Thursday 3 January 2013

Happy Belated New Year...



I’m a little late with the New Year’s post I promised myself I’d write, but that’s ok; I’m not going to beat myself up about that, because that is my one resolution this year. To stop beating myself up about things.

I remember past New Years when I would write a nice neat list of resolutions and head into the New Year clutching it, all shiny faced and hopeful about becoming a newer, nicer, more successful version of myself. And then invariably, usually within a week, I’d be crumpling up the list, scrapping it completely, promising myself that I really would do better next year.

Often, I find that I live in a monochromatic world. Either something is black, or it is white. I love it or I loathe it. I am totally passionate and invested, or I am limply disinterested.

Part of that monochromatic lifestyle is thinking that if you fail at something, you’ve failed completely, once and for all, and forever. Which is why I think a resolution is like a grenade in the wrong hands, just waiting to blow you into a billion flaming pieces. Once I’ve broken a resolution – or any kind of rule, really – I feel that there’s no starting over. It seems to me that it would be like making allowances I didn’t deserve – which really defies the whole purpose of setting the rules in the first place. The point is to abide by them, yes? The point is to succeed.

I’m happy to say that I seem to have come out of the last year a little older and a little wiser. (Well, maybe I’m not so happy about the ‘older’ part…). I still don’t find it easy to live outside my grid of extremes – things I absolutely can do and things I absolutely mustn’t do – and I still feel dreadful if I feel that I’ve failed at something or taken the easy way out. The difference is that I’m beginning to be able to accept that ‘success’ isn’t about setting a rule and sticking to it. Partly, yes, success is about achieving our goals. But it’s also – perhaps more importantly – about learning to take the knocks, acknowledge the stumbles, and move on from them. And learn from them. Not just stop trying, throw our hands up in the air and say, Oh well, there’s always next year. Every day is a clean slate. Every morning. Every minute.

This year I’m going to keep getting back up no matter how many times I fall, no matter how skinned my knees get or how bruised my outflung hands.

And that is my wish for all of you.

Here’s to a wonderful 2013

xxx

5 comments:

  1. Happy new year to you Cheryl

    I wish you every success and happiness for 2013 x

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  2. Totally get the all-or-nothing thinking, I have a real problem with it too - a tiny slip up and I feel I've failed anyway, so I might as well go the whole hog and relapse.

    We just need to keep pushing through and one day we WILL make it!

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  3. happy new year!! this post made me smile ;) and you are right- every day is a clean slate... we need to work on the all or nothing thinking and start living in the gray.

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  4. Hi Cheryl, you're very right.
    We shouldn't ssee resolutions as rules or take them so seriously. Every day is a new chance, every minute for starting over, reinventing. And success isn't just about achieving our goals, but definitely more about our journey to achieving them, what we learn in between, and very much so, learning how to handle the knocks and failures along the way. 'Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better' - Samuel Beckett
    Success is more to do with how well we rise when we get knocked down!
    Hope the New Year holds every success for you! :)

    ps(Thank you for your comments on my blogs - I got them by email, but seems they're invisible on the actual blog page! or they have disappeared! But thanks, I appreciate the commentary. Glad you are enjoying the Poem a Day!)

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  5. "But it’s also – perhaps more importantly – about learning to take the knocks, acknowledge the stumbles, and move on from them. And learn from them. Not just stop trying, throw our hands up in the air and say, Oh well, there’s always next year. Every day is a clean slate. Every morning. Every minute."

    Love, love, LOVE this. From someone who is still often in the black OR white mindset, I love how simply you explained the possibles of a much more colorful world.

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