With New Year’s just around the corner, our thoughts have turned to how we can live our lives to better ourselves and our families. Our hopes are that we’re both successful in our endeavors to improve all our lives by making better decisions and getting things in order.
We believe that setting goals for New Year’s is important. It gives us something to work for and look forward to. Time changes everything and everyone, and although we’ll be celebrating the past year, we’d also like to celebrate the year ahead by inspiring ourselves to make 2012 the best it can be with our own lists of simple, but important, resolutions!
Amy’s Resolutions:
This New Year’s I’ve decided that with my sister moving in it’s important to save on unnecessary spending. With another person under the roof expenses have gone up, and I’d rather have my sister here than feed into my shopping addiction. It’s not that most of my purchases are unreasonable, but I need to get rid of the online shopping. I know that because I’m always at home, shopping is much easier done online than out with my little girls, who tend to do a lot of whining and screaming. Unpleasant. My New Year’s resolution is that I will not purchase a single item online this year. If I need anything, I’m going to brave shopping with my girls, screaming and all, so I can hit the sales. I have a feeling spending is going to go down…substantially.
My second resolution is to bring some organization to my days. Balancing my family, housework and the blog is currently somewhat of hectic jumble. I’m a first time blogger, but happy with my quick progress. The one thing that makes keeping up with it all a little crazy is the fact that I need, and I stress need, to get organized! My day needs to be a balance of family, home, blog and me! Why? They are all important and need attention. So, I started to get ready for the new year by focusing on different, scheduled hours for every area that is important to me.
Finally, like most people, I want to focus on my health–the key being my health, not my weight. I spent most of 2011 focusing on my health and lost 55 pounds, but then I dropped the ball and stopped caring–putting my weight at a standstill. My goal is simple: eat better, don’t eat late at night, don’t let my mood dictate my eating habits and exercise at least twice a week! I don’t want to look at the pounds, but focus more on how I feel.
Jessi’s Resolutions:
Like Amy said, health is big focus for most people, and I’m certainly no exception. I’ll be 33 in March and am really starting to feel the consequences of three decades of poor health decisions. I’m achy all over and becoming less and less of a fan of stairs. I’m going to continue to resist worrying–or obsessing–about my weight, and concentrate on improving how I’m feeling in general. But, I am amping up my game, especially in the exercise department.
My second resolution is to concentrate more on my relationships with my family and friends. I’ve been enjoying some successes on the business end of things, but have found that I’ve been, in turn, distancing myself from those I love and making myself really emotionally unavailable all the way around. As a naturally social person, being a hermit weighs heavily on me, and I need to turn it around for myself and those I love. No amount of money is ever going to bring me the fulfillment that my loved ones do.
Finally, I’m committed to trying new things, from crafty projects at home to going to a real sushi joint and giving it an honest try. I’m tired of limiting my experience because I’m afraid of failure or disappointment, and if I don’t give some new things a shot, I won’t gain anything but regrets. As opportunities to live life more fully present themselves, I’ll give them more consideration than I have in the past, as long as they’re not risky for my health or safety. I’m sure that some of these new experiences may not work out how I hope, but at least I’ll know.
So, there we have it, our top New Year’s resolutions for 2012. We’ll be checking in periodically throughout the year to share our progress, because accountability is a strong motivator for both of us. Keep an eye on us!
Do you have any New Year’s resolutions for 2012?
Photo: flickr.com/photos/swimparallel/3160528007
