Menu Close

For Unto Us a *blank* Is Born: Thoughts of New Year’s Resolutions and New Life

In the past few weeks, we’ve been awash with images of all the various holidays celebrated at this time of year: Christmas (the big one), Hanukkah, Winter Solstice, St. Lucia Day (being Swedish, I had to have that in there), Kwanzaa, and even Festivus. I’ve also been in a rather melancholy spirit this season. I’m not sure if it’s regarding my getting used to the loss of my mother (she died in September 2009 after a long illness), my own illness and hospitalization (cellulitis caught while in the hospital waiting for my mother to die after we took her off life support), or just where I am in life. I’m assuming it’s probably a combination of everything. Regardless, I’ve been in a bit of a reflective mood at this time, and haven’t actually gone to many parties or done much of anything that I normally would.

This has given me a bit of brain space to try to merge together in my brain how all this goes together. Now, most of us are aware that a major theme of this time of year is light, and bringing back the light when it it darkest outside, but what has struck me is the concept of this being a time of something which we have waited for a long time to finally be born. Almost everyone knows the story of Jesus’ birth that is celebrated mostly by the reenacting of searching for riches and depositing them upon friends, family, and anyone we can (whether they want said riches or not), but there’s also the concept in the pagan tradition that the Sun is born this time of year, and we also have the birth of the “New Me” that is so present in New Year’s Resolutions. I’m also aware in my own life that things have started to grow and come to fruition at this time, whereas I feel like I’ve been gestating them for months (this blog being one of them.)

I’m feeling relieved that there seems to be a releasing of energy, in that I can now develop all those things that I’ve been thinking about for a while. Of course, there’s the issue of moving forward on these great new baby plans that have finally come into the world.

At this time, how are you planning to care and feed these new parts of you?

As one who’s profession it is to help people bring their dreams into reality, I think a lot about how to help people move towards their goals. I’m giving a workshop at the New Year’s Celebration program at Easton Mountain this coming week, and my main focus is to make sure that participants look to their core spiritual values and then connect them with action steps that will allow success to flow. While I’m still finalizing the workshop, here are two steps that are critical to success in achieving goals:

  1. Make Your Goals Achievable Early: Don’t make your resolution that you will be 100 lbs. lighter by the end of the year.  For one thing, it’s hard to see that goal in February because you might have only lost one lb. by that time. Some thing that you can achieve quickly, such as “walking 30 minutes a day, three days a week” or “not eating a donut every morning” is something that you can get a “quick win” and know that you’re doing something good for yourself.It takes about six weeks of doing something new to make it a habit, so allow for some things that you develop easily, and then build up them.
  2. Develop Your Support Network: Nothing keeps you honest like having someone else know your goals.  You need to speak your dreams out loud and then follow that up with a conversation.  Allow people to ask about it, in a loving, non-nagging way.  If you know that your best friend will be checking in on you next week, you better make some progress by then!

So, what are my goals (I was afraid you would ask.)  While these are bound to change, here’s what they are now.

  • Get back on my eating plan so that I am mindful of what I am eating each day (and therefore make better food choices).
  • Practice playing the hammered dulcimer at least twice a week.
  • Continue my meditation practice (I’ve had a lot of people say they like my meditation tweets!)
  • Continue to keep on top of my own “things to do” so that I never have a pile of unidentified stuff that I’m scared to address.

What are your goals and how are you getting to them?

With love and wishes for a new birth of a new you in 2010,
Ken

Hits: 59

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.