Happy New Year! As is traditional for me, it’s time to put my intentions for the year out into the world, ready to focus on and achieve. Intentions are similar to resolutions, but instead of specific target-based goals, they are about mindset and approach, working on my values instead of losing sight of myself to reach a certain outcome. What good is aiming for world domination if you have to destroy the world to get there? (Looking at you, Thanos!)
I used to diligently set my resolutions every year, and promptly fail at each of them before the end of January. The fastest I ever gave up was about 00:38 on January 1st 2020 when I lit my first cigarette of the new year after declaring I was going to quit smoking (again). Turns out, at the grand age of 27 when I moved back home after the initial COVID restrictions lifted, the fear of my own mother catching me with a cigarette down the bottom of the garden during the later November lockdown in 2020 was what scared me into ditching the darn things and I’ve never looked back! I digress…
Intentions are about setting broader goals, they’re generally not something that you “complete”, but more of a mindful committment of time to a lifelong task that could easily be forgotten in the hustle and bustle of life. I like my intentions to align with my values to create a greater feeling of purposefulness in my life. This method also helps breaks the cycle of setting an often unattainable goal, failing, talking negatively to yourself and then feeling bad because not only have you “failed”, but you’ve given yourself a mental telling off as well. To avoid this feeling you don’t pick the task back up, you leave it there to revisit next year… often to replay the same cycle.
For example “stop eating fast food.” Yes, it’s doable, you’d need willpower that matches the physical strength of Hercules to resist so you’re already set up to stumble on this one. You have your first maccies January 20th because it’s dark and cold out, work was rubbish, you hadn”t realised your fridge was empty and it’s 9pm. You feel guilty that you ordered fast food, you tell yourself off for it, you make yourself feel worse but now you’ve already broken your resolution so why bother to start fresh now? Or… “be more mindful of healthy eating choices”. You start drinking more water, you cook food from fresh ingredients 29 days of January but you had two fast food orders. That doesn’t sound like a failure to me! That’s 31 days of success, showing moderation, healthy choices and only two fast food dinner treats.
Last year was a success, I took a look back on my progress last month (and wrote about it here). This year, I’ve kept it slightly simpler:
- Look after myself – I want to build on the progress I made last year, aim to always speak kindly to myself, not forget to schedule in breaks, stop beating myself up if I’ve set myself a long list of to-do items and been too physically or emotionally drained to get it done. I know I cannot give my best to my relationship, family or patients if I’m low on battery. This isn’t just about eating well, drinking water and exercising, but also having time to decompress.
- Look after my family – Seems like an obvious one, but running a business can tear my focus away from the present and suck my attention in to my emails, marketing or admin very easily. Not ideal if it’s been 2 weeks since Harry and I have had a matching day off and I can’t be in the moment! This need to be present will become even more important as the year goes on and our family grows.
- Look after my business – Since expanding the team to include the wonderful Tas, the success of Wisbey Osteopathy doesn’t impact just me, but also her life. As the fantastic principle that I strive to be this means getting more creative with the marketing to let people know she’s so good, directing people to her if her skillset will suit a patients needs more and giving patients the options for both her diary hours and my diary hours. I have to be a good business woman, a great clinician and and even better leader.
- Improve organisation – I’m really good at having a busy schedule, I’m also really good at having a day to get all my tasks done and completely forgetting what’s stored on the mental to-do list. I have already made improvements this year, by getting a monthly wall calendar in the house so me and Harry know who is working when and what social engagements or appointments each other have over the month, I have a hefty new work planner which is a day per page so I can focus on the “what’s happening next” and I have a yearly wall calendar to map out stuff in the future like time off, holidays, scheduled CPD workshops or Harry’s work courses when he needs to travel. It sounds like a lot but having just a monthly calendar allows me to sweep small tasks to the side, conversely having just a daily planner helps me completely forget pre-booked appointments and birthdays!
This year I have gone particularly broad in my choice of intentions but the details of ‘how’ I will achieve them have been documented in my planner. It’s not always easy to separate self, family unit and work when they’re all so closely linked, but it is certainly a more healthy way to experience life than allowing one area to ‘steal’ time from the others. I think “health” is going to be my word for the year!
Now it’s your turn! Sit down and think for 10 minutes about what you feel would add meaning and fulfillment to your life, then write it down. We’d love to hear what you come up with so do share them in our social media comment section.
Happy New Year from the whole team at Wisbey Osteopathy!
Wisbey Osteopathy 