2017
Happy New Year this and thatters! I cannot believe another year has flown by. I've been cracking up at everyone's posts hating on 2016. I think 2016 was a year of growth for a lot of us and the hope is that we reap the benefits of all that work in 2017 (that's my story and I'm sticking to it).
Leading up to New Years I started thinking more about what I didn't want to bring into 2017. What behaviors/patterns/things do I not want to drag into 2017? I didn't want to make a bunch of resolutions that I would abandon and then feel bad about I wanted to dig a little deeper and figure out what was really important to me. After lots of soul searching I realized a few things:
1. We had to get organized. Matt and I had pretty much been operating like we were still childless without a care in the world. The problem with having no structure is that it was stressing us both out! And if any little thing out of the ordinary happened we were completely thrown off and chaos ensued. I think we were hoping that not having a schedule would allow us to be laid back but in fact the opposite happened.
So what did we do? We had a conversation about it. Honestly we were both pretty allergic to structure and had to get super clear on our priorities. We decided who was taking Em to school what days, when we were going to workout, who was cooking dinner on what night etc., etc.
I bought a big magnetic, dry erase calendar for the fridge and have written down everything happening for the month. I do have to do some gentle reminders with Matt but given we are on our 4th week of this it is feeling so much more routine. I will tell you that my stress level is down immensely and I have more time to do things. Who knew? I knew I didn't want to bring chaos, the feeling of being overwhelmed about our home life into 2017 and slowly but surely we are getting there. The other funny thing about being organized is it actually allows us to be more flexible when something unexpected happens.
2. I wanted to find some alone time for myself. Time when I wasn't working, emailing, being on conference calls, being a mom or wife. I wanted some time when I just got to be myself. I also have had this nagging feeling I really needed to get in better shape. I had a cardiologist appointment in 2016 after being referred by my internist. The net, net I need to lower my cholesterol and be much more aware of my stress level.
I thought long and hard about the last time I felt healthy and like I had some time for myself. And I realized it was before kids...big surprise! But I thought back about what I was doing and at that time I had a personal trainer. I do really well with a trainer because it's an appointment and I won't miss it. I also like the one on one attention you get. I did some research and found a gym and trainer I love. I go two days a week and it has been life changing for my attitude and I can already tell a big difference in my cardio health.
3. Letting shit go. I'm really bad about this. Something will happen and I will chew on it until there's no taste left and then chew some more. I had to figure out a way to stop being so hard on myself....about everything. Matt and I went to lunch one day and talked about how hard everyone is on themselves. I don't think beating yourself up is just something I do. I did some research and found an amazing researcher Kristin Neff that has written about self-compassion.
She is an academic and researcher and her information on self-criticism vs self-compassion is truly life changing. She has written an awesome book Self Compassion: The Proven Power of Being Kind to Yourself. She and Brene Brown also did a 4 week course online at Courage Works that is super helpful.
I'm definitely a work in progress but absolutely feel like I have more tools in my toolbox to help me let stuff go and to actually be nice to myself while doing it.
4. It's not going to look how I thought it would....
This is a hard one for me! I've realized the way I think something is going to be in my mind vs the reality is not always the same. My sister said something very profound to me the other day, she said "I'm not sure it's ever going to look exactly like we thought it would"
And she's right. I do this thing were I envision events, situations, entire parts of my life in my mind and then when these things actually happen they rarely look like they did in my mind. The chasm between reality and what I thought was going to happen left me feeling angry, let down, disappointed and confused.
I realized I had to start being more mindful. I heard something the other day that helped bring this into focus for me. Someone told me to envision an orange in my mind and I did. Then they told me to hold an actual orange and I did. Then he said do you see the difference? He went on to say I bet in your mind the orange was perfect in color, perfectly round and had no bruises. And he was right, the orange in my mind was perfect and to be fair doesn't exist.
The orange I held in my hand was still beautiful, but it was real, smelled amazing but had some dimples and would eventually spoil unlike the perfect orange in my head. This exercise was kind of mind blowing for my type A self. This is a completely new approach for me and one that is taking some time to develop but I am committed to it.
I hope 2017 is an awesome year for you and yours!! I hope everything that you want, you receive and I hope it's an amazing year of growth and good things for you. Thank you as always for being a part of my journey.
xoxo
Leading up to New Years I started thinking more about what I didn't want to bring into 2017. What behaviors/patterns/things do I not want to drag into 2017? I didn't want to make a bunch of resolutions that I would abandon and then feel bad about I wanted to dig a little deeper and figure out what was really important to me. After lots of soul searching I realized a few things:
1. We had to get organized. Matt and I had pretty much been operating like we were still childless without a care in the world. The problem with having no structure is that it was stressing us both out! And if any little thing out of the ordinary happened we were completely thrown off and chaos ensued. I think we were hoping that not having a schedule would allow us to be laid back but in fact the opposite happened.
So what did we do? We had a conversation about it. Honestly we were both pretty allergic to structure and had to get super clear on our priorities. We decided who was taking Em to school what days, when we were going to workout, who was cooking dinner on what night etc., etc.
I bought a big magnetic, dry erase calendar for the fridge and have written down everything happening for the month. I do have to do some gentle reminders with Matt but given we are on our 4th week of this it is feeling so much more routine. I will tell you that my stress level is down immensely and I have more time to do things. Who knew? I knew I didn't want to bring chaos, the feeling of being overwhelmed about our home life into 2017 and slowly but surely we are getting there. The other funny thing about being organized is it actually allows us to be more flexible when something unexpected happens.
2. I wanted to find some alone time for myself. Time when I wasn't working, emailing, being on conference calls, being a mom or wife. I wanted some time when I just got to be myself. I also have had this nagging feeling I really needed to get in better shape. I had a cardiologist appointment in 2016 after being referred by my internist. The net, net I need to lower my cholesterol and be much more aware of my stress level.
I thought long and hard about the last time I felt healthy and like I had some time for myself. And I realized it was before kids...big surprise! But I thought back about what I was doing and at that time I had a personal trainer. I do really well with a trainer because it's an appointment and I won't miss it. I also like the one on one attention you get. I did some research and found a gym and trainer I love. I go two days a week and it has been life changing for my attitude and I can already tell a big difference in my cardio health.
3. Letting shit go. I'm really bad about this. Something will happen and I will chew on it until there's no taste left and then chew some more. I had to figure out a way to stop being so hard on myself....about everything. Matt and I went to lunch one day and talked about how hard everyone is on themselves. I don't think beating yourself up is just something I do. I did some research and found an amazing researcher Kristin Neff that has written about self-compassion.
She is an academic and researcher and her information on self-criticism vs self-compassion is truly life changing. She has written an awesome book Self Compassion: The Proven Power of Being Kind to Yourself. She and Brene Brown also did a 4 week course online at Courage Works that is super helpful.
I'm definitely a work in progress but absolutely feel like I have more tools in my toolbox to help me let stuff go and to actually be nice to myself while doing it.
4. It's not going to look how I thought it would....
This is a hard one for me! I've realized the way I think something is going to be in my mind vs the reality is not always the same. My sister said something very profound to me the other day, she said "I'm not sure it's ever going to look exactly like we thought it would"
And she's right. I do this thing were I envision events, situations, entire parts of my life in my mind and then when these things actually happen they rarely look like they did in my mind. The chasm between reality and what I thought was going to happen left me feeling angry, let down, disappointed and confused.
I realized I had to start being more mindful. I heard something the other day that helped bring this into focus for me. Someone told me to envision an orange in my mind and I did. Then they told me to hold an actual orange and I did. Then he said do you see the difference? He went on to say I bet in your mind the orange was perfect in color, perfectly round and had no bruises. And he was right, the orange in my mind was perfect and to be fair doesn't exist.
The orange I held in my hand was still beautiful, but it was real, smelled amazing but had some dimples and would eventually spoil unlike the perfect orange in my head. This exercise was kind of mind blowing for my type A self. This is a completely new approach for me and one that is taking some time to develop but I am committed to it.
I hope 2017 is an awesome year for you and yours!! I hope everything that you want, you receive and I hope it's an amazing year of growth and good things for you. Thank you as always for being a part of my journey.
xoxo
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