Resolutions. We all feel differently about them. For some, they work brilliantly. For others, not so much. So with that mind, I am not calling today’s adages resolutions nor I am linking them to next year. Today, I am just merely offering some considerations and suggestions for next week. If they take, perhaps they can be given more of a formal name like a ritual, if you will, or a (dare I say it) resolution. But I am just fine with, “huh, that’s an interesting idea,” if that’s all you got this time of year (because, let me be honest here, I am a lot more ‘that’s an interesting idea’-ish than you might realize).
1. Go on a media diet. This is the only time I am willing to suggest a diet, and I do more than just suggest one for my students every semester. I insist. For 3 days, they record absolutely everything they take in via media– from Twitter to Facebook, video games to reality tv, music to movies. Then for 3 days, they go cold turkey. They can email. They can text their family and friends. But they cannot take in media. It is so hard for them, media has become such a necessity to them, that very few of them are able to go 72 hours without media. Yet, when they write their follow-up papers, they are struck by how much more time they have than they thought they did. They are startled by how the media they take in really stresses and negatively influences them. They are struck by the racket media brings into their life and how it quiets when they quiet the media. They sleep better. They talk to people more directly. They get their work done for school. They go outside more. Obviously, these are all good things. I try now to go as unwired as possible every weekend and it is restorative. I am such a believer in unwired time, that I am suggesting a media fast to you. Go ahead and pick a 24, 48 or, if you are bold, a 72 hour time frame in the next couple months where you can go unplugged and give yourself the challenge and gift of that experience.
2. Go All Natural. So this is another every semester challenge for my students. One day each semester, my students go fresh bodied, haired, and faced– no products used other than cleansers and non-tinted, non-scented, non-firming or whatever moisturizer. They are always terrified of the challenge and then shocked that no one in class looks any different and that no one in their life finds that they look any different. Schedule an all natural day in your life to remind you that beauty rituals can be fun but they aren’t necessary– and to put your use of enhancements into perspective. You can also join my class’s effort as I’ll announce the all natural day here once it is officially set.
3. Regularly claim your care. This whole month I’ve promoted claiming your care here and on Twitter and Facebook. I’ve wanted to diligently remind all of us- especially me- that our wellbeing is in our own hands. No one else can make us go to the doctor or get enough sleep or eat well or move our bodies or drink enough water or get a massage or see our therapist or have time with friends or find time alone or read for pleasure or take a long, hot bath or you get the picture. Our care is on us- and, yet, our wellbeing matters to everyone around us and to everything we do– making our care all the more essential because of its ripple effect. Be really deliberate about claiming your care. It makes such a difference.
4. Really, really ditch the fat chat. Quit talking to yourself like that. If you wouldn’t say it to a child, don’t you dare say it to yourself. And while you are at it, change the whole tune in yourself and start claiming your brilliance in your words and actions. It is not just perfectly okay to say you are good at something. It is authentic and true to claim what you are good at and what you love. Do it already. Being real about what you have to offer is so 2012.
5. Choose an intention and create a vision board for 2012. More on this next week, but, for now, begin to consider the possibility that choosing a word for the year- really setting an intention by embracing a word- can be both affirming and inspirational. And go ahead and check out this read to get started in your thinking. Also, begin to scout images and words from magazines so that you can make a vision board to consciously and subconsciously guide you in 2012. By creating an intention and crafting a vision for the year, you set intention that follows you throughout the year in a very powerful way. Next week, I’ll do a roll call asking you to share your word and will also invite you to share your vision boards here as they are such beautiful, inspirational works of art.
Do you set suggestions, rituals, or resolutions for the new year? What are you thinking for your 2012?
i love this post so much i think i want to marry it!
1. every time i do a media fast i am SHOCKED at how much free time i suddenly have. i always find the time to do the mundane tasks that get pushed aside for checking facebook and ALWAYS have such a sense of accomplishment when they are done. clearly i need to schedule another.
2. i go natural more often than not and not one person ever says i look better when i do where make up. in all honesty, i think i only look less tired.
3. claiming my care prior to baby – probably my #1 activity. wow, it’s so much harder with a baby. i do have a massage scheduled this week, so that’s progress.
4. right around when i turned 30 (almost 12 years ago!) i decided to stop being mean to my body by harping on my fat. i also started practicing yoga and found other people who aren’t into running themselves into the ground – such a nicer place to live.
great ideas!
I love this: “If you wouldn’t say it to a child, don’t you dare say it to yourself.”