"I made no resolutions for the New Year. The habit of making plans, of criticizing, sanctioning and molding my life, is too much of a daily event for me." ~ Anais Nin
I used to love New Year's resolutions. Making lists, mapping out my year, getting excited about how everything would be so different if I just went heads down and didn't screw up. It never worked of course. Sure there were some moments of personal achievement, short bursts of time where it looked hopeful, but somewhere in that year it all crashes down.
Instead of a resolution I can check off a list (I do love lists), I'm looking at how I can move differently this next year. I woke up to a Future Me letter from 2019 and there weren't any surprises on what I said or the subsequent outcomes. Lessons were learned, my heart was broken, I rose up and I'm still here. Yet how I moved in my interactions and reactions was basically the same; mostly coming from my trauma.
I have both a therapist appointment today as well as one with my life coach. Because why not take the last day of 2020 to slam it hard and feel everything?! I have different though similar items for both of them I want to talk about; and it comes down to how I react and move through life. I made the statement to my life coach in our last session that "I'm out of time" when it came to a troubling area in my life. My homework was to list out all the things I feel I'm out of time for. Well fuck.
I don't want you to see my list. I don't want her to hear my list. But in the name of moving differently, walking through fear and not giving a fuck; here it is ~
1.) I'm out of time for a life partner. Yes, people meet later in life but I don't see it as a possibility for me. She offered stories of couples that met at the end of their lives and were thrilled. I said, "That just makes me sadder."
2.) Fame (my stomach convulsed typing the word). And what do I even mean by this? There is a part of me that has believed for years that some day I'd be a public speaker of some sort. I think part of this comes from a so called prophet at a previous church of mine nearly 30 years ago saying God told him I'd be a famous Christian speaker. Well the Christian part is no more but would this make me happy anyway? Could I handle public scrutiny? Feels too late anyway.
3.) A body I love. I hate that I just said that. I don't want any young women to read it. But admittedly my eating disorder, though I'm decently living in recovery, comes out hard at New Year's and screams at every part of me where I see imperfection. Do a cleanse, stop drinking, eat vegan, more weights, more cardio...the voices can be overwhelming.
That's only 3 things and I expected this to be a lot longer. But shit, those are huge things. Sure I know about journaling, positive affirmations, meditation and all the other things to at least handle one of these. Yet I'm tired. I'm so tired. I'm glancing at my side table right now with a good 5 journals of various sorts that I've been "doing the work" in for ages. My bookshelf has over 15 self help books and this is just at a glance from across the room. I work hard.
In a serendipitous moment last night I saw a post that said, "The Queen's Gambit has been viewed by 62 million people. The producer, Allan Scott, is on BBC News talking about how it took 30 years, with 9 rewrites, and ... PLEASE PERSEVERE WITH THAT THING YOU'RE MAKING." I doubt I have 30 years left but perhaps it's not as late for me as it seems.
Tonight I'm going to a friend's house for a new year's eve bonfire (socially distanced, outside, masks) and we're invited to bring the 2020 things we want to burn. Burning is my jam. I have a special burn bowl on my porch as I'm frequently burning something I want out of my life. I decided the perfect item to start my 2020 burn would be my Vision Board. I had big travel plans for 2020 which didn't happen and I got misty staring at the board showing where I couldn't go. Yet if I let go of the travel, as we all did, I see I actually did achieve what I wanted in many ways.
So maybe there's still time...
