Happy New To Do List!

The festive season is almost over, and we just entered a new calendar year.

As the dust settles on 1st January 2020 however I sense there are a lot of people out there enthusiastically writing our New Years Resolutions and telling themselves all the things they're going to make themselves do this year, and how they're going to become an Instagram Fitness Influencer, start a successful blog, or buy a big house!

It makes me wonder if rather than Happy New Year, we should say "Happy New To Do List" instead! 

If you're in the process of writing yours that or plan to make some new years resolutions you know you, with the best will in the world, you probably wont be able to keep, I just want to say to you, wait a minute there...

I think most of us can agree that 2018 & 2019 were pretty challenging years. 

Financially many of us a worse off than ever before, house prices are insanely out of reach for most under 50 to even contemplate and we see nothing but war and devastation reported in the mainstream media.

Whilst I like to help motivate and cheer you all along with your goals, after a particularly trying few years, this year I'm going to say something a bit different. 

I'm going to suggest that we make this year the year that we say goodbye to the word should.

Now to clarify this does not give you a free pass to be irresponsible or to act like a child. I just want you to take a moment and think about what that word means and how it makes you feel. 

We don't normally use the word should for happy or positive statements - we use it to guilt ourselves or others into doing things. 

Should is all about guilt, and can bring up feelings of inadequacy, failure and self loathing.

I should go to the gym

I should get a better job

I should be able to buy a house by now

Any of these sound familiar? 

Do they make you feel good when you say them to yourself - nope. 

Are they helpful or productive in the current climate - probably not.

SO I'm going to make a suggestion this year that perhaps we give the new years resolutions a rest.

Goal setting can be done at any time, it doesn't have to coincide with an arbitrary number on a calendar. If you feel you want to make changes in your life, then by all means write them down and set them with SMART objectives.

But please, please, PLEASE quit saying SHOULD.

For my part, I'm trying to be very gentle with myself at the moment. I haven't been able to achieve very much at all in the past few years, and my biggest obstacle to getting anything done other than my health has been self blame and feeling like a failure. 

I know there are lots of you out there right now who feel frustrated with yourselves for the position you find yourselves in. You might be struggling with mental health challenges than make it extra hard to do anything, or working every hour just to make ends meet and keep a roof over your head.

This year, focus on surviving and trying to be OK.

Your lofty goals and ideals can wait if your unfulfilled shoulds are just making you feel worse or even making you less productive.

Take a rest, breathe, read a book, go for a walk, have a glass of water.

Humanity is under attack from so many different sides at the moment, whether it's the media, radiation, chemtrails, fluoride in the water supply, pollution, toxic processed "foods" or pesticides that it can feel hard just to get through the day.

Our spiritual mission right now is to survive and to learn to be OK despite everything going on around us. Even if we can't make the changes we might want or hope for in the outer world straight away, we can work on our inner world and ultimately the outer world will come to reflect that.

Your were born to be a human being, not a human doing. 

So this new year try letting go of should, let go and just be instead.