Welcome to 2019, dear readers and friends!
It's time to review last year's resolutions and set intentions for the new year! Looking back over the proud and storied history of this blog, I'm pleasantly impressed with all of the (not-always-successful) attempts I've made at self-improvement. It's healthy to take opportunities to gently and sincerely reflect on how we can be better.
In honor of 2018's surprise new pet, this year's theme will be: birds.
My 2018 resolutions were:
1. Regularly smash the patriarchy.
As operationalized by:
--Participate in at least once weekly advocacy with my elected officials.
Diminishing success. I was able to keep this up, with some fluctuation, for a while. This is definitely something I've gotten I've gotten out of the practice of doing. This is in part informed by my increasingly wait-and-see, pay attention but maybe-the-adults-are-actually-doing-things stance, not to mention recalibrating what my daily life is like now that Husband and I have moved to New Home. But clearly there are plenty of things to advocate with elected officials for and, as we've established, technology makes it very easy to do so, so I'm not giving up on this commitment just yet.
--Ongoing self-education through self-directed reading, participation in at least one course to learn about dismantling systemic discrimination, and joining an ongoing anti-racist action group.
Some success! Since moving to New Home, I've been attending an every-other-week anti-racism seminar and have been so grateful for the opportunity to finally get involved in regular anti-racist work. I've arranged my schedule to also get involved in another anti-racist organization, and just need to take the steps to plan and commit to that now that it seems like my schedule has stabilized. As a self-accountability measure, I'll do that planning today, since what better day to do that than Martin Luther King Jr. Day?
--Lead a second round of the multicultural seminar at work.
No success. For reasons I discussed in August, unfortunately I wasn't able to make this happen. All the more reason to redouble my efforts in other realms of anti-racism.
--Practice my right to peacefully assemble and demonstrate at least 3 times this year.
Success! And I'm hoping to continue this especially now that I'm in a New Home whose wellbeing I am even more emotionally invested in.
--Regularly consume news media again.
Success! This has become a sustained and important change thanks largely to this excellent podcast, whose length pretty nicely mirrors the duration of my new commute.
Resolution 2: Learn all the stuff and things.
Some success! There's always going to be room for improvement here, but I'm glad to have kept up reading regularly and also going to several excellent museums.
Resolution 3: Write more: keep journaling and 15 posts!
Success! I've recommenced at least weekly journal writing since moving and just barely squeaked by hitting my 15 posts for the year goal.
Resolution 4: Actively prepare and take steps to build the life I want.
Major success! I am so grateful to be in New Home, where already my life is closer to what I've wanted it to be for years.
Resolution 5: Cultivate compassion.
Some success! I've recommenced integrating loving-kindness meditation into my morning routine, and I'm finding it really helpful. There are certainly other ways I can practice more patience, kindness, and compassion, which I'm interested to pursue.
Resolution 6: Watch at least 52 movies.
Success!! I will be excited to share the year's movies in a forthcoming post!
Reflecting on these resolutions, I'm glad for the progress I made and I'm reminded of how useful it is to have a midyear resolutions check, since my progress on several of 2018's resolutions flagged in the middle of the year but resumed after I had the chance to re-examine them. I'm also eager to shake up some of my resolutions to ensure I'm pushing myself to accomplish things that are important to me.
So, let's dive in!
Resolutions for 2019
1. Participate in concerted anti-racist resistance.
Because operationalization of similar resolutions has been helpful in the past, meeting this resolution will include:
--Ongoing involvement in anti-racist organizations and participation in at least one related training.
--Advocating with elected officials especially related to issues related to systemic racism.
--Taking opportunities to have conversations with other white people about racism.
--Practicing my right to peacefully assemble and demonstrate at least 3 times.
--Supporting businesses and projects created by people of color.
I am particularly hoping I'm able to participate in at least one anti-racism training, because I want to learn how to do this work well. Of course (and thankfully), a lot of people have spent years and years of their lives thinking about how to dismantle racism, so I want to be disciplined in learning about these traditions.
I also want to push myself to learn to be more skillful in having conversations about racism with other white people. I've been fortunate to have some great learning experiences both with people I love and in the context of anti-racism seminars, but like many before me I've realized that it as a bear of a task to go from a) an intellectual understanding of the strategies and approaches that are most likely to be successful in supporting people's listening and growth to b) actually effectively deploying that understanding when you didn't realize you were going to be talking about racism in the middle of dinner and you don't have time to review your notes and get your face and feelings in order.
2. Grow roots in New Home.
This resolution is in some ways linked to and an extension of my first. It would also benefit from some operationalization. Meeting this resolution will mean:
--Trying new restaurants, going to events, and exploring New Home.
--Regularly spending time with family and new and old friends.
--Nesting.
Being in many ways a creature of eating habit, I have a tendency to find restaurants I love and then happily rotate through them regularly forever without much deviation. The thing is, New Home has some of the most delicious food of any of the places I've lived or visited, so to do that would mean tragically missing out on some incredible meals.
One of the things I love so much about New Home is its many arts institutions and vibrant festivals, especially in the spring and summer. And still, there is even more to discover! I want to keep enjoying the things I know I love and also take advantage of new things to be done.
Husband and I also moved to New Home because there are many people here who we love. We should spend time with them!
Finally, we're really fortunate to now live in a gorgeous home that I want to feel very settled in. We're most of the way there, but there are finishing touches I want to follow through on that could be continually overlooked if I'm not diligent about it. For example: one of my goals for today is to continue decorating our currently mostly bare walls.
3. Learn about my heritage.
This is something I've had a growing interest in in the last few years, and I want to get more serious about it. This will include returning to some language learning as well as learning about the history of the regions my ancestors came from and their traditions.
4. Find and enforce balance.
Let's be real: for me personally, this might be the most unrealistic of my resolutions. That being said, I now have more factors in my favor than ever before: I'm almost exclusively self-employed and living in a much more affordable city, so if I'm intentional I might be able to pull this off.
The tricky thing is: What does balance actually mean? Especially when life is always changing?
Some more easily measurable things are continuing to meditate regularly, recommencing regular exercise (at the great-looking gym a few minutes away!), spending quality time with Husband and my pets, and reading some books I think will be helpful to building a life ever more in keeping with my values.
Less concretely, it might also mean doing my best to balance working enough that my needs and goals are met against trying to only say "yes" to things I actually want to do.
...The great thing about psychology is that there is a lot I want to do, so that latter bit might not be a stringent enough metric to determine whether I should take something on. It might be something more like: "only say 'yes' to things I actually want to do that will not significantly impair my ability to do other quality-of-life-enhancing things."
I also recognize I'm at a unique and likely time-limited stage of my life in which I actually get to contemplate this goal as something potentially realizable. So maybe this resolution should also be about enjoying whatever approximation of "balance" I attain while it lasts, knowing that like all things it won't forever. And that's okay.
And finally, as always:
5. Watch at least 52 movies.
Already well on my way, happily!
And a subgoal: write at least 15 posts!
Here's to an excellent and potential-filled new year! In closing, please enjoy this absolutely precious bird!
{Heart}
