The last three years I have chosen a word of the year to live. In 2016, I am not doing that. Instead, I am choosing the start my year off right. Do you ever feel like your year just took a life of its own and you were just along for the ride? That is how I am feeling about 2015. The year was crazy with surgery for me, a busy maple syrup season, a crazy lumberjack season, lots of car repairs, a miscarriage and a pregnancy, and even suddenly deciding to look for a larger house for our growing family.
In 2016, I’d like to back control of my life instead of letting life have control of me. I realize sometimes life just happens and some of the best things happen that way, but I would like be a bit more intentional in how I go about living. Here are some of the ways I am hoping to accomplish this goal of living with intention.
Focus on our spending/saving
The car repairs and then house renovations have completely zapped our savings. When you follow that with 5 weeks in a row of short paychecks, saving money gets hard. Just paying the bills on time gets hard. Part of will be being more intentional with shopping sales and finding coupons. I’ve slacked off in recent months with finding coupons. Pregnancy pretty while wiped me out. Not to mention all the cravings. One week I came home from the store with $20 just in food/drink cravings. I did eat and drink it all but that was still a lot of money that wasn’t in the budget. Being further along has meant that my energy is leveling out some as well as my cravings. I’d like to focus more of stockpiling and stretching what we have so that I’m prepared for when the baby gets here. I know there will be more convenience foods purchased then no matter how prepared I am but the more prepared, the less it will happen.
Focus on my Etsy shop and business
I spent a lot of 2015 focusing on the blog. Which was a good thing. Unfortunately, that focus combined with all the other stuff meant less focus on my Etsy shop. As the shop is a fairly decent and semi-steady source of income for me (mostly just pocket money), I would like to spend more time focusing on that and using my time with it wisely.
Focus on using my mornings wisely
Back in June, I took the Make Over Your Mornings course that Crystal Paine created. I loved how when I followed her tips and used my mornings more intentionally, the rest of my day came together as well. Then my summer and fall got crazy and I fell out of all those good habits. I will be started January with re-taking the course since once you pay for the course, you have lifetime access to the course materials. I’m always amazed with how much better my day goes when I use the first hours of the day more intentionally. I’m looking forward to taking back that time.
Embrace where I am
A large portion of my late summer into fall was going through an early mid-life crisis. I really have no idea what I want to do with my life and what I want out of it. I get so sick of the “laundry, dishes, dinner, repeat” cycle. I want to do more with my life…I just don’t know what. With a baby on the way, you can add “change diaper” and “nurse baby” to that list. In 2016 I have decide to just embrace where I am. Sure, I still want more to my life. But that does not mean that where I am and what I am doing is not important.
These aren’t so much resolutions as they are things I would like to focus more of my energy on in the new year. Do you have any goals for 2016?
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