We’ve gone from dipping our toes in 2019, to having waded out from the shore — pretty soon the undertow will take us out to sea, right? The sea of awesomeness and wonderfulness and unicorns and rainbows, right?
Seriously, though (I can be serious!), I feel like 2019 is going to hold more of the same goodness that 2018 held for me. Continued growth and moving forward, defining both who I am and how to follow my passions while still adulting and paying my mortgage.
To that end, I’m keeping things simple this year. Call me lazy, but I’ll argue that I’m being minimalistic (mostly because that sounds better).
While I have a host of ideas to pursue, I’m only going to hold myself to two resolutions this year to give myself the necessary flexibility to pivot and redirect, as necessary. In other words, I totally want to slam dunk my 2019 goals.
My first goal is a carry-over from 2018 — do my minimum amount of movement every day. For me, that’s an intentional mile of walking. I thought about adding time or distance to it, but in the end, I really do want to make this easy to get done. I can always convince myself, “it’s just a mile, get it done” — and I want it to stay that way because as often as not, the “just a mile” turns into a couple miles or sometimes more than that. Getting out and moving is sometimes all I need.
My second goal is also a carry-over, but a failed one — meditation. This year, just like with movement, I will set the bar low (like, really REALLY low) knowing that creating the habit is, by far, the most important part of the process. In that vein, I intend to meditate for at least a minute every day. Easy, right? I hope so!
Both of these are about the habit, about getting started more than the minimum amount that I have to do. Maybe there’s a week where I walk 7 miles and meditate for 7 minutes — if it was that kind of week, knowing myself that would have been 0 miles and 0 minutes without the habit. Makes sense, right? Like I say, something is always better than nothing.
There you have it. My 2019 resolutions. Are you completely bowled over? It’s a pretty far departure from my usual list of at least half a dozen goals — but I’m doing it with INTENTION. And since that’s my word for the year, that totally fits. Pretty good segue (<– “segue” wins the award for word that should not be spelled like that AT ALL), amiright?
I want to be incredibly intentional about this year. I tend to make “decisions by default” — you know what I mean — where a decision is made by not actually making a decision? It’s so easy. It’s also lazy. It also frequently does not lead to the sorts of results that I’m looking for.
It might sound hokey, but I don’t want to waste any more time. It’s so easy to get home from work and not do much of anything until I go to bed. Turn on the TV, get engrossed in the madness going on in the country, scroll through social media and all of a sudden, the evening is gone and I’ve done nothing. Although, if there’s ice cream in the house, I’ve made at least two trips to the kitchen — one to get the ice cream, and the other to throw out the empty container. So, I suppose not every evening is a loss. But still.
I need to live more. I need to laze less. Be curious about the world around me.
I need to move more. Write more. Travel more. Explore. Learn.
And for what it’s worth, becoming an all-star TV watcher is a little lower on my priority list for the coming year.
