Sometimes the only person missing on your holiday gift list is…you. So, here are four gift ideas for you, the person you know best.

The first gift is an all-expense-paid tour of your home/apartment to… compile a list of “stuff.”

Is it not true that much of our lives have been spent following the right sales and “specials” to make sure we have the right “stuff”? The twelve-speed blender, lava lamp, leaf blower, George Foreman Panini Sandwich Grill and rented storage unit (to stuff all our stuff) are all, ultimately, going to end up strewn on a garage sale table to recoup pennies for all the years of collecting and storing…“stuff.”

Are we comfortable etching our presence on the timeline of history with another truckload of perishable stuff dumped in a nameless landfill? Isn’t it time in the new year to control our need to consume and then give away our…stuff?

The second gift you can present yourself is a healthy plate of food and a sweaty towel.

Who we are and what we ultimately accomplish in life is directly tied to our physical health. A regular exercise program of at least 30 minutes per day, four days a week, and a consistent low-fat-diet will provide both emotional and physical wellness.

The research numbers should stop us in our greasy, sedentary tracks.

The “normal” amount of body fat is 25-30% in women and 18-23% in men. The body fat index (BMI) is the weight of your body (in kilograms) divided by your height (in meters). Obesity is defined as a BMI of 30 and above.

So what’s the problem with a BMI of 30 and higher? The main reason is insulin resistance. Insulin is necessary to move blood glucose (sugar) into the cells of muscle and fat. Fat cells are more insulin resistant therefore causing the pancreas to crank up production of insulin and, over a period of time, Type 2 diabetes develops. This condition starts the domino-effect beginning with high blood pressure, high cholesterol, stroke, heart attack, congestive heart failure, osteoarthritis and sleep apnea.

This second gift will add years of sunrises and smiles.

The third gift to you is quite simple…wrap your index finger with a holiday bow and stretch it way out there to the television remote control and push “off.” Wow!

The average American is watching six and half hours of what the “tube” offers each day. Think about it: the morning news, reruns of Oprah after work, CSI Miami, maybe a half hour of the Food Channel, highlights of a favorite football team’s mistakes and then an another hour of news hoping the boredom of the banal stories will make us comatose.

The problem with television is its passivity. It is one-way communication that does it all for us. Between the plots, political “magic boards” and instant replays, there is not much for us to do but observe. Over time, observing sucks the life out of our brains and spirits.

Instead of going “cold TV turkey,” how about an initial gift of one TV-free-day each week? If you get into the discipline of this gift, be prepared, you may discover you and other people in your family have interesting ideas, feelings they have never expressed and entertainment value that cannot be matched by MTV.

The final gift is rent, lease or just choose a small child who will consent to be your life coach.

Children, preferably between the ages of 2 and 8, are experts on how to suck every last morsel out of a day.

They will teach you how to organize through their “clubhouse construction” techniques using sofa cushions, old blankets and over-turned chairs.

Their skills in honest communication have been developed over months of telling adults “your breath stinks,” “I think you are sad” and asking “What happens when you die?”

These short people, accented with their diapers and dirty nails, are indispensible models of the innocence and hope. They have not become jaded and suspicious like many of us who have been riding the rails of recriminating routine. Their eyes spring open each day to what they know will be waiting wonder.

So, take your pick. Four presents are waiting for you to unwrap in the next twelve months! So, be good to yourself and Happy New Year!