New Year...New Me

I am not one for New Years Resolutions, as I am a firm believer that when we set these kind of goals we are simply setting ourselves up for failure. How many people do you know that have these resolutions and they truly believe that this year will be different. They talk it up all the way up until January 1 and then slowly as time progresses these changes never really happen. Why do we do this to ourselves over and over again.

I for one think that we should always try to be better than the person we were yesterday. Self improvement is important and should not be a thing that we set aside until the first of the year. If that is what we are going to do then I guess it's alright for us to go ahead and wait another 365 days to set any new goals for ourselves from today on. Does that make any sense at all? No matter what day or month of the year I think we need to self assess and see what it is that we can do to make ourselves better people.

Me, Autumn and Mike...it's a small world after all :)

I also think the best thing to do is to take baby steps. By doing this we are not setting ourselves up for failure, instead we may actually see some results. An example is instead of saying that by January 1, 2014 I want to be 100 pounds lighter, set a goal that does not sound so insane. Say that each week your goal is to lose 1 pound. At the end of seven days if you have reached this goal then you can be proud of yourself. By being proud you will continue on the right path as opposed to a self destructive one where you just beat yourself up and admit defeat. There are approximatley 52 weeks in a year so if you do this, then you will have lost 52 pounds by the following January. No that's not 100, but hey look at you...you are now 52 pounds lighter and proud that you reached a goal. That's not too shabby to me.

My goals are simple...I'm not making any new years resolutions. The words actually have a negative connotation to me. Instead I would like to say my daily goal for self improvement would be some of the following: be more positive, more assertive, more forgiving, more appreciative of what I have and not focusing so much on what I do not, telling the people in my life how much they mean to me and expressing that to them so they know. I want to stop assuming that I know what people think...I don't. I want to become more self-accepting. I want to be a kinder, nicer person. I want to focus on forgiving those who have done me wrong or disapointed me, and when I say forgive them, I mean really find it in my heart to forgive them. I want to accept that sometimes (often times) I do wrong or make mistakes and sometimes there is no way to go back and fix these things.

I want to strive to be the best person I can be and the best way to do this is to take a look at me on the inside and be honest with myself about where improvements need to be made. By doing this I believe at the end of every day I will start to become the person I was inteded to be. This is not something I hope to see results in the next year, but hopefully every single day. This is not my "resolution", but instead a promise to myself and how shitty would I feel if I broke a promise to me...lol.

I feel like for the most part I'm a fairly honest person and I will be the firs to tell you that I make mistakes and wrong choices every single day. The worst thing I think I could do would be to be dishonest to myself. Hell, the first step is admitting you have a problem, then you can grow. I hope to learn from my mistakes and grow from them, not repeat them. So I challenge you all to do the same thing and do a self-assessment of yourself. Step 1- cut a hole in the box...oops, wrong step 1...haha...just kidding, but seriously...Step 1- be honest with yourself, what could you do this week to make you a better person? Write down a few things and try them out this week. As you do cross them off your list and by next Sunday look at that list and see how much you've already done. Baby steps! You should be proud because it's the little things in life...and those little things add up.

I hope this wasn't too preachy for you today, but I thought it was worth saying and what was on my heart to talk about today. I hope you all have a very Happy New Year! Be positive and realistic...you never know what awaits you in the future! This reminds me of my goal for today...and that is to not be a Debbie Downer for 24 hours...so far...so good ;)

Love Always,

Cassandra B.

"The Other C.B."