Staring at the blank page before you…

Open up the dirty window – Let the sun illuminate the words that you could not find.
Reaaaaaaching, for something in the disssssstance, so close you can almost taaaaaaste it…

Blah, blah, blah (something about rain and skin and inhibitions)…

And THEN – the meaningful bit:

‘Today is, where your book begins
The rest is still unwritten’…

Ahhhh. The Hills. Natasha Bedingfield. (Yes, that is who sung that song, I just googled it – who knew?!) The soundtrack to my young adult life, which, while seemingly pointless and irrelevant at the time, in retrospect is quite fitting on this New Years Eve.

I have to start this blog post by owning the fact that I can’t stand New Years celebrations. If there is such a thing as a New Years Grinch, it is me 🙋. In addition to the fact that it is always a looooong night (usually in painful shoes!) and always a bi-atch to get home from at the end, I have never really bought into the whole ‘new year, new me’ BS and all the resolutions that go along with it.

I have always thought that every single day – hour – minute?! is an opportunity to assess the things that you love and loathe about your life, circumstances, habits etc and make meaningful changes in the pursuit of happiness and fulfilment. You know, the whole ‘you’re not a tree, you can move’ philosophy?  And the fact of the matter is, (from my ultra cynical perspective anyway), that if you haven’t had the motivation to make those changes during the year, any motivation born from New Years Eve sparklers, or party poppers, or midnight smooches is likely to be short lived. THERE, buzz-killington is in the building.

That being said…

This year has to have been the fastest, craziest, busiest blur of a year to date. We experienced the highest of highs as we welcomed our beautiful baby girl into the world (who I can not fathom was not here this time last year !!), adjusted to life with two little possums to care for, watched my eldest embrace school life as she started her prekindy classes and made a bunch of wonderful new mum friends that I shared daily challenges with. Oh! I also started a blog! You might’ve come across it?! 😄 We also experienced a number of lows as we dealt with personal, family and health related challenges spotted throughout the year.

And while it is tempting to raise a glass of bubbles to ‘that crazy 2016’ if I am honest I think that ‘the crazy’ is just our lives now. There is just so much to squeeze into a day (even if we DO all have the same number of hours as Beyonce). Days turn into weeks, and weeks into months and before we know it, we will be sitting at the end of next year discussing how fast it all has gone. Again.

And for the first time I have had to concede that perhaps it is a little overly simplistic to suggest that ‘you are simply one decision away from a totally different life’. It’s not always so straight forward. In addition to the pesky inconvenience of parental/adult responsibility 😄, we are also so, so busy with our heads down just ‘getting the stuff done’ that sometimes there isn’t the time to sit back, to reflect on the big picture and to assess the gap between where we are and where we want to be.

It has started to become clearer to me why there is such an appeal to the New Year resolution.

It encourages us to put these bigger picture considerations at the front of our mind, rather than somewhere in a far back corner as we juggle the daily pressures that come with having children, families, job responsibilities, financial pressures etc.

It gives us hope that with enough thought and planning and dedication, anything is possible.

It provides us with an opportunity to draw a line under the hardships and lessons from the prior year and focus on the clear slate that a new year brings.

It allows us to start afresh.

And I guess I am all for that.

So I did do a little bit of thinking about how my life might be better in 2017 and have decided to focus on becoming healthier, wealthier and wiser. Very loosely defined goals centred around exercising more; (read: exercising at all – it’s been a long time between jogs), spending less money on things I don’t need (Uhhhh Kmart, we need to talk, it’s not you it’s me) and reading things that make me smarter, not dumber (farewell, DailyMail). And while I still believe that these focus areas are not ‘new year, new me’ style goals, this new year period has allowed me the time to consider what it is I would like to change in my life and to put in place strategies to achieve them (albeit quite vague ones).

So, to all those who are willing the end of 2016 and eagerly anticipating the arrival of 2017 as an opportunity to start fresh, I wish you all of the very, very best. And despite a lifetime of poo-pooing the New Years Resolution, I sincerely wish you every success in implementing the changes you want to make, to pursue the life you want to live.

In the wise words of good old ‘Tasha Bedingfield’ may you seek comfort in the fact that ‘today is where your book begins and the rest is still unwritten…’

HNY lovely people.