New Years Resolution 2021

For the past two years, I have posted a list of resolutions on this blog in order to hopefully help keep me accountable for making sure they happen. It honestly has been pretty helpful, and things have gone well from doing that. But as I am sure many people can relate to, the way things went with any resolutions or goals I had for 2020, were all completely shattered. My main goal was to finally be able to travel more (Covid kicked that one straight in the face) and to also make bigger moves with my blog.  Unfortunately, none of that was really able to happen, and making any plans for 2021 seems like a trap because there is no way to know how things will end up going. I have been struggling with what I am supposed to look forward to this year when the things I have planned could very easily go away. But in spite of all of that, I think it is important to still set intentions for the New Year ahead of us. 

Over the years, there have been a bunch of studies on why setting “New Years Resolutions” never works and why people are always left feeling defeated when they cannot accomplish them. One of the main reasons this happens is because people make massive goals to change things but do not give themselves the smaller, actionable steps they need to take to get there. When someone says they want to work out more, they immediately jump into high-intensity workouts that they think they need to be doing every day, when really starting small and getting a smaller workout in twice a week to start. Or if you want to go Vegan in the new year, you cannot cut out your whole diet in one day: start by cutting out milk, then the random things like cream cheese or sour cream, then cut out eggs and so on and so forth. When people give themselves goals that have no steps to lead up to the thing they want to change, they set themselves up for failure and unhappiness with themselves when they cannot reach these goals. You cannot just make a resolution that you finally want to open up that small business you have been dreaming about but then not give yourself any real steps to get there. That is not fair to yourself. So if you want to make a list of goals for 2021, make them into small steps you can realistically accomplish and feel good about being able to work towards. 

I have one goal this year, and that is to enjoy my life. This may sound a little generic, but the past few years I have been working and in school and haven’t had the freedom to go and have fun or do whatever I wanted. Now the pandemic is raging, and I still have to pay bills and buy groceries but my biggest goal this year is to have fun doing what I can do. I will keep working, and I do have some blog goals as per usual, but at the end of the day and the year, I want to be doing things that I love. I want to be having fun and loving and living my life the best I can be. I want to hike and camp and take small day trips to the beach. As soon as it’s safe again, I want to get back on my travel mojo. I want to road trip in the US and make it to a bunch of places I’ve never been and get to see all the national parks, but I also have a pretty hefty list of places I want to go in the world. Because of the virus and the unknown impact of what the vaccine will totally look like when implemented in full force, this could be a goal I am working on for several years. Just knowing myself and my inability to relax sometimes means I will need to be working towards this goal for quite a while. I often get very caught up in my head about what I should be doing and where I should be doing it and by what time I should have reached certain milestones and there is nothing helpful or positive about any of that. Nothing at all. So this year, I want to take steps to do things I love and having fun with my life and my youth so when I do have the dream job and my career has started, I know how to balance things out and how to enjoy my life without getting fully swept up in work. There was a quote a family friend told me once, and I, unfortunately, can’t remember it all, but it was something like “you don’t want to enter your grave with a full bank account and nothing out of place saying ‘that was nice’. You need to enter the grave with messy hair, messy feet, and a sore body saying ‘wow what a ride!’”. Obviously, I have some time before I enter the grave, but it’s something that has always stuck with me. So this year I am going to pursue to change the way that I handle things, and truly enjoy this life I have been given the privilege of living. 

This was a bit of a shorter post, but this was something I felt needed to be said in the wake of New Years’ with everyone making resolutions and not being able to stick to them by February. And don’t forget to enjoy your life. That may sound a bit cliche, but there are things that you can still do to make life fun and exciting while also staying safe during the pandemic. Don’t be afraid to keep trying to do those things.

Madey

Cover Art by Avery Lynch