From the other side… of 2015. Another year is over and I don’t know about you, but I usually greet the end of a year in a reflective mood and approach the new one with a sense of expectation about great things to come.

I am not going to lie. I was a bit disappointed with my personal accomplishment and growth in the latter half of 2015. I just lost momentum; so it’s easy to hope that things turn around in 2016. But I can’t be the only one. I imagine that must be why the idea of resolutions is so popular.

Even the optical industry typically revs up in the first few months of the year. If you look at our industry calendar for 2016 (you can find it www.visionmonday.com/industry-calendar), other than Vision Expo West in September, all the events are weighted toward the first half of the year.

It makes me wonder why, as time passes, we lose impetus and typically fall back into the comfortable, old way of doing things. How do we ride the energy and excitement of things like SECO, Vision Expo East and the Vision Monday Leadership Summit* (more on that here: www.visionmondaysummit.com) at the beginning of the year all the way through to the end?

So this January, in addition to the usual resolutions (eat better, exercise more, blah, blah, blah), I am adding a new one. This year, I plan on celebrating New Year’s every six months. Maybe I will even pull out the hats and the noisemakers and throw a little party on July 1! That way I can recapture a little of the optimism and excitement we normally have now and end the year with a bang too.

I’m tired of the status quo and ready to effect some serious change! What are you planning to do in 2016 to shake things up?

dcarroll@jobson.com