Greetings Fellow Travelers!
I like to wait until the New Year goal-setting frenzy subsides to send out my January blog—and also because I’m never organized enough to do it earlier. I’m also not so into New Year’s resolutions. They are so aspirational and often simply set us up for failure and all its associated emotions. I’m about successes baby! With that in mind, I took some time to reflect on 2024—through my Bullet Journal, photos, and memories—and here are my “Old Year’s Resolutions” for 2025:
Old Year Resolution #1
Keep working with others to get clarity on my intentions and accountability to follow through.
This time last year I was working on finishing up my primary coaching coursework on my path to certification which involved regular coaching sessions with classmates. I got a lot of personal coaching in the process. In every coaching session, one comes with a topic to be coached on. For me, business development stuff was often in the forefront. The work I did with them was a big part of my evolving sense of what I wanted my business and its relationship to my life to look like. These sessions gave me clarity on my business goals and the accountability to accomplish them. By year's end I had updated my website & graphic design to better reflect my hybrid coaching & organizing business and fine tuned my PQ mental fitness program. I did this while still working with clients and dealing with some very big life issues. I also formed a mastermind group with some fellow coaches and this group has helped me sustain the momentum that started with my classmates. I can’t overstate the value of these connections in my life.
Me and the buddies in the unheated tent.
Old Year Resolution #2
Say Yes Before No
Inspired by Shonda Rhimes' The Year of Yes, I shifted my default response from “hmm, maybe” to “yes.” The results? Tagging along on my husband’s business trip resulted in reconnecting with an old college friend and booking a speaking engagement. One of my besties called and said “Hey, I’ve got space in an unheated tent in Yosemite in February. Anyone wanna go?” I’m not a camper. Had the time of my life. Days before her birthday, my college girl was shook and saddened by the election. Twenty-four hours later, I had conspired with her roommates and travelled 500 miles to orchestrate a surprise. I made her dinner, did her laundry and pretty much turned back around and went home. Result - she got the hug she needed and I got to inhabit her college life for a little while. I was the kind of mom I aspire to be that day.
Old Year Resolution #3
Stay vigilant about my media consumption
Speaking of the election…In the days that followed it, I decided that a news blackout was in order for me. For too many months we’d all been trapped in place of fear and anxiety by the news cycle. Ya’ll know my politics, but it really doesn’t matter which side you’re on - the endless fear mongering of the election year (Rapists pouring over the borders! The end of democracy as we know it!) did us all a disservice. Walking away from constant news—yes, even my beloved NPR—calmed my mind and helped me focus on reality, not speculation. Don’t misunderstand me - this wasn’t a passive response- it’s an active self-preservation choice. Constant information isn’t action. Action is action, and you’ll choose better action from a place of calm, not fear. I’m back to following the news, but I will strive to continue to be mindful and minimalist about it.
Not my mother’s hand. My grandnephew and his mother.
Photo Credit: PJ Lyons
Old Year Resolution #4
Be Here Now
My mother had the softest skin on the planet. Like silk-satin. In the waning weeks of July I took turns with my siblings at her bedside as she slowly left us. I was painfully aware that soon I would not get to feel that softness ever again. So on each of her final days, I held her hand with the hope of searing it into my sense memory. There’s no reason to wait for someone’s death bed to do that. I want to treat every hug like that. I want to treat every beautiful sunset like that. I want to be physically and mentally present for all of life. We must remind ourselves over and over to live this way because it's the best way to live…for what is here right now.
So, my final Old Year’s Resolution, and what will make this list every year: Be Here Now. I hope you can do the same.
Happy New Year friends. Keep doing what’s working for you! Would love to hear about it in the comments…
What I’m Consuming (Post Holiday Edition)
TV
Shrinking, Season 2 (Apple TV)
Love this show so much! So much laughter and real emotion all at once. No surprise from the writers of Ted Lasso, another of my favorites.
Virgin River, Season 6 (Netflix)
Because one needs a good soap opera to love. This show knows how to dose out the sap, suspense and joyful payoff in just the right doses. It’s like a perfect pan of homemade mac and cheese.
Books
According to my Goodreads account, I read or listened to 27 books last year. Behold my obligatory screenshot. Of these, I was most moved and continue to be moved by:
Tom Lake by Ann Patchett
Brilliant author, audiobook read by Meryl Streep, ‘nuf said
How to Know a Person by David Brooks
A manual for great relationships and a great life.
Breath, The New Science of a Lost Art by James Nestor
304 pages about breathing and the history of breathing. Who knew? Very interesting and I put it into aspects into practice daily.
The Husbands by Holly Gramazio
Every time her husband goes up the attic stairs, a different one comes down. A clever and fascinating story of what-ifs.
Reading is such a joy for me—please share your recommendations!
What’s Up at StepOne
2025 Mental Fitness Course Offerings
Stop Sabotaging Yourself! Come join us and learn the power of mental fitness on health, well-being, performance and relationships. I’ll be offering my 8-week mental fitness course again in 2025. Still space available for the January 27 group. Future dates below. You can learn more about this course here.
2025 Program Schedule
January 27 - March 17
March 24 - May 11
May 11 - June 29 (Tentative)
September/October TBD
Coaching & Organizing
While a lot of my focus lately has been on my coaching and mental fitness work, I’m still an organizer as well. What I’ve really started to find is the power of a hybrid of the two to help my clients solve their organizing challenges for the long term. If you want to learn more about working together - schedule a no cost, no pressure, no commitment call with me.