Playing A Musical Instrument, Studying More, Eating Healthy, Writing Poems… All On 2022 Agenda

Bhubaneswar: Ever wonder how many nights you spent tossing and turning, dreaming up new interests and future achievements? No matter how exciting the venture, that first step the next morning, setting aside a chunk of allocated time, to start something outside your crammed daily routine, leaves the best of us flummoxed. If it doesn’t happen immediately, it happens a week or two in, leaving us lost, exhausted with absolutely no momentum to carry forward.

That’s why starting something on New Year and New Year’s resolutions hold so much weight, as they act as the ultimate push off point for at least the next 365 days of our life. The streamlining and tunnel vision of our thoughts and aspirations make it that much more succinct, compared to the random late-night promises, of being a better version of yourself, every Sunday.

Sarthak Mohapatra is a +2 student at DAV Public School, Kalinga Nagar, and is using his New Year’s resolution as a launching pad, to help build a solid base for his higher education. “I spend a reasonable amount of time studying to complete my syllabus, but I also find myself engrossed in different novels, fiction and non-fiction, movies and music. That consumes almost the same amount of time as my studies and leaves me glued to my phone.

Just for 2022, I want to try and focus completely on my academics and see how far I can push myself. It starts with shutting down all my social media accounts, no buying of books unrelated to my studies, and replacing hour-hour movies with shorter forms of media. For recreation, I want to go on trips with friends or just hang out and play football, making up for lost time in the lockdowns. When I am home alone I want to be focused just on my studies, so that I can ace all my upcoming exams. I have tried it out successfully for a few months at a time, but I am pretty adamant about continuing this process for a whole year,” he says.

Abhijeet Rath is very excited about starting his BTech studies in VSSUT, Burla, and is determined to finally master playing the acoustic guitar, during his time living in the hostel. “I’ve been over there for a few weeks, before coming back home for Christmas break, and I’m happy to say the guitar was a hit among all my roommates. We had lots of late-night singing and jam sessions. It helped that I knew how to play a few chords beforehand. I have subscribed to three different guitar learning channels on YouTube. Further down the year, if deemed necessary, I am not against taking classes with a professional. The focus on my degree is paramount, but being able to play any song on a guitar has been a dream of mine for a long time, and this is the year where I will bring it to fruition. Over the span of 2022, hopefully everything goes according to plan, and I transform into the Indian Bob Dylan, instead of turning out like that one kid from 3 Idiots,” he chuckles.

Moving away from Odisha to pursue his MBA in Kochi, Deepak Patra rues the unhealthy diet he has been on for the last few years, and hopes he can bring about the earnest change, with his New Year’s resolution, that he promises himself daily. “My whole life I’ve been skinny, so I had never had to watch what I would eat, but moving away from home and my mother’s homecooked meals made me realise just how important a proper diet is. I’ve been sick the majority of my time here, which hasn’t allowed me to properly enjoy time with my friends, and take in the beautiful new surroundings. Even worse, it has affected my hair and led to a lot of bad hairfall. I’ve been trying to workout on my own, and go on runs trying to improve my health, but I was oblivious to the main cause for a long time. The first thing I did on January 1st was go visit a dietician, and set up a proper meal plan based on my nutritional needs. It’s a bit costly but prevention is always better than cure. This will be a year of reinvention for me and my body, where I will truly be in tune with my well-being.”

Kaibalya Behera is retired after a career in education, in the field of Commerce for over 35 years, and now spends his time between his home in Bhubaneswar, and Bengaluru and Germany where his children reside. At the very start of the year he picked up a hobby off a whim that he now hopes to continue into 2023. “It was a poem about the longing and maturity that comes with age, after seeing the preparations for various New Year’s parties around my colony, and missing my kids who are excelling at forging their own path in life. As soon as I penned my thoughts into words a sense of fulfillment came upon me, which I hadn’t experienced since I stopped working. I shared it with my friends and family and felt a lot of positive affirmations and empathy. I plan to write at least 3-4 short poems every week in January and work my way up to something each day by December. I don’t judge myself too harshly about the quality of my writings. I’ll be happy as long as I can keep finding words to express my truest and deepest feelings.”