My New Year resolutions that I really intend on keeping

I say a list of things every New Year: things that I will do and keep up. And I will keep them up. But I never do. Or not to the great extent that I imagined I would back in week one of the year. There are a list of a few things that I always think about doing and maintaining, namely exercise and diet comes into that equation. But there are also a few things this year that are “new” in terms of resolutions for me. 

Mindfulness – Goal one

The first new kind of resolution for me is all about mindfulness. The latter half of 2016 was quite different for me, I am always a half glass full kind of gal and I simply battled with that for the first time in my life. Everything seemed to be getting on top of me and my glass literally filled up with emotion. I had no room for anything: shouting at the children, crying a lot, I stopped my fitness and I stopped the things I enjoyed doing (creative things) and I just felt tired. I still do. I am aware of this now. The break for Christmas has left me feeling re-charged and ready to tackle 2017 with both hands, gripping it tight. 

The goal for me is to start taking the time each day to reflect on what has happened and think about what I want to achieve the next day. Reflections are a good way of learning from the past and making sure that this doesn’t happen in the future. I wear my heart on my sleeve, so reflecting on things I take personally (when I shouldn’t have) will mean I may not carry around that emotion for longer than I need to. 

One of my besties recently said something to me and I have found it to be extremely useful:

When something is troubling you, you have to make a decision – bin it and forget about it, or deal with it and sort it out! 

I find myself chanting it, mindfully, so that I actually make a conscious decision as to whether I bin it or deal with it. There have been a lot of things that I did not need to carry around with me this year, but because I didn’t bin it – I carried it with me for months. Something that could have been sorted quite quickly on day one, seems like a much bigger mountain to tackle on day 60. Definitely not worth carrying it around with me and I should have put it in the bin. The hypothetical bin of course. I just visualise myself putting what ever it is in a box, then placing it in the bin and doing a shuffle of the palm of my hands! Maybe even a little sigh of relief. 

Another part of this goal is to not get involved in everything with everyone. My personality is a strong fixing type, I want to fix people’s problems and heal wounds. But, sometimes my involvement can come across like I am meddling, which is disastrous. And in most cases the involvement takes its toll on me. I soak up the feelings of the people involved, I cry for them, I feel for them. I have learnt, the hard way, that I cannot fix everything and everyone. Sometimes it’s just great to be a good listener and leave it at that. I am going to make more time to listen. I am going to control the impulse to “help“. 

So, one thing I am going to try and do on a daily basis is to stop in the fresh air and take 5 big breaths. Just the stopping, calmness, fresh air and control will help to make me more focussed and mindful… try it with me! 

Writing in my Sonia style – Goal two

What I mean by this, is entirely in this post! I call them my “Soniaism’s” which is something that came from work, my peers named the things I write as a Soniaism. I quite like it.  It is writing something and writing it in my style, how I want to say it and whatever I want to write about. I always think “I should write about that” but I either think people will not care and not want to read it, or I simple run out of time. So many days I get in to bed, around midnight, thinking about the post that I was going to write earlier in the day and didn’t. Tonight I have. That might be something to do with the teeny lie in I got this morning though! 

I have some useful information in this brain of mine and I enjoy writing my blog posts. So why don’t I do it more often? Heck, I even have some creativity and imagination going on in here. I need to embrace it. I need to embrace me. Do what I enjoy. I am also hoping that part of my goal one will come into play here. Part of the “dealing with it” process maybe a creative piece of writing. Don’t you find that sometimes writing about your feelings is as good as chatting to someone else about it? The venting part of dealing with your feelings. I feel a lot better for just writing this information in a blog post. The thought that someone else might get some helpful tips on dealing with the bad stuff that floats about our minds and bodies, will make me smile! 

So here is to a year of creativity, crochet, mindfulness, music, getting back on my fitness and eating less sugar. Here’s to listening more, not getting involved as much and binning the stuff I do not need to carry around with me too. 

Do you have any helpful tips to add to the post? I would love to hear them in the comments below or on social media. You know where to find me: @mummyconstant. 

New Year scribble in a diary image by ShutterStock. 

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