New Year Resolutions for 2021

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There has been talk that there is no need to write resolutions for 2021, and I get it. People are tired, fatigued from the pivoting we did in 2020, not to mention all the politics and the social conflict. I understand the difficulty in creating expectations that will challenge us further for the year ahead (stretch us past our limits, some will say), but I beg to differ on the writing of resolutions front.

As C.S. Lewis once wrote, “Hardships often prepare ordinary people for an extra-ordinary destiny.”

I have found that the times in my life that have been most tough are the moments right before big change happened. Stead-fastness is what we need during this transition. We need to courage to believe that 2021 holds the potential to be the most amazing years of our lives.

Of course, every individual reacts to trauma differently. Personally, I like to face trauma head on and conquer it (case in point: My Decision to Aggressively Tackle My Student Loan Debt), but even I have challenges that I find difficult to face. However, to give up altogether?! No, that isn’t me, and I don’t think that’s you either.

If you feel like resolutions are a bit too much, just write ONE like I did in 2018, after I went through the most roller-coaster year of my life (which was also the most pivotal!). For the more motivated, try beginning with the end. And for those who really can’t bring themselves to pull out paper and pen at this time, no worries – there is always the opportunity to write resolutions in the middle of the year. Let’s not let the New Year define our opportunities to create change.

I, for one, am excited about what 2021 could bring. My gleaming eyes are looking ahead to a bright future. I’m a dreamer and an optimist, so I wrote a lengthy list of resolutions. 2020 was a year that forced me to slow down. I dissociated myself from my own identity to unearth the real me, an experience that I recently wrote about here.

Each year, I focus my resolutions around a theme. Last year was about self-care in many forms, including taking care of my surroundings and home, focusing on my health, and slowing down enough to give myself time to recharge. In the process, I discovered balance, kindness (towards myself and others), and my place in this world. All of this sets me up nicely for a wonderful 2021.

My focus for 2021 is to make it the year of my most meaningful work.

I feel more grounded in my being that I ever have, and the purpose of creating space the previous year is to fill it as intentionally as possible. This is not to be confused with more work but rather quality work. I am not only referring to professional work either, encompassing work on my relationships, on my home, on my spirituality, and on my self.

In order to set myself up for success, I paired my resolutions with actionable and measurable goals. Maybe you’ll find a few that resonate with you. However, I would highly recommend writing your own first, before allowing someone else’s (mine included) to influence your hopes for the year to come. And if I don’t get around to it, I wish you and yours love and light in the New Year!

My 2021 New Year’s Resolutions

Focus on Health
- Make exercise routine. Focus on the exercises that are enjoyable, like running, swimming and yoga to make it more sustainable. Goal: Exercise 5 days a week.
- Eat more veggies and fruit. Goal: Incorporate these into meals at least 5 days a week.
- Eat to be satiated, abandon gluttony. Goal: Aim to only be 80% full.
- Sleep on a consistent schedule. Goal: Try to sleep between the hours of 10pm and 6am.
- Wake up at a consistent time. Goal: Get up when you feed the cat, instead of crawling back into bed.

Focus on Having Less
- Less Instagram. Goal: Limit yourself to 15 minutes per day.
- Less Shopping for both the self and the home. Goal: Spend only $35 on fun money each month. When you feel the need to buy something new, write the reasons why what you have is enough. Wait at least one month before buying something you want.
- Less obligation and responsibilities. Goal: Practice responding with “Can I get back to you?” to give yourself the space for consideration.

Focus on Creating Your Best Work
- Prepare each morning for the day ahead. Goal: Meditate each morning to clear the mind. Prioritize your tasks for the day ahead, and delegate or de-clutter as many as you can before beginning work. Put on an outfit and get ready as if you are going into work to create that separation between work and home.
- Be on time to show respect for other people’s timelines. Goal: Show up to work, appointments and events at least five minutes early.
- Study dentistry to invigorate a passion towards the profession. Goal: Complete 50 CE units this year.
- Provide usefulness to others via the blog so that I may make a living helping people virtually. Goal: Create digital downloads, consider intentional living consultations, and work on writing a book on living intentionally.
- Create the ideal WFH space. Goal: Carve out a dedicated area in the home for work. Make it a sanctuary.

Focus on Creating a Good Home
- Keep up with de-cluttering. Goal: De-clutter monthly both physical and digital clutter.
- Maintain a clean and tidy home. Goal: Follow this cleaning schedule.

Focus on Spirituality
- Meditate more often. Goal: Use the Tide App 5 times a week.
- More outdoors time to reduce cortisol levels. Goal: Aim for at least 30 minutes of walking or hiking in nature three times a week.
- Have more gratitude. Goal: Write the top 3 things the be grateful for each morning. Thank my food and my things for gracing my life.
- Reflect on a quote each morning. Goal: Find a quote that speaks to where you are in life and share it each day with others.
- Spread goodness. Goal: Volunteer once a month. Call three friends and family members each week and tell them why you are grateful for them.

Focus on Myself
- Make time to read more books, which will expand your knowledge, perspective, and experience. Goal: Read two books a month.
- Learn a language or musical instrument. Goal: Learn French enough to be able to have conversation and learn two songs on either piano or guitar each month.
- Get into drawing again. Goal: Complete two drawings per month.
- Reserve the evenings for relaxation and rejuvenation. Goal: Put the phone away one hour before bed.

Monthly Goals: May 2020

This post was sponsored by Smitten on Paper but all opinions, thoughts, and tips are my own. Smitten on Paper is a paper company based in Monrovia, CA. They have daily planners as well as wedding services including invitations and thank you notes. They also host a number of workshops, for those into stationary and calligraphy.

I always get questions about how I get so much done. Balancing blogging, dentistry, dog-sitting and once a bakery on top of being a wife, sister, and daughter can seem like much, and people often wonder, “How can you even consider yourself as someone who lives a slow lifestyle?” But I do.

You see, a slow lifestyle isn’t just dawdling on the couch reading, or sitting cross-legged on a meditation pillow for an hour in zen (although I also do both). Slow living is all about being mindfully in the present moment. Not surprisingly, when you choose to live slowly, you get more out of the time you have.

Once of my favorite aspects of slow living is intentionality. In order to have time for the things that matter to you (books, exercise, bread, whatever it is that excites you and lets you call this a life), you need to be intentional with what you do. Most people are not intentional enough. They try to do thirty different things at once, instead of honing out the single chore that will get them to where they want, fastest. It is this minimalism with what you choose to do that paves the way to slow living.

Creating Goals

On the first of every month, I write down the goals I want to accomplish. I list personal goals, work goals, home goals, health goals, finance goals, and leave a category for “other“. However, just saying I want something done doesn’t actually get it done. I tie each goal to a habit that I want to form that will get me there… slowly.

Why habits instead of tasks?

When habits are formed, they stay for good thereby improving you over the long-term. When tasks are performed, they are checked-off and dropped, never to be seen again. The difference is that habits make your future life EASIER. You store certain actions that make you 1% better each day in such a way that, eventually, takes no extra energy. Once a habit is formed, it becomes rote motion, thereby making you more efficient. Aditionally, your brain power is now reserved for other thoughts or actions. You compound the interest invested in yourself, and you continually get closer to the person you want to become while also gaining the freedom to stack on even more goals and habits come next month.

Starting this month, I wanted to share with you guys my monthly goals on the first of the month. More importantly, I will share the habit I tie to them, to demonstrate how I use talent stacking to make me one bit more efficient each day.

The goal isn’t the important part. I don’t care if I don’t reach it at the end of the month. It’s the habits that I track. I mark my top habits and physically track them on a daily basis using Smitten On Paper’s Weekly Agenda (#gifted). It is my favorite planner, and the monthly goals page is so helpful to keeping me focused.

I note the goals here in the following manner: GOAL –> HABIT

I hope this is helpful.

May 2020 Goals

PERSONAL:

Decrease phone use –> Dock phone when at home, do not allow the phone at the dining table or when in conversation with others, remove the Instagram app after every use to add a barrier to habit-scrolling, set screen time goal of 30 minutes or less per day.
Show self-care —> Remember to wear the NG every night and turn on the humidifier before bed.

WORK:

Get more affiliate projects for the blog –> Apply to at least 20 affiliates, get at least 10 partnerships
Increase blog views from last month –> Post at least five times a week and get another podcast on the books
Get through dental continuing education classes —> Do one online course every day on Mondays through Thursdays

HOME:

Keep the home tidy –> Put things in their proper place once you are finished using them.
Make it look neat –> Make the bed every day.
Keep it clean –> Run Roomba every other day, deep clean the house every other week.

HEALTH:

Get into a workout routine –> Run or do yoga 6 times a week, Work up to running 6 mikes.
Protect the eyes –> Wear Blue-light glasses from TheBookClub

FINANCES:

Limit spending –> less than $250 in groceries and dining out, less than $75in gas
Increase income –> Make bonus on a daily basis
Tackle loans –> Take advantage of the 0% interest rate on student loans right now and funnel all the money towards debt before September 30 hits

OTHER:

Start writing a book –> Work on it thirty minutes a day.

Tips on Habits

If you’re looking for inspiration – check out this ditty about the power of habits. For more creative minds who struggle with the structure of habits, may I suggest this read? Lastly, a few tips on how to make habits stick.

Create a path of least resistance by setting up cues and reminders for yourself to get a habit done. If you want to read every night, set a book down on your pillow when you make your bed. If you want to exercise every morning, put on your exercise clothes the minute you wake up.
Make it something you want to do. There are many habits you can do to get you to a goal. For example, if you want to lose weight, you can try multiple diets, stop buying plastic, get a gym membership, go on a run, do yoga in your PJs, eliminate just sugar, &c. There are many habits you can use to get you to the same goal. Choose the habit that works for you. You only need to pick one.
Provide motivation. Try using a habit tracker for that natural neurotransmitter kick. It’s FREE! Or try a reward system where you promise yourself something after reaching a goal using the habits you created.
Hold yourself accountable by sharing with a friend, or the world. Tell somebody about what you want to accomplish. Agree to get something done together with someone else. Use people around you to hold you accountable, too.
Make it a positive habit. Verbage is key. If you write something in a negative way, you already start with negative thoughts and your chances of success are diminished. For example, instead of writing “Spend 25% less of my weekly wages this month”, write “Pay 25% more towards credit card debt.” You feel good after your habit, instead of feeling starved.

Of course, there are many other tips and if you have one or two you’d like to share with other readers, please do!

See you in June!

Recent Reads: Marie Kondo Interviews Elizabeth Gilbert on Tidying the Mind

May I start by saying that Elizabeth Gilbert’s book, “Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear” was one of the first catalysts that pushed me to embark on a creative lifestyle. I read the book on our flight home from our honeymoon in New Zealand January 2016, and I remember how powerfully I was impacted by her words. Needless to say, I am a huge fan and attribute this writer-baker-dentist-dog-walking lifestyle to her work. As many of you who have already been in this space for a while know, Marie Kondo’s book, “The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing” was the starting point of my decluttering journey. Since then, I have found that cleaning my home was a reflection of cleaning out all the parts of myself that felt unaligned with who I am and who I wish to be. Alas, it comes as no surprise that this interview between the two is brimming with “all-the-feels”, and stands as my top read for this week. If anything I write on this blog jives with you, perhaps it would be relevant to take a gander at this quick interchange of thought between two modern influential women at this time. If you have more than a few moments, perhaps immersing into either of their books would better suit your taste? Below, I highlight a part of the interview that speaks the most to me at this time, as well as my thoughts on the matter.

Marie Kondo:

In the KonMari Method™, we encourage people to ask the question, “Does it spark joy?” to all areas of their lives. Is there a question or concept that you apply in making important decisions?

Elizabeth Gilbert:

I always say this to women: “Start knowing.”
I say it to myself, too.
Enough of “Should I do this?”
Go deep and say, “It’s time to know.”
You have to believe that the force of knowing is in you. We’ve inherited it from our ancestors; they’ve passed on everything they went through. There’s an old version of you that lives in yourself.
Ask her.

Often times I feel like the big changes in my life have come when the one in me who knows is appalled by the way that I’m living.
She’s so ANGRY.
She just looks at the way I’m living and says,
“No! This isn’t it! This isn’t good enough! This isn’t what we came here to do. We came here for better things than this.”
I don’t mean not rich enough, not famous enough.
I mean not accurate, not honorable enough for who you are.

THIS!! ALL OF THIS.

They say that, sometimes, when something in you is unsettled, you get a feeling. Like when Will in Stranger Things gets that eerie tingling at the back of his neck as the Mind Flayer draws near, I think we all have that little inkling towards auras that are dangerous to our well-being. It CAN’T only be me (and Will).

It’s like your inner-self “that knows” is screaming at your oblivious outer-self to listen. We get these uncertainties, but they’re stronger than our anxieties. I’m not talking about a quiet voice that whispers in your head. What I’m referring to is something waaaay more visceral. Something that comes from your gut … but deeper. The gut of your soul, if you believe in that sort of thing. A learned lesson from your past life, if you believe in THAT sort of thing.

I believe that Gilbert’s addressing of women, in particular, is important. Unfortunately, centuries of societal norms have failed in teaching women how to listen to their inner selves. We’ve historically been taught to listen to someone else (ahem). BUT! Times are changing, and it’s time we listen to us. I hang out with a lot of guys. They point out, in particular, my habit of answering simple questions with, “I don’t know.” Easy decision-making that revolves around where to eat, what to do, how I feel… the easy way out is to say, “I don’t know”. They hate it because I revert most decision-making about what we do and where we eat to them. UGH. I know. Thankfully, I have very progressive guy friends who force me to decide by saying, “No. This is an equal relationship, and you have to decide sometimes.” Thank goodness!

But I do see it in myself and in female friends a lot. This unknowingness. This repulsive impulsive reaction to just let men decide what to do with the simplest of things. It’s a habit that needs to change. It’s a matter of believing in our ability to know. “Ask her,” she says. Sage advice, if ever I heard one.

So in asking her, a topic that has been unsettling for quite some time.

Instagram.

I’ve alluded to my addiction once before, here. I know my triggers (seeing my cell-phone) and my reward (public affirmation). I know my excuses (the need to have Instagram to grow my blog, the need to maintain my relationships however virtual, the need to have a creative output, whatever). I know the consequences (hours spent editing photos, writing up paragraphs, scrolling through feeds… mostly the latter). I know what it was like to quit for one month (more time, more calm, more REAL relationships, more energy, more creativity). From this, you gather that I know a LOT. So why is it that I always say, “I don’t know what to do about Instagram.”

Upon reading EG’s answer to MK’s question, something in me sparked. It wasn’t joy. It was a knowing. It was like that inner me was finally yelling loud enough out of absolute R.A.G.E. at my insensitivity towards the unhealthiness of the app. And it’s like EG spoke the exact words that my inner self was trying to get me to hear.

“No! This isn’t it! This isn’t good enough! This isn’t what we came here to do. We came here for better things than this.”

“I don’t mean not rich enough, not famous enough.” Everything I say Instagram promises for the blog.
“I mean not accurate, not honorable enough for who you are.” Everything that goes against what the blog represents. I always write about being good enough. About fighting societal pressures. About doing what’s aligned. All this and more clashes with everything Instagram sells.

The truth is this:

There are systems in place that sell us the things that are not good for us.

Added salts, sugars and fats that keep us returning to restaurant tables.
Advertisements that keep us spending hard-earned dollars on consuming goods.
Celebrities trying to sell us a glamorous lifestyle.
Wall Street analysts telling us that we can outsmart the market.
Instagram selling us a platform in order to stay connected and relevant.

You see what I mean? They all have their vested interest, while we are being stripped of things that matter most. Health, time, simplicity, financial stability, real relationships, all in that order.

Deep down, I know, just as well as you know. But do we listen?

It’s time to know.

It’s time to set boundaries and separate from Instagram.

It’s time to break the habit loop.

So here are the new rules.

I agree that platforms such as Instagram has its perks. But I also truly know that it has its consequences as well. So I will be deleting TheDebtist Instagram account from my phone. I will allow myself one day a month for ONE HOUR to log back on and post all my updates (new courses, new interviews, new happenings, all the pictures worth sharing – already curated) and check any missed messages, and then I will delete it again. This will allow me to break the habit loop and scrolling through feeds and forever editing in search of perfection. This will rid me of unhealthy dependence. This should free me to have more time to be HERE. I know this because it’s happened before. And it works. I started to wonder, “Why am I taking a picture of my avocado toast?”, and “Why am I carrying my camera on this run on the beach?” It brought awareness to all the little habits that were developed solely for the purpose of sharing on Instagram. Yikes.

Secondly, as I want to focus on growing the bakery, I will keep the AeroBakery account live, and limit my Instagram usage to 15 minutes per day. If I fail to hold myself accountable, I will also delete this account and limit it to once a month. If I had a true vested interest in growing my AeroBakery following, I will follow these simple rules. I know that I have the ability to enforce these parameters so I am not worried. If I am struggling, I have my husband. If I am still struggling, I have hundreds of you.

Instagram is a real addiction. Like alcohol, or over-eating, or gambling, debt, sex, drugs, hoarding, smoking, video-game addictions, emotional dependency and more, Instagram is a habit and the loop is difficult to break. It feeds on many things. The feeling of social acceptance and inclusion, the craving for public affirmation or approval, the creative outlet and the visually artistic appeal, the boasting of one’s life or accomplishments, the list goes on and on.

Worded like that, imagine how giving up Instagram could change a life.

Talk about catharsis.

Talk about Tidying the Mind.