110: Screw New Year's Resolutions - Do This Instead

 

New Year's resolutions are great, but how many of us have set a resolution in January only to abandon it by February 1? Learn what I recommend doing instead of resolutions. This process can be applied to any area of your writing or life in 2024!

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screw new year’s resolutions - do this instead

Welcome to your big creative life, a podcast for writers and creatives that helps you live your best big creative life, whatever that means for you. I'm Katie Wolf, a writer, book editor and creator. Join me every week for tips and discussion on writing, mindset up leveling your life and anything and everything that will help you achieve your big creative dreams. Let's get started.

 

Welcome to your big creative life. I'm so excited to be talking to you about intention setting for 2024. So your big creative life podcast, formerly blank page two book which has been rebranded new and improved for 2024. And it's a podcast is all about writing and creativity and mindset. And essentially just doing everything in your power to create your best possible big creative life. Whatever that means for you, I recorded an episode that is going to be released at the same time as this one talking about the transition and why I decided to kind of rebrand the podcast. So if you've been a listener for blank page to book and you want to check that out, please do so. And yeah, we're also uploading the all the videos to YouTube. So if you prefer to watch a video on YouTube, you can do that as well, the channels at the Katie Wolf.

 

And I know that this episode is coming out after January 1, but it's still January. So the timing doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if you want to do some, some intention setting and sort of like casting for 2024. Even though it's not January 1, that's fine. Like, yes, there's some symbolism to doing it either right before the New Year or on January 1, but it it doesn't matter the whole month of January, there's something kind of magical about it and doing a lot of work to really set yourself up for success in 2024. And just get clarity on what's important to you and what you want to spend your time working on. Whether it's writing related or something else, I think that's really, that's really important.

 

The way that I sort of got onto this idea of intention setting is maybe four, it was before the pandemic. So yeah, it was it was New Year's, New Year's Day 2020. I took a yoga class. And it was the morning of the first and before the class, the instructor gave us a little post it note and a pen. And we sat on our mats. And she said, I want you to write down an intention for for this year for 2020. And she talked about intentions as yes, they can be goals. But really, it's about focusing on how you want to feel for that year.

 

And then we wrote our intention down on a piece of paper and crumpled it up, we did our yoga class. And then on the way out after class, we just either tore up the little post it note or you know, put it in the trash and sort of like released it into the universe. And that was the sort of symbolism of it. And I really liked that as a way to start off the new year. And so I am going to talk about a practice similar to that that you can do in this episode. Now, New Year's resolutions,historically for me have been not great. I am one of those people who like in the past, really wanted to set lofty goals for myself. And so I would set multiple new year's resolutions that were just close to impossible for me to achieve.

 

I'd be like, I want to do this thing related to you know, fitness, I want to work out this many times a week, I want to do this thing related to my health, I want to make this amount of money. I want to like all just so many intent, so many goals rather, so many resolutions that I would just set myself up for failure. And then by like mid January, I just like toss the list and forget all about it. Because number one, I had too many things that I was trying to work towards. And number two, it was just impossible. So and there's the classic, you know, people always talk about New Year's resolutions, as you know, oh, a lot of people have a resolution around like losing weight or getting healthy. And you know, if that's what you want to set, if that's your goal, that's a resolution, that's fine. But I'd encourage you to think, again more about an intention.

 

So if we think about a goal or a resolution as something tangible and achievable as in like, you either do it or you don't. A goal or a resolution is like something that you can check off a list. Did you do this thing? Yes or no? Did you go to the gym five times a week? You either did or you didn't? Did you cook at home five nights a week instead of ordering UberEATS? Yes or no? Did you keep your room clean? I don't know. Whatever the thing is, did you do it? Yes or no? goals and resolutions are very cut and dry. You either did it or you or you didn't? And that's fine and sometimes you know maybe in the case of writing, maybe that is something that makes sense for you saying like, I want to complete my book that I'm writing this year in 2024. And that is very black and white, you either write your book and 2024, or you don't you get to the end of the year, and it's not done. intentions, again, are focused more on how you want to feel. Because especially with something like writing, yes, the end result is important. But so is the process along the way.

 

If you are miserable, and you're killing yourself, and you're not enjoying the process of getting to the end result, then how sweet is that achievement really going to be, especially with writing where if you have a goal like writing a book, it's going to take you a while, it's going to take a long time to write a book. And if you dread sitting down to write because you are so frantically trying to reach this goal, that you're just killing yourself. And again, you're you're just not enjoying the process. The now fulfilling is that going to be and also how difficult is it going to be to motivate you to do the thing and to stay on track, if you are not enjoying the process at all. I'm going to give you another example of this that's outside of writing.

 

So I did when I was still living in Nashville, I did orange theory for about six months. And orange theory is this hit style method where you were this heart rate monitor, and there's a treadmill portion and a rowing machine portion and then a strength training portion. And so there's a lot of there's cardio, you're really getting your heart rate up. And you're also working on strength training a lot. I love the strength training part of it hated the cardio, I don't like cardio, I despise it, I don't run I'm not a runner, and I could modify in the class like the treadmill portion, I would just walk and I would put the treadmill on an incline. So it was fine. I could still do the class without running. But I really did like it. And you know what was interesting about it is my body didn't like it either. I didn't notice any real differences in my body.

 

Not that I had a set goal for what I was trying to do. But I just felt like my body, I started having these aches like my knees started hurting. And maybe I was just doing something wrong with the format of how I was, I don't know going on the treadmill or lifting weights or something. But my knees started aching My my, I don't know, I just felt like I even my body just yeah, my body just didn't like it, it didn't respond well to that type of hit style workout. For other people, that could be exactly what their body needs. They could feel strong and powerful and just look forward to it and absolutely love it. But I didn't, I found myself kind of dreading the classes outside of the strength training component like I would dread the treadmill. Unfortunate of it. And but I kept sticking with it for six months because I thought, Well, no, this is such a good workout, I've got to train my heart rate to be better.

 

I've got to like, work on my cardiovascular health, all this stuff. But I wasn't enjoying it. So finally, after six months, I just I got to this point where I decided you know what, this is not worth it to me, I'm going to set an intention around exercise because this ain't this ain't it? My intention that I said was not. Again, it was related to how I how I wanted to feel it was not a set goal that I'm going to work out this many times a week, I'm going to lift weights this many times a week, I'm going to set a record where I want to lift this many pounds. It was nothing like that. It was just an intention of I want to do exercise that feels good. In my body.

 

I want to do exercise that feels good that I enjoy. That was my intention. And that is my cornerstone that I come back to again and again when it comes to exercise. I love bar. And yoga, I taught bar part time for two years. Before the pandemic, when I was living in Nashville, I taught like three or four classes a week because I love bar, my body responds well to it. It loves bar, I look forward to it. I don't dread it. There's minimal cardio, which is exactly what I want. But I still get my heart rate up a bit. It's fantastic. So that's what I do. I do bar, I do yoga, and I do a little bit of strength training at home I have some weights that I'll I'll lift because I enjoy that as well. And that's a good way to get my heart rate up without cardio. So that's an example right? I focused on how I want to feel not what the external kind of like black and white yes or no result is. And that has made such a huge difference for me in my life with my relationship to exercise my relationship to my body. It's it's a game changer. It really has made such a difference.

 

So I encourage you, if you're thinking about okay 2024 What do I want to spend time on what do I want to focus on? Think about how you want to feel, I promise this is going to be so much more enjoyable. And the motivation piece, if you enjoy what you're doing, it is so much easier to find motivation to do it, whether it's exercise or whether it's writing, whether it's whatever it is. So think about, okay, let's get into the practicality of like how to actually do this. So what I encourage you to do, what I think is really powerful is to spend some time in meditation. And just let yourself think about the year ahead, think about 2024. You can even break this down further if you don't want to do the whole year at once.

 

If you just want to think about January, okay, January 2024. What do I want to focus on? How do I want to feel in all these different areas of my life, right? And if you hear the word meditation, and you're like, oh, I don't I can't meditate. I'm not good at it. Well, first of all, that's not true. No one's bad at meditation. It's your brains job to think thoughts. So if your mind wanders during meditation, that's okay, your brains just doing exactly what it's supposed to do. But what you can do is set a timer. Just give yourself five minutes, let your mind wander. It doesn't have to be a formal practice or anything. But just start thinking like, what do I want to give my energy to this year? How do I want to feel what do I want to say yes to what do I want to say no to, you can write a list if you want, you can put a few intentions on post it notes exactly like I did in that yoga class.

 

You can put them on pieces of paper, you can put them on your phone, if you want to create like a background for your phone, the screen so that you see your list every time you open up your phone, however you want to do it so that you get these intentions down either on your phone or on paper some way, write them down. In terms of how many, I think doing a few is fine, like three is great. Where it gets problematic is if you have like 10 that you're trying to focus on. Again, that that can be I think if you do that, you're more likely to just sort of like abandon the list by mid January or end of January if you do that. But if that feels empowering to you go for it. Again, I just think maybe like no more than threes is helpful. And they can be in different areas of your life. Or they can all be in one area, if you want to have three intentions that are all related to writing, awesome, go for it.

 

Once you have that list, you can tear up the pieces of paper, you can burn them, you can light a candle and just put the paper in the fire, you can do something symbolic with them that way. However, you want to just release the intentions to the universe. If you have a spiritual practice, if your spiritual or religious person this can be saying a prayer. And if not, you can just again, sort of put them out into the to the universe. So that source energy or Mother Earth or whatever you you, you know kind of believe in can can take over and do their part. And you just are responsible for making sure that you're always coming back to that intention and focusing on how you want to feel this year.

 

And if you want to keep them instead of tearing them up, you know, you can put the post it note on your computer or you can put it on your bathroom mirror, wherever you're going to find it and just keep coming back to that over and over. Like I mentioned with exercise that has been my guidepost where I come back to that over and over. So if I start getting that voice in my head, that's like, you're not doing enough or you need to be doing this type of exercise you need to be working out in this way. Because that's what this person does. I can say wait, nope. My intention that I'm really focusing on is how do I want to move my body in a way that feels good to me? And if it doesn't feel good? Not going to do it?

 

I'm just not going to do it. It's that simple. And yeah, that's really that's really what it comes down to. So I encourage you to get quiet Be honest with yourself about how you want to feel and what you want to call him this year. All related to this idea of your big creative life. It there's there are no right answers. Again, you get to create this reality, like you get to decide what's important to you. Which I think is really exciting. So if you're listening to this in mid January, end of January, even if you're listening to this, like down the road in like, April, it doesn't matter, you can still take the time to do this. And, you know, focus on what you want this the month, the year, your life, whatever.

 

All right, well, I'm very excited to again be relaunching this podcast, having the YouTube videos and I'm excited for for this year. I really speaking of coming back to what feels good, and what feels motivating and empowering. That's a big reason I decided to do this rebrand for the podcast is setting an intention around spending my time in my business.

 

Its creating content that feels good that I know will have an impact on people. Because when my energy is right, and I'm putting out content that I believe in, and I want to create, I know it's going to have more of an impact on people than if I just create content, I have a sense of obligation, like, Oh, I've got to post something, because it's been a while, what do I want to talk about, uh, you know, there's a sense of lightness and fun to it when you create content that you want to create. And I feel like it resonates more with people when you do it that way. So that's part of the reason behind rebranding the podcast as well.

 

Wherever you are, whenever you are listening to this, I hope that you have a fucking amazing 2024 and that you achieve all of your goals and resolutions if you set them but also that you come back to your intentions and, and really start living this intentional, big creative life this year. I'll see you next week.

Katie Wolf