Resolve

Are you a New Year's Resolution setter? 

I personally love the fresh start that a new year brings.

Last year I set some resolutions in regards to my physical health and I never could have predicted how working toward those goals would spiral into so many areas of my life. 

It has me wanting to go really big this year by setting a few goals that seem almost impossible, then making a plan of how I'm going to follow through. 

They say that your brain is wired to look for problems, so I'm going to give it a few exciting problems to solve, both in regards to my personal and spiritual growth. 

How about you?

I have a feeling that 2018 is going to be a year to remember. 

Earned Ability

Maddie received a ukulele from her grandparents for Christmas. It was her one Christmas wish.

Once the presents were all opened and the kids ran off to play a new game, I picked up the ukelele and downloaded the corresponding app to my phone.

I learned very quickly that it would take a musical novice such as myself a lot of work to learn even a simple song.

It was awkward and uncomfortable to play the simplest chords.

I became irritated with myself, the ukulele, and even the app on my phone (which, amazingly, goes through each and every step of teaching me how to use the instrument).

Malcolm Gladwell believes that, in general, people prize natural endowment over earned ability. While we live in a culture that claims to value effort and self-improvement, we revere the naturals.

Instead of viewing them as ordinary people who work really hard, we see them as magical unicorns who were born with extraordinary, super-hero-like abilities.

Part of me wonders if we do this in part to let ourselves off the hook a little bit. If I credit my childhood best friend's piano playing abilities up to blood, sweat, and tears, then I can't honestly say "I'd give anything to play the piano like you." Because I wouldn't. I wouldn't give up the hours and  hours of tedious, awkward practicing. Truth be told, I'd rather watch the latest season of Fuller House instead.

If I acknowledge that getting really good at anything, even for those born with better-than-average ability, takes hard work, then I don't have an excuse. I'm not off the hook. Because I'm capable of working hard too.

I'm going to prove to myself that I can learn to play the ukelele. I can earn that ability. I'm going to put in the hard, awkward, uncomfortable hours and teach myself (with my trusty app) to play "Happy Birthday to You." It's one of my New Year's Resolutions.

Maybe you can teach an old dog new tricks.

Wish me luck.

Perfectionism

I'm a perfectionist. Recovering perfectionist to be exact. I like things to be perfect. I want to be the perfect mother. The perfect wife. The perfect friend. What's so wrong with that? A lot, actually. By expecting perfection out of myself, I wasn't allowing myself to show up, be vulnerable, and risk failure.

As I've been working on letting go of my perfectionist tendencies, I have felt so much freedom!

Christmas doesn't have to be perfect to be special.

My kids don't have to be overjoyed with their Christmas gifts (at least one of them is going to be disappointed, no doubt). It can still be a special day.

I don't have to be the perfect wife, the perfect mother, the perfect friend, or the perfect writer to make a contribution to the world. My family is learning oodles and oodles from my flaws as well as my strengths. And so am I.

So for now, when I feel the perfectionism start to creep in, I tell myself that good is good enough.

Growth Mindset

My children attend a K-8 school here in our tiny rural town in Maine. I love our little school. The principal, the teachers, the parents, and the support staff are all so caring and hard working. This year, the school is focusing on fostering a growth mindset among the students. If you haven't read Carol Dweck's book yet, you really should. It's on my nightstand right now and I'm having a boatload of ah-ha moments in every chapter! 

I have seen how, just in the last few months, my older children have slowly been opening up to the idea of a growth mindset. See this illustration from Dartmouth in case you haven't read the book:

I think it was best described this way: Growth Mindset says "I made a mistake," whereas the Fixed Mindset says, "I am a mistake."

Dweck said this about failure: "When people believe their basic qualities can be developed, failures may still hurt, but failures don't define them. And if abilities can be expanded---if change and growth are possible'''then there are still many paths to success."

Most people aren't a simple one or the other. All of us have fixed mindsets in certain parts of our lives and growth mindsets in others. "I'm not good at math...I've never been an artist...I'll never lose weight...I'm not good at setting goals...I'm just not a patient person..."

Where might a fixed mindset be holding you back?

A Little More Compassion

Today in this moment I just feel an overwhelming sense of gratitude for my life. Life can be so challenging, and I try to imagine that everyone is doing the very best they can. It helps me love them more than when I judge them or try to change their behavior (even though the judging and wanting THEM to change is so easy to do!). I am discovering that when I am more compassionate with others, it helps me to be more compassionate with myself, and vice versa. And couldn't we all use a little more compassion? There is a quote by Theodore Roosevelt that I recently read:

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly;...who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly."

Here's to being less of a critic, both to ourselves (especially to ourselves)  and all the others doing their best in the arena of life.

Keeping Commitments

Many people are dependable and reliable when it comes to keeping commitments to others, but struggle to keep commitments they make to themselves (I'll exercise...tomorrow...eat healthy...one day...get up early...next week...). I have been known to fall into that category. In an attempt to exercise my writing skills and hopefully improve them, I made a commitment to no one but myself that I would write a blog post each day for 30 days. Because I said I would. Here's to writing and improving each day. Wish me luck. And more than anything, hopefully I'm learning keep my commitments to myself.

The Load

I recently read a book by Ryan Holiday titled The Obstacle is the Way and his ideas have been floating around in my brain ever since. The premise of this particular self-help book is that obstacles or trials in our lives will become the very things that strengthen us if we let them. Not in spite of them but because of them. Holiday gives many many examples from history to prove his point, with inspirational figures from Abraham Lincoln to Amelia Earhart to Marcus Aurelius.

"The obstacle in the path becomes the path. Never forget, with every obstacle is an opportunity to improve our condition."

I have thought a lot about the current obstacles I am facing and how, instead of trying to convince myself that what I'm going through "isn't that bad" (which is better than wallowing in self-pity--I'm a pro at that), I can focus on how my particular trials are shaping me into the kind of person I want to be. Better than before, as Gretchen Rubin would say.

"Your biggest problem is that you think you shouldn't have them."--Tony Robbins

In April of 2014 Elder David A. Bednar gave a talk in General Conference called "Bear Up Their Burdens with Ease". You might remember him telling the story of a friend who got stuck in the mountains in his new 4-wheel-drive truck after attempting to bring home fire wood for the winter. It wasn't until he loaded the back of  his pick-up truck with wood that his tires had enough traction to get unstuck from the snow. It was the load of wood that ended up helping to set him free.

"Each of us also carries a load. Our individual load is comprised of demands and opportunities, obligations and privileges, afflictions and blessings, and options and constraints...Sometimes we mistakenly may believe that happiness is the absence of a load. But bearing a load is a necessary and essential part of the plan of happiness."

Why is the load necessary? Why can't life just be easy? Wouldn't we be happier without problems? And doesn't God want us to be happy? Of course He does, so He provided a way through His Son.

  "The unique burdens in each of our lives help us to rely on the merits, mercy, and grace of the Holy Messiah." -Elder Bednar

The load will humble us and help us turn to Him ,and eventually return to Him.

How I Built This

Are you into podcasts? If so, what are your favorites? If not, what are you waiting for?! I'm a self-proclaimed podcast junkie. I listen to them when I'm cooking, cleaning, driving, and even exercising. How I Built This is one of my new favorites. It's put on by NPR, so it's nice and polished, and Guy Raz (a household favorite of ours) is the host. Each week he interviews a different entrepreneur about how their successful business came to be. Every single episode is interesting and motivating and leaves me thinking, 'What could I create into a business?' My favorite episode so far is his interview with Sara Blakely, the inventor of Spanx undergarments. It's just so inspiring and interesting, you can't help but cheer her on.

Project 333

I recently heard of Project 333 while watching a documentary on Netflix about Minimalism. I was in the thick of working on some really intense fitness goals, but I told myself that once I accomplished those goals, I would focus on Project 333. I'm still working on those fitness goals, but a friend motivated me to take the plunge with this project and the positive peer pressure won out.

If you've never heard of it before, it's a minimalist idea that centers on clothing---you narrow your closet down to 33 items and you wear only those for 3 months and box the rest of it up and get it out of sight. This includes shoes, jewelry (except for sentimental pieces like wedding rings), outerwear, and accessories (like gloves, hats, scarves). It does not include undergarments, lounge clothes, or exercise clothes (unless you wear them all day long). You can read more about it here. I took the challenge on three weeks ago and I must say that I really like it. I said goodbye to a cluttered closet! Goodbye to decision fatigue about what to wear! And goodbye to purchasing items I don't really need just because they are "on sale." I'm now much more interested in clothing that fits me great and that can stand the test of time.

I didn't mention this project I took on to Ryan because I was curious to see if he would notice. He didn't! We'll see how I feel about my clothes in another 2 months, but something tells me this minimalist idea is one I will want to stick with.