5 Habits I will KEEP for the New Year…And so Should You

If you know me at all, you know that I LOVE a resolution.  However, with the onset of the new year, I thought I would instead take a moment to acknowledge the habits I will keep.  I have done enough transitioning, end-of-the-year resolutioning, and adjusting.  I peeled away layer after layer and found a core group of values that will sustain me going forward.

1.   Daily devotion.  You can call it prayer.  You can call it journaling.  You can call it meditation.  Yet that time that I take all to myself – just me and God – allows for a moment of peace.  Sometimes I can carry that peace with me all day long.  Sometimes life snatches it away as soon as I can get out an Amen.  Nothing, though, can snatch that conversation with my Best Friend.  Nothing can silence that still, small voice even in the midst of utter chaos.

2.   Date Night.  Time away from from the day to day monotony with one of the people you love the most in the world.  I find that date nights with my best girl friends are just as important as those with my husband.   I love my job; I love being a mother; I love the coziness I have created at my home, but sometimes I need some time away from it all in the presence of my nearest and dearest.

3.   Embracing undone.  I spent the last year of my life looking for balance.  I thought it looked a certain way, felt a certain way.  I thought that balance accompanied being finished – establishing a routine, looking around at a perfectly clean house, well-behaved children, finely tuned lessons, fully-functioning exercise patterns, habits that look the same day in and day out.  And that IS actually 50% of balance.  The other 50% is quite the opposite.  It is adjusting to inevitable curve balls.  Doing too much of something you love.  Overindulging in something you need.  50% of balance is an unfinished product.  It is, instead, an never-ending process.  It is undone, and undone means I still have more to learn.  Undone means I still have room to grow.

4.   Creating. Some people create music.  Some people create art.  Some people create delicious meals.  Some create curriculum.  Some create programs.  I create positive environments for my children, for my track team, for my students…but mostly for myself.  I must feel at home wherever I am, and I am not afraid to change the environment or leave if I no longer feel welcome.  I decorate my classroom.  I decorate my home.  I decorate myself.  We color as a class.  We make wreaths as a family…I blog…You must do the same.  Do whatever you can so that you get lost in the moment…lost in making something better than it could have ever been without you.

5.   Relishing moments that take my breath away.  I take more pictures than I can ever develop or share.  I simply want to remember.  I want to capture every smile.  I want to document every laugh, every dance, every hug and every kiss.  At times, I must force myself to put the camera down and enjoy.  Enjoy right now for right now is all anyone has.  This is it, and I never want to forget it.  I never want to forget ordinary.  My daily dose of ordinary creates my ever-evasive extraordinary.

I highly recommend you keep these same habits throughout your new year.  Yes, life will deal you a hand for which you were unprepared.  Life will knock the wind out of you.  Life will smack you in the face with reality.  But life will also smile at you. Life will shine on you.  Life will laugh WITH you.  Life will take your ordinary and build extraordinary.  Life will twist your darkness into light.

Speaking of light, this year I will continue to keep God first.

And so should you…

God will KEEP up with the rest.

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What habits would you like to keep this new year?

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