I just read an Instagram post that offered the likes of the following words for 2026: faith, bloom, ease, abundance, and magic. I felt these deeply…and simultaneously wondered when did we start giving words to years?
It’s the start of a new year, a new page, a new semester, and according to Chinese culture, this one’s the year of the horse. Each new year hits differently? We can journal, read, and wrap ourselves with intention settings and resolutions. We can take stock of where we are, ask pointed questions to see where we’d like to head, sit with the wins and the learnings of the previous 12 months, and find gratitude for the fact that we get to experience it all. We can ignore it, feel the feelings and do it anyway, and move through each day with one foot in front of the other.
However we choose to meet these days, there are often big feelings, shifting emotions, and a whole host of thoughts about life. In week two, how are you doing?
The start of a new year can often feel monumental. Sometimes it takes us by surprise, sometimes it’s what we’ve been waiting for forever, and sometimes it’s just tomorrow. Each of us enters that space between the 31st of one and the 1st of another with their own outlook, hesitations, excitement, and really, their own well, stuff. Whether you literally threw out the old and let in the new or felt it all figuratively fall away as the Sydney fireworks lit up the night sky, the new day is here. Now it’s up to us.
I don’t know about you, but I struggle with decision making. Dark chocolate or milk – easy. Beach or snow – no brainer. What I want to be when I grow up – I can come up with happy, living with purpose, and choosing joy but after that, nope, the vision is kinda sorta fuzzy and rarely takes full shape with sharp edges. A coach friend of mine talks about fuzzy vision. It’s a positive psychology term used in goal setting and working within a life trajectory. Think a long-term goal but more of a direction, an image, something that feels like you but is yet fully formed. Martha Beck talks about a north star. Both tilt you towards direction, nudge along a path yet still allowing for twists and turns of your choosing and sometimes ones in which you have zero control.
All the time, I think about where I would like to live. I’ve got an image of a cottage or apartment. It’s near or in a community that’s filled with people who zestfully live their lives. You can hear the waves crash, there’s a sandy shore, and the sunrises or sunsets are epic. It’s rarely super cold, people are kind, money isn’t the core of any conversation, and passion and purpose take center stage. Around, people are exercising, walking, laughing, connecting, living their best story. That’s kind of it. The where, the when, the how long, the languages, the currency, the how did you come by it – nope, none of that shows up. Simultaneously, I love where I am in time and space right now and when the conversation comes to make hard-edged decisions, I’m more likely to want to hide under my sparkly pillow fort than do the thing. And yet, action and doing the thing is what moves the needle and clarifies the edges.
These days that shift the calendar pages from one month or year to the next often feel weighted. We joke that the amorphous weirdness comes from cookies, cheese, and confusion about what day it is, but perhaps it’s our way of sitting in the messy middle – the space between where we review what was and put our energy to what’s next.
Perhaps it’s how we, maybe, attempt to unfuzz our fuzzy vision, write intentions with sharpies instead of pencil, and challenge our focus from what we wish we did to what we want to and will do. Maybe, just maybe, it’s how we shove ourselves out of that comfy pillow fort, fling off our weighted blankets, put down our half-finished hot chocolate, stamp our fuzzy sock-covered feet on the ground, and say I’m grateful to be here, I will do the next thing.
How many times have we sat in classrooms, been in offices, or even listened to podcasts asking, “what do you want?”, “What will you do next?”, and “When will you feel ready?” We spend so much time hoping for motivation, waiting for signs, wishing someone else will make the decision so we don’t have to. It could be about what elective to take in high school, which major to choose in college, what neighborhood to move to, or with whom to spend our time. Maybe it’s who to vote for, which life path to take, how to adult, or what cause to act in, and just how to do it. We may find answers to those questions that keep us up at night in all sorts of places, but at the end of the day, ready isn’t a feeling, it’s a decision. Yup, it is – and if you’re like me, sometimes decisions are hard.
As we flip the calendar to January, as we aim to start fresh, seek new, challenge ourselves, or finally give ourselves some credit for how we show up, remember do it all with grace, ease, compassion for ourselves and each other, and know that as long as we keep putting one foot in front of the other, we can truly do anything (even make those hard decisions).
Happy new year, friends. You’ve got this!
4 Tips and tricks to get those feet moving in the directions you choose
Set the intentions
At the end of every year, a professor of mine does her own version of a Wheel of Life template. The idea: draw a circle, cut it into pieces of a pie or spokes of a wheel. Write the main tenets or significant facets of your life (i.e., career, health, relationships, finance, romance, personal growth, spiritual), then dive in. Either ratings or actual feelings and facts: what took place in the previous one, what lit you up, where you’d like to see improvement. Take stock. Then dream of a new one for the start of the new year. Place your desired scenarios, lean in, set intentions and use the wheel as your guide. A positive psychology practice, the Wheel of Life puts things into perspective, allows the practitioner to witness what’s gone on and what you wish to choose going forward. Move towards the life you desire. Take the wheel. Drive ahead.
Motivation - how it works
There’s a whole host of podcasts, tools, and social pages out there. Some resonate, and others miss the mark. You can find zillions that talk about motivation, goal setting, and focusing attention. Mel Robbins one time literally posted in her pajamas, slithered out of bed, and crawled from floor to the bathroom…and claimed her therapist told her to do it. At the time, she shared a struggle to fling off the covers and get out of bed; the guidance was slither if you must, but do the thing. Whether in pajamas or on the court, field, or stage, the advice for motivation seems to sing the same tune.
No matter the feeling, the weather, or the moment, commit to a thing and do it. Do it sad, do it tired, do it when no one is watching. We don’t feel ready; it’s in the doing that the ready comes.
Simone Biles began gymnastics at the age of 6. Misty Copeland started ballet later than the experts ‘suggest’. Kobe was known to practice on the court at all hours, including after big wins. The work isn’t pretty. The work is hard. The work takes compromises, consists of setbacks, stumbles, and limited highlight reels. But you know. You feel it. Amidst the moments of hard, there’s noticing. We grow bigger. We look fear in the face and do the thing afraid. Action shuts down doubt. So, on the days that it’s hard to flip, twirl, or jump, slither if you must, but do it anyway.
Decision making
Known as the Mother of Mindfulness, Harvard professor Dr. Ellen Langer has been teaching decision making methods for decades. Her famous approach about making the decision right involves two chocolate bars and whittling down major milestone making decisions to realize that sometimes you know exactly which chocolate bar you want, and sometimes, either one will do. And even more importantly, just because you chose one and didn’t like it doesn’t mean you would have liked the other any more than the first.
Her words echo in the minds of decision makers everywhere – and we’re all decision makers. Big or small, life changing or minimally momentous, we make millions every day and sometimes struggle or trudge through the process.
What if we looked at it a different way? What if we took Dr. Langer’s advice, flipped a coin or picked one and leaned into it. Fling off the voices of doubt that often shout loudly even in the middle of the night and lean into making the decision that we chose the best one.
Maybe you learn, maybe you grow, maybe it works for a time, maybe it changes your life. Either way, you practice the art of decision making, leaning in, and growing through it. With each action, movement. With each step, growth. And maybe, just maybe, the next decision will be that much easier. It’s time to be the you that you wish to be today…even if that you is different from yesterday and might be different tomorrow. Your move.
Do the next right thing
January always hits differently. December was a whirlwind of sparkle and with the calendar flip and return to school and work, the alarm clock rings, and you have to remember how to take those next steps. Perhaps you’ve set intentions, perhaps you’re dealing with grief, perhaps you’re trying to make sense of what you want to do next in a relationship, personal growth, career, or life trajectory. But sometimes there’s a stuck feeling – a deer in the headlights frozen for a moment with your feet nailed to the floor not knowing which direction to move kind of feeling.
Take a cue from Arendelle’s Princess Anna and do the next right thing. Whether through tears, sorrow, joy, struggle, sunshine, or sluggish movement, we don’t have to know exactly how or the big picture, just do the next right thing. It could be as simple as drink the water, do the dishes, pack the backpack, get some sunlight; no big production, no big pronouncement, just remind your feet to move. And when they forget, remind them again.
You got this!
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Stacey Ebert, our Educational Travels Editor, is a traveler at heart who met her Australian-born husband while on a trip in New Zealand. Stacey was an extracurricular advisor and taught history in a Long Island public high school for over fifteen years, enjoying both the formal and informal educational practices. After a one year 'round the world honeymoon, travel and its many gifts changed her perspective. She has since left the educational world to focus on writing and travel. She is energetic and enthusiastic about long term travel, finding what makes you happy and making the leap. In her spare time she is an event planner, yogi, dark chocolate lover, and spends as much time as possible with her toes in the sand.
Check out her website at thegiftoftravel.wordpress.com for more of her travel musings.