I have lived together for nearly a decade and have never combined bookshelves.)

Even if you don’t find a soul mate this year, there are a zillion ways that you can add love to your life, and you deserve to enjoy them all!!!

I would like to finish a first draft of my novel by spring but have been stuck and procrastinating since basically mid December!

You can barf out a first draft!!! It is within your grasp!!! It doesn’t even have to be good!!! No one ever has to see it!!! You can write the easy parts first if you are finding yourself stuck with something complicated!!! No one has to know!!! Making it readable is future-you’s problem!!! Right now your job is to spill your brain out into a document and trust that you’ll mop it up later!!!

One of my resolutions is to try more drugs.

I am famously not an expert on this topic; even my modest effort to occasionally smoke a little semi-legal weed last year was not especially successful. But I think you can find a safe and comfortable way to expand your comfort zone around people you trust! Although for legal reasons, you did not hear that from me. Legally, I think you should do FEWER drugs. Cut out caffeine, even. I am unclear about what my liability is here, so I’m kind of throwing stuff at the wall.

I'm resolved to sincere post this year into oblivion. I see a post about a sweater, great sweater! Something silly makes me giggle, tell the silly goose themselves. I rarely engage on social media. Not anymore mofos! I'm coming in complimenting.

I'm trying to outwardly express my appreciation and gratitude for things more often! Check in with friends more, tell people when their outfit is cute, write reviews of small businesses I enjoy, etc. As an introvert it doesn't come naturally but it's the 2025 energy I need to cultivate!

Obviously, these two resolutions are right up my alley! The writer podcaster John Moe recently mentioned on BlueSky how nice it is when people reach out to an artist to say they enjoy their work! I would even go as far as to say those interactions (especially if you’re not, say, interrupting someone in public eating dinner with their family or secret family) almost always go pleasantly (and usually it’s neutral at worst).

This for sure extends to the people in your life. Maybe your friend got a nice new sweater! Let ‘em know! Perhaps a co-worker’s homemade lunches always look and small great! Tell ‘em! Did the cashier at CVS make your day by applying a customer cares code even though you didn’t bring your card? Appreciate them!!! So much of the time, we’re all shuffling around, unsure if we are pulling off this new haircut or should start taking piano lessons. It’s a true kindness to offer enthusiasm and reassurance to the people around you (without being a creep)!

I refer to the online practice of this as Uncle Posting or Aunt Posting. I honestly aspire to the digital life of someone who logs on with no self-consciousness, who just wants to tell their nieces and nephews that they’re doing great, and has no inkling that strangers will see these comments. I will leave the comment “You two!!!” on the anniversary picture of people I’ve met one time. I’ll throw down some flame emojis on a photo of a friend wearing a suit to the theater. Why hold back? Who are you trying to look cool in front of? Leave the sincere comment that your heart years to share!

I’m working to get my dumb ass to read a book a month. It shouldn’t be hard, but there’s so much tv and things to look at on my phone instead.

Oh yell yeah. As someone with a similarly dumb ass, who is also prone to scrolling, I believe in you (and me) here! There are so many great books, and so many of them are fun to read. And guess what? The fun ones count as books too! A.B.A.B. (All Books Are Books). You don’t have to read War and Peace to consider yourself a reader. You don’t have to swim against the tide of Moby Dick’s page count to prove your literacy! I am POSITIVE that you can find a book or two that fires up the little pinball machine lights in your brain and makes you want to leave your phone across the room for an hour or two.

Extremely biased recommendation: Nobody talks about books and suggests good books to read like

Maris Kreizman

over at her newsletter The Maris Review!

I would like to watch more movies, especially older ones, and spend less time brainlessly poking around the streaming platforms looking for I-don't-know-what.

We’ve all heard the jokes about someone’s favorite movie being the Netflix home screen. Or how we have access to a nearly infinite deluge of entertainment but somehow, just like when we had three channels beamed into our home via a big metal antenna, there’s nothing on. What the hell?

This conundrum is wildly relatable! To slip into the dreaded “advice” mode, I find keeping a list of things I want to watch is super helpful. That way when it gets to be 8pm, I don’t have to try and discover something that fits my mood. I keep a little running tally in my phone of things I’ve heard are good so that when the time comes I can snap into (in)action and enjoy a movie. This method also helps stave off the feeling of not being in the mood that sets in when I scroll. There are so many great movies that I stumble across and think not tonight. If you keep a log of everything you want to watch, there’s a much better chance of having something temperament-appropriate at your fingertips when you want it.

Also, they don’t tell you this, but you don’t have to watch the whole thing at once! Watch half, go to be, watch the other half the next day. The Brutalist has an intermission, but when you’re at home, you can put a break in any movie you want.

I'm resolved to floss every day. It's the only resolution I make, because I've yet to complete a full 365 days of flossing.
Made a bunch of micro goals for better health.
Trying to be patient with myself and regulate when I’m overstimulated. (With ptsd, adhd, and a toddler it is a LOT!!)

These are some great goals! One beautiful thing about setting long-term intentions like these is that you can give yourself credit every time you do something resolution-compliant instead of kicking yourself in the butt (or punching yourself in the butt if you’re more of an upper-body type) every time you feel like you’re falling short.

I am a total (platonic) freak about flossing. People say that flossers live longer than non-flossers, and I’ve taken that to heart. It’s basically the only good habit I have, and I fully pat myself on the back every time I do it (which is every day, sometimes twice).

Wayne Gretzky (allegedly) said that you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take. But it’s important to remember that you might also miss most of the shots you DO take, and that’s just part of it. I’ve probably said this before in the newsletter, but I’m just obsessed with poking holes in Gretzky’s logic. That smug son of a gun.

An imperfect attempt at achieving a goal isn’t always a failure; most of the time it’s the process working as processes do. You rarely hit every green light (or every zero-wait subway transfer) on the way home from work. You rarely hit every note when you’re singing along to the radio. You deserve the same gentleness from yourself with resolutions you’ve explicitly set as you do with less formal aims.

Give yourself credit when credit’s due, and don’t—I don’t know—send yourself to detention every time you slip up.

I’d like to be a better friend this year. While my favorite plans are canceled ones, so much of relationships are showing up. I’d like to do that more. The depression be on my head, though.
- Out On Bail

Yes yes yes! You can do this! One thing I started doing a few years ago that might be helpful is making the kinds of plans I’m likely to keep. Maybe you’re not always going to be up for a sunrise bike ride across a mountain ridge. But chances are it’s a little easier to keep plans like “hey why don’t you come over here and we’ll watch the game” or “let’s grab coffee and sit in the park”. Let people know where your head is at, and I bet they’ll show you the same consideration and care you’d show them under similar circumstances. When you’re not at your best, it’s okay to let people show up for YOU, and maybe that will help you cultivate the skills at showing up for them too.

I’m trying to *operate from a place of confidence* this year, Josh!! and it ain’t gonna be easy!!

I love this goal because confidence is an attribute that you can benefit from nearly as much by pretending to have it as you do by actually having it. That’s not true of, like, a medical degree. You need to actually know the stuff you’re claiming to in order to perform an appendectomy. But with self-esteem, you can kind of fake it ‘til you make it, and really you never even have to make it. You can fake it forever, and that usually does the trick.

I feel like every wildly arrogant jerk I’ve ever met has someone trailing behind them, whispering to the people in their wake: “Actually, they’re really insecure.” And in my head, my response is always: “Then they should fuckin’ act insecure so we know their deal.” But you don’t have to be a monster to enjoy this loophole. Just…ask yourself what a confident person would do…and then do it, and reap the rewards. There’s no way for impostor syndrome to set in when you are intentionally being an impostor. Go wild with it. No one will know the difference. It’s the perfect crime.

I need to spend this year trying to create a life in which it is possible for me to thrive.

Here’s the best part about this resolution: It doesn’t even require you to thrive. You just have to set up the preconditions for thriving and then que será será! That’s such solid, process over results shit. I hope that in this coming year, we all create lives in which it is possible for us to thrive! And then whether we do or not is kind of up in the air, but hey we did what we could, and if things end up falling short of great, that’s probably fine too. Unless you’re Shaq, you’re probably going to miss at least 50% of the shots you take, after all.

PICK-ME-UP SONG OF THE WEEK:
Redman ft. Method Man - “Lalala”

For over a quarter of a century, Redman and Method Man have reliably released rap songs about smoking weed, and I think that’s beautiful. Both rappers are in their (let’s say) mid-50s now, but they still sound like they’re having a lot of fun hanging out and making songs (primarily about smoking weed) together. Redman’s new album Muddy Waters Too can get a little too backwards-looking at times, as you night anticipate from the fact that it’s a sequel to his 1996 album Muddy Waters. And sometimes Redman’s lyrics are a little *cough* from another time, but he has a Don Rickles-y charm that makes it mostly feel warm or at least benign.But there’s something comforting about knowing that Red and Meth are still out there, doing their thing. It’s not quite like meeting up with an old friend, but it’s definitely like seeing old friends meet up with each other.

UPCOMING SHOWS

I’ve got a bunch of NYC dates coming up, and then a bunch back on the road!
I’ll probably have some LA spots locked in by net week! See you there?!?!

1/8: Ambush at Flophouse Comedy Club (Brooklyn)

1/9: Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me Live Recording (Chicago)

1/11: Sick-ass Panther (Manhattan) and QED (Queens)

1/16: Bomb Shelter at Gaf West (Manhattan)

1/17: Best Night Ever and BCC (Both in Brooklyn)

1/18: Bushwick Comedy Club (Brooklyn)

1/20: Co-hosting Frankenstein’s Baby at Union Hall (Brooklyn)

1/21: Scorpion Records (Ridgewood)

1/22: Young Ethels (Brooklyn)

1/23: New Money at Flophouse Comedy Club (Brooklyn)

1/25: Sup, Bro? at SF Sketchfest

2/8: Circle Round Live Recording (Boston)

leeapeea

Jan 6

To the individual who wants to find love - a pet counts if that's an option available to you! I promise it goes both ways, and the love of a pet (or several pets) is so fulfilling.

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1 reply by Josh Gondelman