2026 Resolution: Go Big or Go Home | Healthy Aging Series: S12 E13
My first two years of high school were a complete failure. Zero motivation. I wasn’t a smartass or anything, I just didn’t care. I remember sitting in the back of Miss Miller’s Spanish class and flipping nickels with my friend, Don. I didn’t learn a thing.
I did just enough to pass. My grade point average was close to 1.5 GPA, and believe it or not, I was on the college track. Yeah, I know.
I had no plans for college. Mom and dad informed me that if I chose to go to college, I’d need to arrange financing on my own. They did not, they explained, have the resources to send nine children to college.
So, as many of you know, I chose the Air Force, and they paid for much of it!
Back to high school… I had no academic goals. I was smart. I always scored high on aptitude tests. I read a lot. Thank you Betty Neese.
But I never imagined or dreamed of getting a college degree. And here I am, with about 10 years of higher education (2 Master’s Degrees) and tons of all sorts of certifications that reflect years, many years, of learning.
Things changed halfway through my Sophomore year. I fell in love…with geometry. For some reason geometry activated some part of my brain and I probably never made less than a B during my Junior and Senior years. Of course, it was too late. I finished high school with a 2.3 GPA.
But something happened during those last two years of high school. I started to dream. I started to imagine the possibilities, and although I didn’t think of them as goals, I started developing a hunger for more: more education, more opportunities, and more adventure.
I remember years later, sitting in my English Comp 103 professor’s office, discussing an assigned paper that I had written about, “My Ideal Woman.” “It seems like you value a woman who likes to set goals for herself,” she observed, “and accomplish those goals.”
Maybe she was right and then again maybe not. I’ve discovered through these decades since that I was really writing about myself.
Making goals and attaining them is my drug of choice. They inspire me. I develop goals and a plan for each new year. I turn 70 in 2026, and I plan on doing lots of Feats of Strength.
Mental and physical Feats of Strength.
I just got my drone pilot’s license. That was a mental Feat of Strength. I have lots of plans for the 12 months between July 19th, 2026, and July 18th, 2027. That’s the 12 months that I’m 70. I’m not going to run a marathon, or any race for that matter. Those days are gone, but I’ll still hike, backpack, cycle, and climb. I’ll still write and read and do a blog every week. And now I’m doing a YouTube channel. I’ll set goals, monster goals.
Here’s what I want to say about 2026: Go big or go home! The new common wisdom for the Hoi Polloi (common people) is, don’t set unrealistic goals. Don’t set too many goals or resolutions for yourself or goals that are beyond your reach. Set moderate goals. Set goals that you’re certain to achieve.
Set goals that your grandpa and grandma can accomplish, or your elderly parents, or goals that the out-of-shape gamer who is sitting right now in his parents’ basement, wasting his or her life sitting in front of his computer, set goals that they could accomplish.
How is this strategy working out for America? 65% of American adults are overweight or obese. Maybe it’s time to abandon that “Easy does it” approach and opt for the “Go big or go home,” approach.
I’ve written about the book my father gave me when I turned 40, “Dr. Bob Arnot’s Guide to Turning Back the Clock.” Thank you, Jerry Neese!
Bob Arnot’s admonition is for everyone to begin thinking of themselves as an athlete. Here is what he wrote:
“My conclusion is this: the average ‘nonathlete’ has been badly cheated by a physical education system that selects very few for a very narrow range of sports. That’s the bad news. The good news is that it’s never too late to start playing the sport that’s right for you! If for no other reason, pick a new sport to spite that high school gym teacher who thought you were a loser.
Take great pride in continually improving your skills, endurance, speed, power, and ability against your own personal standard and within your own physiology. You can create your own enthusiasm and excitement by the objective progress you measure. When you do look around, I bet you’ll be surprised how really good you are.
The more you look and feel like an athlete, the more you will want to transform yourself into a bold, vigorous, and dynamic person. The process of becoming an athlete can give you a new identity. Your posture will improve, your skin will assume a more healthy glow, and your stride will quicken.”
Act as if!
I took him to heart. I became a runner. I became a climber. I became an expert backpacker and hiker. Have hiked the highest peak in the continental United States, Mount Whitney. I’ve done a Rim-to-River-to-Rim hike of the Grand Canyon twice in the past five years. I’ve ridden my bicycle across the state of Indiana in one day. On my 55th birthday, 161 miles.
I’m not finished! Go big or go home. Read Jack Lalane’s biography and memoir. He did a Feat of Strength every year after he turned 50. When he was 61, he swam from Alcatraz to Fisherman’s Wharf, handcuffed and shackled, towing a 1000 LB boat. At 70 he towed 70 row boats, one with special guests, from Queens Way Bridge in Long Island beach harbor to the Queen Mary, one mile away.
Go big or go home!
So, maybe it’s time for you to think big in 2026. Nothing wimpy! Run a half marathon or marathon by the end of 2026. Plan on losing 40 or 50 lbs., 1 lb. a week. Plan on doing a Century Bike Ride by the fall of 2026! That’s 100 miles. Plan on logging 10 to 15 hours a week exercising, to include walking, resistance training, cycling, swimming, jazzercise, Zumba, and any other thing that you enjoy doing.
Hire personal trainer to help you with these goals. When I was approaching 60, my trainer asked me what my goal was for when I turned 60. I said, “I want to be a badass.”
I’ve had a, “Go big or go home,” attitude every year since. 10 years later, I feel great and can do anything I want to do.
Forget the wimpy goal setting. It hasn’t worked for anyone. Goals can be powerful things. They can take an unmotivated, aimless 15-year-old and transform him into an educated, professional, fit, caring, youthful, man.
Take out a pad of paper and number it 1 to 25 and come up with 25 big goals, goals that are out of reach. Maybe you’re nothing like me. Maybe it won’t work on you like it worked on me. And then again, maybe it will. Go big or go home.
Print that on a poster size foam board and put it in a prominent place.
Start thinking of yourself as an athlete.
And maybe, just maybe, you’ll become one!
