New Year’s Traditions: A Time for Goal Setting and Letting Go

 

New Year’s Eve traditions are a bit different in my home, it’s the perfect time for goal setting and letting go of negativity. 

Yesterday I drove to the Oregon Coast with my lifelong best friend Lisa. We’ve known each other since before we can remember, but this was one of our first Christmas and New Year’s spent together. To mark the occasion we decided to create a new tradition, one we both pledge to follow each year moving forward. 

FIRST, we began by writing a letter to the Universe, containing all the deepest desires of our heart.

We each wrote it in silence, staring out at the stunning Pacific Ocean, the sun warming our faces. We took this time to sit and reflect in silence, insuring we gave thought and presence of mind to the moment. I didn’t want to forget anything. After all if you have a chance to write the Universe a letting spilling all your dreams and desires, you definitely don’t want to short change yourself! 

Once our letters were complete we sealed them in beautiful little antique bottles (found at Craft Warehouse for $1.99). 

NEXT, we took out our notepads and wrote out our goals, resolutions and plans for 2018.

There’s something to be said for taking the time to write on paper (with your own hand and a pen, not a keyboard). I’ve always found this process to be so therapeutic, motivating and empowering. Seeing on paper your plans, how you aim to accomplish them and what you’ll be doing each day to make them happen, is so powerful. It makes me feel as though I’m in control of my life and my future, rather than helplessly being dragged through it year after year.

#WriteIT you may remember, is one of my 8-steps in my #HBRMethod from my book Hustle Believe Receive, for this very reason. I’ve always kept journals throughout my life and written New Year’s Resolutions at the start of a new year, so for me this step is not new. But our new ritual is, and I LOVED it. 

THEN, we wrote down all the negative beliefs, feelings and thoughts that have held us back, and burned them.

This was a really powerful step in our new ritual. Believing as I do, that words and writing holds so much power, I’ve always tried to NOT write down the negative stuff, so as not to lend it more power. But there was something very freeing in just getting out of my mind, and off my chest onto a sheet of paper. When a thought has hounded us for years (or maybe a lifetime) and you see it on paper for the first time, suddenly it doesn’t seem so scary. 

There was such peace watching those words; fears, doubts, negativity, beliefs and struggles burn. Allowing them to be free of me, letting them turn to ashes which the Universe almost instantly absorbed into rocks and sand, set my soul free. 

FINALLY, we took our little bottles, climbed some massive sea-crusted rocks and threw them in the ocean. 

We set our dreams free. 

We made a plan and a promise  to do what is within our power to help us get closer to those dreams.

We released all the thoughts that have held us back. 

And now we are ready to take on 2018 like the badass chicks we are! 

As we left the beach, the supermoon began to rise as the sun began setting beyond the horizon. I’ve been to this beach for over 20 years and I’ve NEVER seen a sunset like that one, or a moon like that at the same time. It was… magical. I will forever take that as a sign from the Universe that it was pleased by our  new, New Year’s Tradition.