Can you feel the little jittery flutter that takes place around the end of the year? The excitement of closing down one year and starting again fresh? The promise of new year’s resolutions and intentions, new habits to be created, dreams to be achieved. It can all feel very exciting, can’t it? And it totally can be! Intentional living for me is all about taking time out to see how we want to live our lives – what is it ultimately that we’d like to create?
With that in mind, I think there’s so much value to looking back at the year just gone before you start working on your intentions for the new year. Just hold on with diving straight into 2018 for a little bit!
Why?
Because there’s so much value to be found in celebrating all that has been and learning from the things that may not have gone that well. It’s really about creating more mindfulness of all that is already there, rather than always looking ahead at what will come. Moreover, we can’t really set the direction of the journey ahead if we don’t know where we are on the map of life right now. The map being all the adventures you want to have, the people you want to meet, the places you want to visit, the things you want to do. What have you learned along the way? What surprised you? What perhaps wasn’t as you had hoped?
Looking at your life from this kind of place of stillness requires courage and reminding ourselves of the fact that nothing is inherently good or bad. We are the ones who decide what meaning to attach to our journey. The challenging times we face in our lives can often also be the most meaningful times, if we allow ourselves the time to sit still and soak up the wisdom. To really integrate what we have learned so that this newfound learning becomes a part of who we are, turning us into wiser and perhaps even more compassionate creatures of this planet.
Have you ever noticed how quickly life passes us by? How quickly we forget the small joyous moments that together make up our life? Sometimes I feel we just rush our way through life, and forget so much of what makes this life so worthwhile. The small seemingly mundane matched with the big life events.
Intentional Living Workbook
So during this holiday season, why not take out a little time for yourself to remember all that has been and soak it all up?
And yes, you guessed it right. I couldn’t help myself, I created a little something for you to do exactly that. I wasn’t even planning on doing it this year, but there you go!
Here’s an Intentional Living Workbook for you that consists of two parts: Reviewing 2017 and Looking Ahead to 2018.
You’ll find a range of exercises that I’ve found helpful –do them all or pick a couple. Do it one sitting or over a couple of days, all up to you!
And yes, I’ve absolutely also included a section on setting intentions to take you into the new year, because let’s face it, there’s nothing quite as exciting as the thought of a blank slate that is waiting to be filled in and it’s so important to set the direction for your life.
Where do you really want to go?
If you’ve done this with me before, this year I’ve taken a slightly different approach: a small step away from traditional goals-setting and slightly more towards intentions and what I like to call intentional living.
Who do you want to be? What do you stand for? And how will you live this?
Grab a cup of a nice something something (tea, coffee, vino, you can take it from here), settle in, get cosy and bring in both equal measures of courage, compassion and curiosity.
So much more is possible than what we often allow ourselves to believe. Dream your biggest dreams, even the seemingly impossible – you are capable of great things!
Happy Holidays!
