A Healing Story: 2011 Goals/Hopes/Dreams

I just wrote a post declaring that my "one word" for 2011 is going to be Heal.  And that my overarching word theme for my life is "story," as in "write a better story". 

For the last few days, as I've been reading blog posts and articles about new year's resolutions and healing, and happiness and mental health, and minimalism, and simplicity, and all the other topics that inspire or capture me, I've been jotting notes on a slip of paper, tucked in the back of the notebook in which I've recently been making the daily "to do" list items that don't quite make the list of "to do's" that I keep in my phone.

This morning I spent about an hour, curled up under a pile of blankets, translating that slip of paper into a mulit-colored journal entry, creating a list of goals and dreams for 2011.

I wasn't going to do it by hand this year, but I'm glad I changed my mind.  There's something therapeutic about writing by hand, planning and dreaming for the year to come.

When I finished, the page of goals and dreams looked like this:

 

(I did mention that I like to use multiple colors of ink, right?)

These are the items that list contained:

• Yoga.  Do 10 minute yoga at home at least twice a week.  Use up the 40 yoga class passes for a local yoga studio that I purchased when they were the deal of the day on Living Social.
• Scarf wearing.  Totally a random thing, but I want to wear a scarf at least once or twice a week, just because I love how they look, and how I feel in them.
• Curly hair.  Ditto to the scarf wearing.  Wearing my hair curly also means I spend a bit more time caring for my appearance.
• One Word.  Do the project for the class each month.  Basically a way to inspire creativity and focus on my theme word of "heal" for the year.
• Vitamins.  Keep up with a regular routine of taking them.  The same for the natural health treatments, using my SAD lamp, and a couple of other natural health steps I've been taking.
• Scripture Reading.  This only works for me if there is some kind of discipline involved.  I'm crappy at just picking up the bible and reading consistently.  So, the goal is to read through the Bible in a year.  Choose a plan, and stick to it.  Read ahead, catch up, whatever, but read through the whole Bible in the 1 year time frame. 
• Cook.  Same idea as last year, and another way to stir creativity and to find joy in doing something I love.  Try 12 new recipes total.  Half of last year's goal, but more feasible given my lack of a kitchen of my own.
• Write real cards and letters.  A fun way to build friendships, express gratitude and love, and just generally appreciate people.  At least 2 per month, and keep a list of who they've gone to.  (Bonus points for taking the time to make the cards by hand.)
• Budget.  2010 saw the end of all debt except my student loans (which will likely be increasing instead of decreasing for a while now, given that I'm planning to go back to school).  Let's keep it that way.
• Read.  At least two books a month.  Or listen to unabridged audio versions.  Whatever.  Just take in new information and challenge my brain along with stimulating my love affair with words.
• TOMS.  Buy a pair.  Probably these.  Because friends swear they're comfy, and because I love shoes and think the concept of donating a pair for every pair sold is very cool.
• Kiva loan.  Loan at least $50 to kiva projects over the course of the year.
• Write.  On paper.  In a journal.  At least once a week.  For something different.  I think it takes different brain cells to write on paper instead of online.  And I find it therapeutic, but don't do it nearly often enough.
• Blog.  Keep up the daily 5.  Aim for about one other post other than the daily 5 a day, at least on weekdays.  Keep working on the Grey's Monologue's blog project I started as a hobby.  Finish transcribing the monologues from the past season's of Grey's.
• Risk.  Try new things and give old things a second chance.  It's okay if you hate it.  It's okay if nothing has changed since you tried it in the first place, but be willing to give it a shot.  (As an aside, I lived this one out on Christmas day when I tried eating crab in two different forms.  I still hate it.  It did nothing to change my position that if it lived in water when it was alive, it should most definitely never cross my lips.  But, I did try it.)
• Get my US passport.  Because then I can say I legally have two passports, and that's fun, right?
• Travel.  Someplace requiring an airline ticket. (And preferably the crossing of an international border, even if it is just the border to the US.)

There are other things that I'll continue with in 2011.  Other things that have shaped and will shape my life.  But these are the sort of fun, shape my ability to live joyfully, and shape who I am as a person goals.  And these days, those are the sorts of goals that I most want to set and live out.  Because they are the ones that shape the story I tell with my life, and shape things like whether or not 2011 is a year where the word that defines it is "heal".