For years I have considered living aboard a sailboat and taking an extended voyage at some point. With that in mind I thought I should learn celestial navigation so that I would have a backup in case my GPS failed. Over a year ago I purchased a sextant to practice celestial navigation. I kept forgetting to bring it to the beach when visiting my family and generally slacked on learning the fundamentals, but I finally resorted to using an artificial horizon and learning today. What a rewarding skill to learn! I used a cheap plastic sextant to find my latitude and longitude to within a few minutes (60ths of a degree). I will continue learning about celestial navigation, such as the lunar distance method and plotting a course.
I have also been on a kick of abstaining from various habits for month-long stretches. Last night I decided to refrain from cursing for the next month. I don't necessarily think cursing is wrong or unsavory, I just want to challenge myself to exercise more self-control over a habit I don't consciously engage in.
New Year's resolutions are not really my thing, but I am trying to follow through with my goals more consistently. I read recently that telling people your goals is a bad habit that can cause you not to follow through with them. When you tell people about your ambitions it can make you feel partially accomplished for verbally "committing" to the goal. It defaces your resolve to publicly claim something and not follow through. Nobody reads this anyway so I guess it doesn't count, right?
No comments:
Post a Comment