Life is Great in 2008!

Yeah, I know, it’s pretty corny. My hubby & teenager have been looking at me like I’m the biggest dork for repeating my new mantra when the mood strikes—I just can’t help myself! In fact it’s been so much fun annoying them with it that I think I’m going to do it every year..lemme see…I could get a head start on next year's (Everything’s fine in 2009? We’re at it again in 2010? Okay, I’ll stop now.) But seriously folks….I have a New Year’s tradition I do each year on New Year’s Eve. I learned this many years ago and have since heard of others doing it as well. Each year-end after writing my final journal entry I list the big negatives of the year along with my hopes for various positives in the coming year. Then I print out the negatives, cut each into it’s own little paper strip, and burn each one in a bowl at midnight, thereby “letting go” of them. New Year = new start. Of course I’m not going to list them here for you to see, but those of you who know me can probably guess some of them!

Anywho, I thought I would share my thoughts on the start of the New Year and getting started on those resolutions. We are all familiar with the old Diet resolution; we tell ourselves "No more bad foods!" and then come February (if not the end of January) we are at it again with our favorite junk foods. Then there’s the ever-popular “I resolve to exercise daily” which again turns into a week (maybe a month) of diligence followed by many weeks/months of guilt in which we just don’t “get around to it”. I suggest that making small, positive steps in the right direction is a better idea than making grandiose promises to ourselves that we know we can’t/won’t keep. Take the dieting thing for example…for years I was famous for telling myself that beginning January 1st I would no longer eat anything “bad” (high fat, sugar, refined grain, etc.) and of course I would never stick to this for long. Anything that is too restrictive is destined to fail (and that goes for other things in life, but I digress). So now, years later and wiser, I know that I need to be realistic. So, although some of my favorite foods are on the “naughty” list, I use moderation in choosing how often and how much I’ll eat of these foods and stick to a healthy eating plan for the majority of the time. I mean seriously, if I could never have pizza again—well, you might as well just shoot me!

I plan to have some fun blog posts coming up so “stay tuned” and Happy New Year! Oh, and hey, it's going to be GREAT in 2008! ;-)