If you’re tired of making resolutions and goals that you never accomplish, a new approach may help. Conventional mindset goals can fall apart for several reasons. Once you’re aware of why this happens, you can prevent it or fix it so you can be on your way to achievement.
Try these techniques to achieve your goals:
1. Pick realistic goals. One of the most frequent issues is that you may pick goals that aren’t realistic. Perhaps you want to travel around the globe, read hundreds of books, and start your own business. Logistically speaking, some of your goals might simply not be possible any time soon. You may not have the money for travel, you don’t have the time to read, and pursuing your new business venture may require a lot of capital. It’s important to make your goals tangible. For example, instead of taking one long vacation spanning all the Earth’s continents, plan your one next big adventure to visit a country.
2. Break goals into a journey. It’s easy to set a goal, miss it, and get upset. Instead of doing this to yourself with each resolution, try a different way. View your goal as a long-term journey, where each leg of the journey leads up to where you’ll finally arrive. Create a plan that will get you to that goal. Set milestones and rewards along the way.
3. Measure your progress. In some cases, you may be close to achieving your goal, but you give up too soon. By measuring your progress, you’ll be able to see what you’re doing more clearly. You’ll be more motivated to stay on the journey and keep pushing toward your resolution. Set up a system to track your progress. Try different tools, such as calendars, journals, or logs to keep track of your goals and see which system works best for you.
4. Ask for help. Sometimes you might fail simply because you don’t ask for help and try to do everything by yourself. Perhaps a little help will bring you success! It’s normal to need help along your journey. You may need an entire support network behind you to achieve your goal. Turn to friends, family, coworkers, and others for support. Asking for help can help you achieve your goals faster and make the entire process easier as you work toward your target.
5. Feel free to adjust goals. You don’t have to stick with an old goal. Sometimes goals need to be changed and modified. You may evolve as a person and realize that your earlier ambitions are no longer relevant. Your present is constantly affecting your mindset and the way you perceive things. You accumulate knowledge, wisdom, and experience over time that affects your goals.
6. Stay aware of growth. You will continue to grow even if you don’t reach your goals. In some cases, failure may be a blessing because it teaches you valuable life lessons you wouldn’t have realized before. Without failure, you may not change enough to grow. Failure isn’t the end, and you can always set new goals. It’s more important to grow and become stronger than to reach every goal on your list.
Remember, your list will also change, so it won’t look the same as when you started. Be proactive about your goals! Take effective actions that support you and your goals, and you’ll find that achievement comes much easier.
Most likely, you won’t change the world in a month, but you can create new habits that
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put you on the road to making a difference in your world. Most people can drop or create a habit within 30 days. The only item you need is commitment.
Do you have what it takes? This list will provide you with a few ideas. Put your creative thinking cap on, and you’ll develop a few of your own ideas for challenges that will make a positive difference in your life.
Challenge yourself and change your life:
1. Try a new recipe. Let’s face it. You have the same thing for breakfast every day. Only a couple of different things for lunch. And maybe 10 different things for dinner. You’ve been eating the same stuff for years! Try something new. You’re bound to find something you love. Eat something new each day for a month.
2. Drink only water as a beverage for a month. How much do you rely on your morning cafe latte? You’re about to find out. Just go one month without drinking anything other than what your adult body was designed to drink – water.
3. Give up your news habit. See how many days you can go without watching or reading any news. Think you’ll miss out on something important? Your friends will tell you. Besides, the news hasn’t changed much for the last 100 years. Look at an old newspaper for proof.
4. Take a cold shower. There are lots of health benefits to be found from taking cold showers. They’re great for your mood and immune system. See how tough you really are. One tip: Rather than starting with a cold shower, start with a hot shower and gradually keep turning the temperature down. It’s refreshing!
5. Wake up 30 minutes earlier. Get out of bed 30 minutes earlier and do something productive. You might try learning Italian or reading. It might be a good time for a walk. Maybe you’ll meditate, pray, or write. See how special the morning can be before everyone else gets up!
6. Avoid complaining. Thirty days without complaining? Can you do it? You might struggle at first if you have a habit of complaining. But you’ll feel great by the end of the month!
7. Avoid negative thoughts. How about skipping all negative thoughts for a month? It’s important to catch yourself early in the process, and there will be plenty of times you’ll have to catch yourself. Breaking this one negative habit can make a huge positive difference in your life.
8. Do something nice for someone each day. You can do 30 things for the same person or for a variety of people. The choice is yours. Try to accomplish this anonymously. You’ll learn how good it feels to do something for someone else without getting anything in return.
9. Study something for a month. Pull the old guitar out of the attic. Learn how to paint. Study web marketing. This is a great challenge to combine with waking up earlier. What will you learn this month?
10. Exercise daily for a month. It doesn’t have to be challenging, but do something physical and fun each day for 30 days. Think of ways you can enjoy this time. You might shoot baskets in the driveway one day, and meet a friend for tennis the next. Take the family for a hike. Play with your dog. Try that new Body Groove class. Just do something active and enjoy the endorphin rush!
What ideas do you have for a 30-day challenge? Visualize how great you’ll feel if you can make just a couple of worthwhile changes over the next month. Your life will be moving toward new possibilities. You can change your habits in 30 days. Let’s get started!
Today is the third Monday of January – aka Blue Monday – claimed to be the most depressing day of the year. While this internet-made day has long since been debunked by science, there’s no denying that seasonal depression is very real.
Seasonal depression is a more common term for a condition named SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder). SAD is a recurring depression that often occurs in the late fall and winter months. Contrary to common belief, you can successfully combat seasonal depression long before you feel its effects.
Try these tips to ward off seasonal depression:
1. Mimic the sun. Make sure to get some sun on your face for at least 20 minutes a day; failing that, consider purchasing a sunlamp that mimics the rays of the sun. Light therapy is one of the highest recommended treatments for seasonal depression.
2. Nurture your social life. Being socially active is an important part of keeping up your spirits during the wintertime. Have a weekly dinner with your friends. If the weather is nasty, host a dinner in your home or head over to your friends’ house for a nice evening. If the weather allows, head out for a weekly catch-up with the girls or poker night with the boys.
3. Boost your vitamins intake. Consider speaking with your family doctor and/or naturopathic doctor to see whether taking a course of vitamin supplements can help you. For instance, ample research shows that Seasonal Affective Disorder is prevalent when vitamin D stores are typically low. Get your levels properly tested.
4. Take a winter vacation. There’s a reason millions of Canadians are known as snowbirds! Head to a warm, sandy beach for a fresh perspective. Pack your bags and take a two-week vacation to Florida, Hawaii, or even a cruise in the Bahamas. Just two weeks, or even less if your schedule is rigid, will make a world of a difference on your mood. If you’re low on funds, consider nixing your summer vacation in favour of a yearly winter vacation. Generally, SAD recurs every winter. Instead of fleeing your home during the warm summer months, think of a winter vacation as your secret weapon against combating seasonal depression.
5. Practice daily mindfulness. By now, you likely have heard all about the benefits of daily meditation, right? These include lowered blood pressure, increased immunity, better sleep, and a reduction of symptoms associated with depression, anxiety, and pain related to stress.
In essence, you can effectively combat seasonal depression by being aware of both your behaviour and environment. Make a conscious effort to boost your own spirits and refrain from slipping into a rut. Of course, if you know that you’re suffering from a debilitating episode of SAD, contact a family doctor to ensure that your condition is safely treated and whether you need medication or not. And also consider working with a licensed psychotherapist to help you find the right coping strategies for you.
With a few small changes, you can survive – and even thrive – through the dreary winter season. Spring is right around the corner and the sunny weather and new perspective you crave can be yours, even before spring gets here.
It’s not easy to find your way through the world. You might have interests that don’t coincide with the values of your parents or with those of western society. It’s important to remember that everyone is different, and while the status quo might work for the majority of the population, it doesn’t work for everyone.
To have a truly fulfilling life, you must live it on your own terms. There are plenty of forces willing to tell you what your path should be:
Parents. Your parents want you to be happy and successful. They love you, and they want you to thrive and blossom. Many of them may also like to be able to brag to their friends about their children. 🙂 Most parents tend to be practical in their advice. Just remember that you’d have a similar life to them if you always followed their advice. That might be good or bad. Keep in mind that you are not the same as your parents. You also have your own life to live. You owe it to yourself to live a life that’s right for YOU.
Educational system. The educational system wants to turn out productive people into society that conform to their ways of thinking. This might be great for society, but it might not always be in your best interests. What if you want to be a rockstar, or take a few years to travel and write a book, own an alpaca farm, or become a Buddhist monk in Sri Lanka? Your school guidance counsellor might be less than supportive of such pursuits!
Society as a whole. We, in the Western world, live in a society that places a strong value on achievement, financial resources, and personal possessions. We’re supposed to get married to a “perfect” partner, have a few kids, and own a house in the suburbs. It’s natural to want to play that game because we’ve all been so deeply indoctrinated to view these as measures of a “successful” life, even if it doesn’t quite suit our true nature. It’s nice to have the admiration of society, our ego minds crave this type of recognition. But the type of life dictated by society isn’t alwaysa good fit for everyone. There are plenty of people that are highly successful by society’s criteria that are profoundly unhappy with how their lives turned out.
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As you can see, plenty of people are willing to influence your choice of lifestyle and career. But it’s unlikely that their advice will be optimal for you all the time. Be an individual and find the path that works best for you.Find and follow your own path with these strategies:
Ask yourself what you really want to do. Don’t say that you don’t know, because you do know. You’re just afraid to allow it to see the light of day. You might be concerned what others think, or you might be afraid that you’re not capable of doing it. Deep down, if you turned inward and listened to the whispers in your heart, you know what you want. Ask yourself what you would do if you could do anything, and then listen to the answer.
Decide that you’re going to follow your path. One of the biggest obstacles to success is failing to make a true decision. A decision only occurs when you shut yourself off to other possibilities. If you frequently change your mind, you’re not making true decisions.
Make a plan. Rome wasn’t built in a day. So set up a schedule of daily tasks that will bring you closer to living the life that you have chosen. In doing so, you’re practically guaranteed success provided you don’t give up.
Your life is your responsibility. If you find yourself stuck living someone else’s definition of success, you’ll find yourself unhappy. The people that influenced you to live this way will be off living their own best lives. Take control of your destiny and find your own path. Your life will be more interesting, more satisfying, and uniquely your own!
Most people look back on their life and wonder what they could have accomplished if they’d only been more decisive and committed. You can avoid that kind of regret by choosing to become the best you can at something. Think about it for a moment. What do you want to master?
Follow this process to be the best version of you that you can be:
Assess your strengths. Your greatest potential will involve one or more of your strengths. Most strengths can be applied to any endeavour with a focused approach. The first step is to identify these strengths. What are you better at than nearly everyone you know? What has always been easy for you? What are you best at?
Assess your weaknesses. Do the same with your weaknesses. While weaknesses can, and often should, be strengthened, it’s helpful to avoid them at all costs when it’s time to get busy. Relying on your weaknesses increases the odds of failure.
What do you like? It’s not just about effort and skill. It’s about putting in enough time to be successful. That’s easier to do when you enjoy what you’re doing. You might have great potential to be the world’s greatest golfer, but if you can’t stand the game, you’ll never do it. More importantly, you wouldn’t want to anyway. Think about what you enjoy doing. What activities cause you to lose track of time?
What do you want to accomplish? Now that you know your strengths, weaknesses, and likes, you can decide what you want to master. You can’t do much without making this important decision. Everything going forward depends on this decision. Think carefully. Consider how you will measure mastery. Is it when you can drive a golf ball 300 yards 9 times out of 10? Play a specific piece of music on the piano? Earn $1 million in a year? How will you know you’ve won?
Avoid distractions. Distractions are the enemy to progress. We all have things we enjoy doing that accomplish nothing other than providing temporary amusement. Make a list of your favourite distractions. How willing are you to avoid these items? This is a good indicator of your potential for success.
Find a mentor. You can’t reach your ultimate potential without a mentor, coach, advisor, or whatever title you prefer. It can shave years off your learning curve and help you to avoid the mistakes you’re destined to make on your own. Seek out the best in your field and make contact. At the very least, read books on the topic written by experts. The library can provide you with plenty of mentors.
Make a commitment. Mastery requires commitment. It’s the commitment to develop yourself, overcome obstacles, and to put in the necessary time. It’s the commitment to find a mentor and to avoid those appealing distractions.
Focus on improvement. Seek regular small improvements. Consistent progress is the key to mastery. Mastering anything can take years, or even decades. If perfection is your daily goal, you’ll be disappointed. Weekly progress is an attainable goal that can keep you going. Have you ever truly committed yourself to anything? Now can be that time. What interests you? What do you want to know inside and out? Mastering anything can give you a new level of pride and confidence.
It takes some sacrifice to master anything because you have less time available for other pursuits. However, most people find it’s worth the sacrifice. So…. What do you want to master?
No matter where you are on your life journey, setbacks can cause disappointment and a loss of momentum.
Whether it’s a new career you’re working towards or an overall appreciation of life, every step towards fulfilment can seem financially, emotionally, or psychologically draining from time to time.
To boost your confidence, here’s a list of the top 10 power words and tips to keep you motivated and passionate, no matter what life throws your way:
Purpose. Whenever you’re feeling discouraged or disappointed, always remember your original purpose. Reminding yourself of the original reason for venturing down your path in the first place will help refresh your mind when things go awry.
Planning. Though you may think that you’ve done enough planning towards the fulfilment of your goal, thinking it through again will help eliminate aspects of your plan of action that may be causing you setbacks. Put all your thoughts down on paper, from the smallest details to the larger movements. Being able to see the timeline of your mission will help you focus on taking one step at a time to reach your goals.
Acceptance. Accepting that you’re a human being who’s bound to have ups and downs is absolutely crucial to your success. Without this self-acceptance, you’ll be subject to a foggy mind that’s unable to think positively, clearly, and innovatively. Acceptance of what hasn’t worked in the past helps you gain a better knowledge of what will work in the future.
Reward. When your motivation starts to wean, it’s crucial to give yourself rewards along the way. This is one of the best ways to stay motivated on your path to success. By giving yourself a taste of what you’re working for – whether it’s financial freedom, career responsibility, or your dream lifestyle – you won’t feel like you’re working so hard for nothing. This refreshes your mind and helps you work more productively.
Health. You know what this entails: moderate exercise, a healthy diet, and 7-8 hours of sleep per night. Feeling worn-down will make it almost impossible to pursue your goals and vision with the same clarity and vigour you had when you first set out. Take care of your basic needs first, and you’ll be strong enough to pursue your dreams.
Motivation. Research motivational books, CDs, and seminars. Sometimes hearing motivational tips from a different perspective can greatly motivate you to act and succeed. Find a source or two that touches you in some way and keep them close for those moments when you feel discouraged. After all, we all get discouraged at one time or another.
Organization. Ever feel depressed and worn out, and then you clean your surroundings and instantly feel more focused and motivated? The same applies to your goal. Organize and clean house when it comes to the operation of your goal. Organizing yourself gives you a fresh start and a feeling of clarity. In doing so, you’ll be able to attack your short and long-term goals more vigorously and effectively.
Refresh. Refresh your plan with something new. It could be a different tactic, setting, or career. Whatever it is, break out of the pattern you’re in and try something new. Even if this new tactic doesn’t yield positive results immediately, at the very least it will make you aware of the availability of your options.
Networking. Reach out to people in your industry or those who share your life goal. You can do this a number of ways: check out local clubs, find a plethora of people online, or talk to existing contacts that may have already succeeded in your goal. Having someone to voice your struggles, questions, and experience to will invigorate you to keep moving forward.
Action. Taking action, despite doubts and setbacks, will further your progress. By moving on, despite any pessimistic thoughts, you will motivate yourself by the sheer momentum of doing something proactive to change your circumstances.
Whenever you feel like your progress has stalled, or you simply want some quick inspiration, look to these 10 powerful words and strategies to spur you on. You’re sure to find something to get you back on track toward success!
Limiting beliefs are dysfunctional ideas/beliefs that we make up about ourselves, others and the world around us. Like the name suggests, they inhibit and hold us back from positive growth. We all have them, to varying extents, but the good news is that there are ways to banish them for good. Ready? Here we go:
7 Steps To Banishing A Limiting Belief – Toronto Mindful Solutions Clinic
Since psychotherapy (also known as counselling) is a rather misunderstood concept (not to mention often steeped in stigma), the suggestion that you see a therapist can be scary.
You may perceive getting therapy to mean that there’s something wrong with you. But this isn’t the case at all! While it may not be for everyone, counselling can be beneficial to most people at challenging points in their lives.
Although it’s important to recognize that therapy is not a panacea, it makes a difference every day in thousands of lives across the world. If you find that you have uncomfortable feelings of “stuckness” in your life, you may very well benefit from this working with a psychotherapist.
Consider these ways that therapy can help you:
Get an objective viewpoint: Counseling allows the opportunity to talk about your current challenges with someone who’s trained, impartial and objective. Open communication with your friends and loved ones is usually a good idea. However, there are times when you might find it more comforting and safe to share your feelings, innermost thoughts, and worries with a therapist.
Clarify your feelings: Many times, people begin therapy feeling confused and not really able to identify their emotions. A good therapist can assist you in recognizing your feelings. The therapeutic process can help you explore particularly troubling emotions and resolve them.
Learn to appropriately communicate: Being able to share honest, genuine feelings using more effective communication can enrich your relationships and help you succeed in your life. Once you learn to pay more attention to your feelings and share them with others, you’ll get more of what you want from life, whatever that may be. Most importantly, your life is more fulfilling when you live based on how you truly feel.
Get stress-relief: How many times do you have an opportunity to say whatever you want however you want with no repercussions later? It’s possible to liberate yourself from psychological pain by talking with a therapist. Therapy is a safe place to vent your negative feelings. Whether you’re feeling scared, hurt, angry, lonely, confused, stuck or other negative feelings, you can share it with your therapist, take a load off your chest, and gain clarity. For many, therapy is a sanctuary when they’re feeling overwhelmed with negativity in their life. This makes counselling a great stress reliever!
It’s all about you: When you go to therapy, the session is focused on your benefit. Your time with a psychotherapist is all about you. You can say whatever you want, and you won’t ever have to worry about being judged by the therapist, as they are trained to keep their personal feelings out of it.
Gain valuable insights: When you talk about yourself with someone who’s non-judgmental and objective, you’re truly tuned in to the moment and what you’re saying. Therapy provides a chance for you to hear yourself talk and share your own personal struggles. It may sound unusual, but people in counselling frequently have “a-ha” moments about something they shared. Your therapist will ask questions which encourage you to examine your current situation more thoroughly. After all, human difficulties are complex. Through this process, you can discover your motives and learn to understand yourself better. Developing insight and awareness into your feelings empowers you to set priorities about what’s most important to you and make choices that enable you to live the life you truly seek.
Bring out your strengths: With therapy, you can develop or gain confidence in your capacity to live a healthy, fulfilling life, while learning more about what makes you tick, and how to harness your strengths.
Simply put, working with a therapist can be one of the most profound gifts you can ever give yourself. Most likely, you’ll experience less stress, feel more satisfied and contented with your life after participating in counselling. If you find yourself struggling emotionally, remind yourself that therapy can help. Tell yourself that therapy is a crucial component of your self-care plan. And then commit to doing the work!
So here we are, in the new year, which is always a great time of year to develop good, new habits or to deepen old ones.
Today’s blog post is about the benefits of regular journaling.
Who among us used to keep a diary when we were younger?
I know I’ve been a lifelong journaler; I started the habit pretty much as soon as I learned to write full sentences! I must have filled up dozens and dozens of old diaries over the years because I intuitively understood journals as the powerful tools they are to help me understand my struggles and fears without judgment or punishment. I remember how good it felt to release all of those thoughts and feelings, and to write out my deepest, most personal hopes and dreams, getting them out of my head and down onto paper. My world somehow seemed clearer after journaling.
But then adulthood rolled around… and my journaling stopped being as prolific as it used to be. Like so many adults, I too can get caught up in the busyness of day-to-day life. Adulting is hard, y’all! I know I’m not alone on this because I hear it often from my clients too.
But… it’s such a shame that so many of us have stopped keeping regular journals!
One of the very first things I do with all my clients as soon as I start working with them is to encourage them to get back to a regular journaling practice as a supplemental support to our work together. Keeping a regular diary is a great way to develop self-reflection and self- compassion. It helps us to understand our shadow selves, our triggers, our deepest dreams… In my years of working one-on-one with clients in private practice, I’ve noticed that those who regularly write in their journals are the ones who more often than not get the clarity they’re seeking much sooner. And as a result, they are usually the ones who “graduate” from therapy a LOT sooner. Positive outcomes are more easily attained, and at a much more rapid pace. WHY? It’s simple. Writing down our thoughts and feelings helps us understand them more clearly. It helps us notice our limiting beliefs and our dysfunctional coping mechanisms. It helps us get in touch with our core values – what really matters to us, what we want more of. It propels us forward.
So… if you struggle with stress, depression, or anxiety, or even if you’re just feeling STUCK (don’t we all at times?!), keeping a journal is a great idea. It can help you gain control of your emotions, improve your mental health, and gain CLARITY on your life. Journalling can help you prioritize any problems, fear and concerns. It can help you track your day to day thoughts and feelings, and can also provide you with a great opportunity to practice positive self-talk and affirmations.
So… journaling is a pretty simple but powerful tool to help develop a healthy lifestyle for better managing stress, anxiety, and mental health & wellness. It’s an incredible tool to help you cultivate a more MINDFUL life. And when I talk of an overall healthy lifestyle that includes journaling, I’m also talking about things like
Lowering your stress levels
Eating a healthy, balanced, nutrient-rich diet
Exercising regularly, preferably outside, in nature while absorbing the sun’s healing Vitamin D
Meditating each day
Getting plenty of sleep each night
Reducing (or ideally abstaining) from alcohol and drugs
Whenever I’ve recommended journaling to my clients, I’ve sometimes been met with resistance from them.
“But it’s so time-consuming, Sandy”…. “I have no time.”… “I’m MUCH too busy for that.”
“I would have no idea what to even write in my journal.”
“The blank pages overwhelm me.”
“I have too many thoughts in my head, and I can’t possibly discern which ones are important enough to capture and which ones are just… noise in my head.”
Clearly, we seem to have collectively embraced the “I’m much too busy” lament. Sure, life is busy with work/school, childcare, eldercare, paying the bills, cleaning the house, doing laundry, cooking, etc. But journaling doesn’t have to be a long, time-consuming process. Some days, I will jot down some stream of consciousness notes as they pop into my head in under 5 minutes, in point form, on the Notes app in my phone. Other days, as time allows, the entries will be deeper and more fleshed out, and handwritten in a journal. I’ve also noticed the best time for me to journal is first thing in the morning, immediately after having meditated. I got into this habit years ago, after having read Julia Cameron’s wonderous The Artist’s Way, in which she describes the importance of what she calls Morning Pages.
My point is, journaling doesn’t have to take hours and hours to be effective. We can help ourselves by trading out some of our mind-numbing Netflix time with some important self-care time that actually helps us connect more deeply with ourselves and our values.
As for the excuse of “I don’t know what to write about”… That’s a pretty valid concern too, especially if you’re a journaling newbie or somebody who hasn’t engaged in this practice in a long time… which is why I’ve recently published a colourful journal with over 80 powerful coaching prompts to help you get in touch with yourself and live a more mindful life. And I’ve since I’ve always understood the deep connection between creative expression and self-reflection, I’ve included a sampling of some mandalas that I’ve drawn over the year, which you can colour in, if you like. There are also plenty of blank pages on which you can create your own artwork to help get your creativity and self-reflection juices flowing.
The book is available for purchase at most major online retailers like Amazon, etc. But I’ll let you in on a little secret… It’s also available to preview and buy at a lower price, direct from the publisher, below. I would love for you to have a look, buy it, and to share it with your circles to help me spread the word. And please tell me how you like using it, if you do decide to purchase it!
My Mindful Life Journal by Sandy Kiaizadeh. Click on this photo to preview and purchase this book direct from the publisher.
You know, keeping a journal can help you create order when your world feels like it’s in chaos. Using a journal like this one will help you get to know yourself by revealing your most private fears, dreams, thoughts, and feelings. I encourage you to look at your writing time as personal relaxation time. Remember that it’s a meditative process that can help you de-stress and wind down.
I invite you to get into the habit of journaling again. Make self-care an important part of your 2020. Make the practice of journaling a special time to reconnect with yourself, by creating a ritual around it… maybe writing in a place that’s relaxing and soothing, or maybe combining it with another mindful ritual, like tea time. Ultimately though, look forward to your journaling time, and know that you’re doing something good for your mind, body and spirit.
For many, the promise of the new year is a time for reflection and rebirth. It’s a reset. A fresh start. An opportunity for reinvention and creating abundance.
I probably go against conventional wisdom when it comes to setting New Year’s Resolutions. Simply put, I don’t like ’em. Why? Because it’s not uncommon for most well-intentioned resolutions to be discarded by January 17, which, incidentally enough, is known as Ditch New Year’s Resolution Day. How many of us have signed up for gym memberships soon after New Year’s only to never go, despite our credit cards still being charged? Gyms worldwide know this about us! Not to mention how ditched resolutions only make us feel terrible about ourselves!
So. Resolutions, bad. In my books, they’re the antithesis of self-compassion, and anyone who’s spent any quality time with me knows that I’m all about compassion-based living.
BUT.
I still believe in living life mindfully.
With full intentions and awareness.
What I’ve been practising annually to keep myself on track and accountable is to live by themes. For instance, for me, 2017 was all about embracing joy, while 2018 was my year of healing. 2019 was all about inviting more love, while 2020 will be all about courage. This means that, before every action I take or every choice I make over the next 12 months, I will ask myself first whether I’m putting myself out there authentically in order to stretch myself, even if it may make me slightly uncomfortable. It takes courage to do that!
So I invite you to think about what theme you’d like to live by in 2020.
To keep on track with your chosen theme, affirmations can be powerful tools to help shift your mindset. So why not use an affirmation or two to help you start the year off on the right foot?
So for instance, if you’re looking to invite more joy (theme) into your life, you could try these affirmations, if they resonate for you:
To have great joy, I open my mind and my heart to what the New Year will bring. I avoid fearing the change that the ending of one year offers. I welcome change because it allows for growth. Change keeps things interesting and eventful. I find excitement and joy in every new experience.
Or more simply:
Today, I embrace and welcome the joy the New Year will surely bring to me.
Of course, these are only suggestions. Come up with your own affirmations by spending a few moments with the following self-reflection questions:
What theme do I choose to embrace in 2020?
How can I make 2020 more joyous than the last one (if joy is your theme)?
What can I do to bring more joy (if that’s your theme) to others in the coming year?
How can I embrace the changes and challenges of the New Year while living in alignment with my chosen theme?
So… what theme and affirmation will you live by in 2020?
Since psychotherapy (also known as counselling) is a rather misunderstood concept (not to mention often steeped in stigma), the suggestion that you see a therapist can be scary.
Mindful Solutions Clinic 
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