Resolutions and Goals for 2013

It has come time for me to publicly announce my goals for 2013 in order to shame myself into following through.

I have the following resolutions.

1. Only acquire things I will use.  Right now my "minimalism" is sustained by high object turnover: I give away things quickly to balance out acquiring them quickly.  To work towards true minimalism I will instate a two-week decision period before acquiring non-essential items.
2. Get rid of things I do not use.  I would like to keep giving away (and occasionally selling) objects that I have not demonstrated need for in the past year.
3. Only take on commitments I want and can handle.  I am happier and more productive when I want to be doing what I am doing and I have time to do a good job.  I will instate a one-day decision period for new commitments.
4. Eat well.  I would like to take more pleasure in the process of eating and focus on quality rather than quantity.  I will make time for eating in my schedule and plan ahead so I can have food that is both good and good for me.
5. Meditate.  In working towards meditating daily, in 2013 I aim to do it at least once a week. 

In 2013 I plan to keep pursuing my two main interests: 1) empowering people to be more productive through their programming tools and 2) empowering women to have the same opportunities as anyone else.

Towards improving programming tools, I have some specific goals regarding Jeeves, the programming language I have been developing for automatically enforcing privacy policies, and demonstrating its feasibility as part of a framework.  I would also like to continue spreading the gospel of statically-typed functional programming languages.  I would like to become more familiar with Scala and continue my Scala evangelism.

Towards empowering women, I am concluding my tenure as an Executive Board member of Graduate Women at MIT and would like to think about what other change I want to see.  I want to reach out to more young girls--I would love to see a framework that allows young girls to be pen pals with young women, their "future selves."  I also want to give people intellectual ammunition to defend their feminist views--for instance, in light of the Delhi gang rape death.  I will think about how this translates into actionable items for me.

Happy New Year, friends.  In the upcoming year, please feel free to discuss these goals with me to make sure I have not forgotten about them!