Showing posts with label Gratitude Journal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gratitude Journal. Show all posts

Thursday, January 3, 2013

A New Year, A New Word, and a Splash of Gratitude!


Well, ladies and gents, we made it! Into a new year. Past the end of the world. Who'd've thunk it? But yes, it is Day 3 of 2013, and so far, things are going pretty good -- how about you? Have you made your resolutions yet? Me, not so much. I'm not sure I buy into the whole "resolution" thing -- mostly because I pretty much never keep them. Last year, I started my year off by making monthly goals, and that seemed to work pretty well for me, so I think I'll try that again for 2013. DISCLAIMER: I went to Brave Girls Camp last year, and learned a thing or two. I learned that one, I AM a brave girl, and that two, Today is Day One. So is tomorrow. Everyday can be day one, so I'm going to be gentle with myself. (more on this in #2)! So without any further ado, here are my January goals, in no particular order:

 1. Move more, eat well -- This is a Cathy Zielske class, hosted by Big Picture Classes. I'm trying a different approach this year. I've had "diet" on my resolution list for, oh, I don't know, EVER. It doesn't work. And, I can't afford the surgery, so this year I'm throwing it all out the window. I'm thinking about M.E. I'm pretty sure that I'm a nice person - at least, I try to be - and it's high time I treated mySELF nicely. And I think that making better health decisions -- i.e., what foods I put into my body and choosing to get in a little exercise -- are probably the best way to start enforcing the niceness. If I lose weight along the way, all the better. But my GOAL is to be a better me. I'm hoping participating in the class will help me with motivation!

2. Choosing "One Little Word" for 2013: PEACE -- I'm so glad there are really motivated people out there with really good ideas that I can work with! Ali Edwards' "OLW2013" is another year-long class I'm participating in, and this year I've chosen the word "PEACE." This goes along with being nicer to myself. For so long, I've suffered from depression and anxiety. This year, I want to invite peace into my life and into my body. I want to pray more. I want to learn to meditate. I'd love to do yoga. I want to be mindful -- to live in the moment, in the now, and not worry about tomorrow or what might have been. And I want to be gentle with myself -- to realize that these goals are not going to come right away. They're going to take work.  And that's okay. Because each day gives me the opportunity to start fresh, to invite peace into my mind and my soul, to move more and eat well, and to practice making each of them a habit.

3. Live with a Grateful Heart -- My sweet friend Monika Wright gifted me with one of her amazing Gratitude Journals last year. I absolutely loved it -- but I'm sad to say, I wasn't very good at writing things down. :/ This year my goal is to do better. I've put together my own little journal, and I'm hoping to get much closer to documenting 365 things I'm grateful for! I really believe that living with a grateful heart puts everything into perspective. From the great big miracles to the itty bitty everyday things that we usually don't notice, we need to be thankful for them all. It's in the noticing that gratitude comes. 

4. Blogging More -- This one seems pretty easy compared to the others, but it's really not! Even though I've been online for a couple a years now, I'm still really new to this whole blogging thing. I'd like to post more, I'd like to make more connections with other people, I'd like to take a few classes and maybe step up my blog a little! :) This will also probably be a year-long goal, but my immediate goal for January is to blog at least twice a week.

Phew!  To some of you, that may not seem like much.  I'm sure it will keep my plate full!  What about the rest of you?  Do you make resolutions?  Set goals?  Fly by the seat of your pants?  I would love to hear your plans for the coming year!  Wishing you all a fantastic 2013.

Until next time,    

   siggy

Tuesday, January 3, 2012

Habits, not Resolutions!

Ah, welcome, my friends, to 2012!!  I hope that you all had a blessed Christmas and a fun and happy New Year celebration!  I've been somewhat MIA on my blog, as I started the Christmas week with strep, which quickly moved into a rather nasty sinus infection.  We postponed our trip for Christmas by one day, and so have just arrived back home and are getting settled back in.  Our "girls," who were at the doggie spa for a week, were happy to see us, and have needed a little extra attention these past few days as they felt neglected over the holidays!

So, it seems that the blog topic for the week is New Years Resolutions.  Do you make them?  I have for years, and have just as consistently failed at most of them!!  Anyone know what I mean?  I resolve to lose weight.  Mmmmm, not so successful.  I resolve to exercise more.  Does shopping count?  I resolve to quit (fill in the blank.)  I'll say "chewing my nails."  (Nervous habit I've had since I was young.)  Never happened.  And each year, I feel a little worse about myself.  Anyone else feel this way?  Ever?  Well, I've decided to change my thinking this year, and do things a little differently.  Instead of making resolutions, I'm going to change habits.  Yep.  You heard me.  Big difference.

For one thing, when you set resolutions, they are often arbitrary, and so you are spending all your effort working towards something that is (basically) meaningless -- IE. "I'm going to 'get fit' in 2012." And then if you don’t achieve it, you feel like you failed, even though you didn't define what "get fit" meant.  Did it mean exercising more?  Eating better?  Changing habits is different, if you approach it with an attitude of “this is one little change I can make and I will enjoy the change as I do it."  Another thing we do to set ourselves up for New Year's failure is trying to do too much at once.  Ten resolutions.  I'm going to eat better, exercise more, get up an hour earlier, blah blah blah.  And when we fall off the wagon with one, more often than not we fall of the entire track, because why bother?  You can make a list of habits you want to change.  That's fine.  But don't change more than one habit at once.  Why?  Because it takes about 30 days to create a new habit.  So, if you plan just one little change a month, in a year you'll have formed 12 new habits!  

To start myself off for 2012, the habit I want to change is how often I post to my blog.  So I've created the following schedule to follow, to make myself accountable, and to hopefully keep you all coming back for more!

Blog planner 2012:

Weekly:
  • Project Life – Weekly on Tuesday
  • 52 Photos – Weekly on Wednesday
  • Gratitude Journal – Weekly on Saturday
  • Sunday Scriptures – Weekly on Sunday
Monthly: 
  • One Little Word – Monthly on the 2nd Monday
  • Scrapbook*Life* Journal Class – monthly on the 2nd Thursday 
  • Close to My Heart 
    • Layout/Playgroup – Monthly on the 4th Monday 
    • Stamp of the Month Card – Monthly on the 4th Thursday 
    • Studio J Layout – Monthly on the 4th Friday
As needed:
·         CTMH Special Projects
·         CTMH Constant Campaigns
·         Art Journaling & Sketching

There may be a few things added or taken off of this list as I fine tune my year, but I hope that you'll follow the posts that interest you, and encourage your friends to, as well.  

I'll be back tomorrow with a NEW Close to My Heart Special, and later this week with a "Special Project" that relates to my "changing habits" goal for 2012.  Check back soon!  You won't want to miss it!  Until next time,


siggy