New Year Resolutions 2024

Looking back at my resolution posts over there years there are certainly some themes that have developed, be happier, do more things, go on adventures, move. They also feel like they’ve gotten a little less happy each year as the weight of everything piles up. So this year I’m going to try to be happy and well, I’ll be following on my themes because I don’t do these things as much as I’d like to.

So here are the things I’d like to work on this year:

• Choose happiness: I want to laugh more, and do light things and be light. I talked last year about finding happiness inside myself (as that’s the only place it can be found), and that’s a goal to continue for this year. There is pain in the world, I have fears that are justified, but I want to push back on the greyness that sits in my mind and find joy again.
• Be more intentional: This is something I’ve been working on for a while, but the way my brain works, I often find myself doing things that I didn’t mean to do. As part of my other resolutions, I want to do what I mean and mean what I do. So I’m going to try check in on myself regularly to see if I’m doing what I want to be doing.
• Do: On that note, I’m putting one of my old favourite resolutions back on the list. “Do” means I want to have a bias towards action. I often struggle to separate my sense of self and self worth from my productivity, but at the same time I feel better if I do things. 10 minutes of cleaning or half an hour of writing make me feel better and I want to remember that.
• Finish (small) things: As I mentioned in my review of last year’s resolutions, the big thing I ended up working on this year was another novel and I certainly didn’t finish it. Some of my projects are big, and they need to be finished. That being said, finishing the small things, like a scene or a chapter or a bit of a coding project or tidying part of a room or building a thing are all important too and I want to get in the habit of finishing. More importantly, is that I would like to get in the habit of finishing and feeling accomplished rather than just looking at all of the things I haven’t done.
• Read more non-fiction: I’ve read a ton of fiction in 2023 and I think it’s been good for me. I have a big pile of non-fiction books that have been sitting around and it’s time I developed the habit of reading those too.

So 2024 is certainly a follow on to my themes and I hope I’ll be able to use this post as a reminder when I’m feeling unsure about what I want to do.