New Year's Resolution - Love (Yourself)

As we settle into a new year, there are numerous invitations to set goals, to choose a word or words for the year. 

And on the flip side, I see communication to not set goals, to live in the now. Those messages claim that goals don’t work. 

And I feel that like most things, there are truths in both and one can be true for me and another true for you. 

Setting goals can be an extremely useful tool to organize and to align your soul’s desires to offer the world your unique gifts and your ego/mind’s desire to get that work done. In other words, you are inspired to offer something to yourself or others and you break that down into to-do’s that become goals. Therefore, your heart and mind are working in collaboration. And that’s beautiful. 

You can also follow your heart in every moment and find you offer yourself or the world the same thing. Your heart and mind automatically work together because you are leading with your heart in every moment. 

The trick with both is to recognize when we get distracted. But that’s probably another blog post. 

But what about goals as a way to “be better”. I mean isn’t that often what we’re trying to do? We’re trying to improve ourselves or eliminate our negatives. And it can be healthy when it’s motivated by self love - move our bodies more, drink more water, eat healthier foods. Sometimes it’s driven a bit more (or a lot) by self “improvement” or even self-loathing - lose weight so I can be good enough, do this or that more so I’m worthy. Worthy of what? Someone else’s approval? Your love? Let’s dive into the “be better” goals for a few moments.

In a book I've been reading titled “Touch the Earth, Kiss the Sky”, the author talks about criticism and punishment as “inducements to improve” she writes that we “criticize and punish not only others but ourselves in our own thoughts.” The author goes on to say it is “a belief tightly woven into our culture thoroughly disproven by psychology and neuroscience.”

What if, instead, we focus on true acceptance? What if we accept ourselves and others as fully and completely as we can. Can we focus on loving ourselves? We are never going to be everyone’s cup of tea. That’s okay. But can we at least focus more on being our own cup of tea - right now as we are?

And if we can’t, if there are some aspects of ourselves or others that trigger us, what if we observe that? 

Those things that trigger or bother us - what if they are invitations? As uncomfortable as it may seem, it’s helpful to turn inward when we are upset or annoyed by others, or even ourselves. If we allow ourselves to be curious about our reaction, and if we feel into it without judgment, we find that there is something waiting to be seen, heard or felt within us.

And that, my friend, is a path to enlightenment. It’s gritty work, but it’s “the work”. It’s not complicated, not always easy but always worth it. You are loved.