So when I say "screw your New Years Resolutions" what I really mean is, well... screw your New Years Resolutions. Majority of the people who set them, including myself in the past, get all excited to start new each January. Its when my personal training schedule blows up and when yoga classes are busting at the seams. I am all about new beginnings and starting over to reach a goal, I actually think it is the most important part of achieving your goal but I think this mentality should come with you all year long.

If you've done any reading on "successful" people you will find that many of them had to try over and over again to reach their goals. It took Thomas Edison 1000 times to create a successful light bulb. One thousand times!!! This simply means that it may take multiple tries to make your New Years goals become a reality. The problem is that after the 2-3 months that we allow ourselves to reach success, we give up and go back to our old ways, quite frankly because it's easier. Then, we start the cycle of beating ourselves up because we "can't ever stick to our plans", or we fill our heads with negative blubber when we realize we've completely fallen of our path. Even worse, we just push those emotions down and make excuses.

I'm trying something new this year. I snagged this idea from one of my favorite podcasts and it is to simply pick a theme, one word to represent my life in the year 2017. I love picking themes for a yoga class so this was very easy to get excited about. My word for this year is FOUNDATION. There are a lot of new things happening in my life and in order for these wonderful things to continue to grow I must, I must, I must create a healthy, solid, built-to-last foundation. You can't build a high rise on a foundation designed to hold a single story building.

I sat down with my journal and mapped out what a solid foundation would look like in each area of my life. I didn't get create crazy overwhelming plans or get ahead of myself. I simply made a blueprint for what I hope my foundation will look like this year in the following areas: Spirituality & Creativity, Body & Wellness, Relationships & Community, and Livelihood & Lifestyle. What would a sturdy foundation look like if I could create it? I then put an alarm in my calendar to pop up monthly as a reminder to reflect and regroup if necessary. As long as I am moving towards creating a foundation in any of those areas I will consider it a win. Brick by brick I will build my high rise, except maybe my high rise will look like a beautiful lake house.