About 5 years ago, I was going through a big change in my life and at a crossroads, I decided to make a list of some goals I had for myself. I'm the kind of person who, throughout the year, thinks of great Halloween costumes or New Years resolutions and then forgets them when the holidays get closer. I decided that year that I would keep track of my goals as I went along and on NYE, I posted a Facebook note with my resolutions for the next year.
The result was amazing - having my resolutions in a public place made me feel accountable to them and I made sure to update throughout the year with my progress. All of my resolutions were completely realistic and while I didn't get 100%, I'd say it would be have been a B+ at least. The next year, I didn't do any such thing and I don't even know what my resolution was or if I even had one. The year after, in the midst of another change, I started my first blog and the resolution list became an annual post. Now that I write here, I thought I'd share that with you.
The first resolution post is always a look back at my past year (and is actually something I slowly write during the course of the year because this is a journey not a finish line). My original 2013 resolution post is here. The big take away is that I realized after so many years of resolution lists - they started to look the same. There were so many that by nature were easy to try to do every year (travel somewhere new for example) that they were just tacked on there. I also realized that 2012 was my worst year for following my resolutions after traveling so much in 2011 . I decided to par it down and focus on one that I needed to do... be selfish.
I always felt like I needed to be in defense of this. It sounds terrible, right? Being selfish? For me, I just wanted to be better at saying no to things I didn't want to do, making time for myself, and not feeling so obligated to everything and everyone. As a single woman in my twenties, I shouldn't have felt like I was stretched so thin, but I did. I needed to fix this. Obviously, I would still try to be a good friend and be there for people or attend major events but I didn't want to feel as though I had to be at every single thing. I had people tell me it was a terrible idea and others who thought it was about time.
A lot of the time, I forgot about saying no. Every now and then though, something would come up that I just did not want to do and the sense of obligation burned inside me... and I would remember my resolution and decide to do what I really preferred. There were some exceptions to this of course. I know some times being there for your close friends is more important and I made sure to do that when I needed to also. However, most of the time, just playing "if they were in my shoes" gave me more than enough reason to follow through on my selfish resolution. Every now and then I would stop and think "Did I alienate some people with my selfish maneuver?" The answer was almost always no. When it wasn't, a nice phone call or apology or clarification almost always cleared it up.
Ironically, even without my big list of resolutions, I ended up doing a lot of the things that would have been on it: travel somewhere new (South Africa, Boston), do something adventurous (paragliding), read more books than the year before, pass an exam, figure out a workout schedule, eat better, take control of my romantic life (this is a more complicated thing in itself but I learned it was time to cut out people and situations that weren't good for me), be closer with family, be nicer, etc. The problem wasn't needing a list to get things done, it was needing the state of mind to put myself as a priority. To visit a country or city I'd been wanting to go to for years, to feel like I could do whatever I want without needing someone to hold my hand, realizing I wanted that anyways, not continuing to chase dead ends, letting go, and making decisions about my life that make me happy - because when it comes to that, no one else's opinions matter.
This year led to me growing in ways I never thought possible. When I started this year, I said that I was in a better mindset then I ever had before but I still felt burnt out and like something didn't click. A year later, I have a much healthier career path, the best friends ever, a fantastic opportunity to combine my loves of writing and wine tasting, and amazing memories.
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