Happy New Year!
I hope all of you are staying warm and safe during the crazy cold snap that much of the United States is experiencing. I’m looking out at my frozen garden as I write, more grateful than ever for the roof over my head and heat coming through the vents.
Wonder and amazement are also part of my emotional package this morning. Despite this freeze, beautiful in its own right, spring WILL come in just a matter of weeks, transforming the white, brown, and beige palette outside my window to a rich array of greens, yellows, purples, and pinks. Miraculous.
I’ve taken these first few days of the year slowly, working my way back into list making and traditional definitions of productivity after my holiday break. As of yesterday, the decorations are packed away and the pine needles are vacuumed up from the corner where the Christmas tree stood. The dusty holiday energy is cleared, making room for fresh starts.
After reflecting on my past year and reviewing my progress on 2017’s goals, it’s time to share, in no particular order…
My 2018 Goals
- Help more people cultivate their own mindfulness practice (our first 30-Day Mindfulness Meditation Challenge begins on February 1 – click here for details!).
- Attend a residential silent meditation retreat to deepen my practice.
- Strengthen my mindfulness facilitation skills through additional training.
- Grow my business and my circles so that I can help more people access mindfulness to live and work more skillfully.
- Improve my mindful listening skills.
- Take at least one photography class.
- Expand my Damselwings Photography collection at https://www.damselwingsphotography.com/.
- Place my wall art in healthcare facilities to provide calming, joyful, healing energy (if you have contacts to suggest, I’d be grateful!)
- Devote more time to mindful political action (I have found Jen Hoffman’s Weekly Checklist for Americans of Conscience to be a thoughtful, balanced, and efficient resource for this).
- Unplug from social and other media one day a week.
- Maintain work and family balance, including regular date nights.
- Play more games.
- Grow my garden (with Apollo’s cooperation).
- Reboot my composting habits.
- Maintain my accountability buddy projects (In addition to my weekly phone call with my business accountability buddy and my more sporadic de-clutter accountability buddy check-ins, another friend and I have started a soul-nourishing accountability project, whereby we email each other at the end of each week reporting what we did to feed our souls and setting three self-care goals for the upcoming week. FUN!)
I guess that’s enough to keep me busy this year.
How about you? Have you given thought to your broad goals for the year? Consider finding an accountability buddy to help keep you on track!
I’d love to hear about your plans. Leave a comment or just reply to this email. In the meantime, know that I’m cheering you on, sending every ounce of positive energy at my disposal!
New Reader Communication System Starts NOW
As of this month my new reader communication system goes into place, distinguishing a bit between my mindfulness blog recipients and my photography followers. I will generally have one newsletter a month that goes to all of my readers summarizing events and broad-reaching developments (this post counts as broad-reaching, so if you’re on both lists you’ll get it twice).
The photography website subscribers will receive special offers and content focused on my images and my process, so if you’re interested in that make sure to sign up at https://www.damselwingsphotography.com/. I know a lot of you signed up for mindfulness content before my photography journey took off so unexpectedly. I totally get it if you don’t want to receive emails about art sales and the like, so this puts the choice in your hands.
The reverse is also true – if you subscribe to Damselwings Photography but would also like to receive my mindfulness content, please visit my main Damselwings, LLC, site at https://damselwings.com/ and join my readers circle there.
I hope you’re as excited about 2018 as I am. Thank you for joining me on the adventure!
Self Portrait
