Happy (very belated) New Year! I’m quite late with my round-up of intentions for the new year and also very unbothered with my chosen timing for publishing them. If I’ve learned anything about my relationship with blogging it’s that forcing it never works for me. Better late than never, right?
Today, I wanted to talk about my intentions for 2020. I’m abandoning the word resolution this year because I think ‘intentions’ suits my purpose more and also because I think we’re all a little tired of the word.
I’m at a very interesting place in my life right now.
For the last ten years, my whole focus has been trained on making the most of opportunities and jumping from one thing to the next. Basically the whole “throw spaghetti at the wall and see what sticks” kind of mentality. It’s exhausting trying to keep up with the high expectations I’ve set for myself while “saying yes” and “trying new things” and “thinking outside of the box”. This is why I’m not doing that anymore and why I’ve stopped looking for the next shiny new thing. It’s time to take a little pause and actually evaluate what I want to get out of the next few years.
I want to settle into my job and home and quell my racing heart and say goodbye to fight or flight mode. I want to think carefully about my decisions and finish tasks that I’ve been putting off. I want to hone in on some of the skills I’ve been learning (I’m looking at YOU, Google Analytics course I’ve never completed) and I want to explore some of the ideas that have been percolating at the back of my mind for my whole life.
This is why my word for the year is BRAVE. Which might sound crazy after all that talk of settling down and saying ‘no’. But to me, being brave means moving away from the mindset I’ve lived in for 10 years and accepting that I’m on the right path. It’s about trusting myself. To me, this word is here to help me as I navigate the choices that I have to make… and to validate the choices I’ve already made this year.
Aside from these broader intentions for 2020, I’ve also come up with a few things that I want to focus on.
01 | Invest in my growth
This intention is already off to a great start! I’ve already bought tickets to two events that will help me move forward in some of my goals. It wasn’t a huge expense to spend $10 on a networking event but buying the ticket was empowering. I spent the money without second-guessing myself because I’m starting to believe that my dreams are actually worthy of my time and resources. And that’s a big step for me.
02| Get my driver’s license
I almost didn’t include this intention on this list. I was going to keep this one close and not tell anyone just in case I “failed” but that doesn’t exactly align with my word of the year. So, I’m being brave and professing to the world that I’m going to try to get my driver’s licence this year. I’m starting to feel that this is a huge barrier in my life and one that I finally have to tackle. I can practically hear my family members cheering from all corners of the world with this one.
03| Focus on family time
If I’m lucky, I see my family twice a year. It’s really unsettling just how normal it is to check in once in the summer and maybe at Christmas with my parents and siblings but that’s been my reality for the past 6 years. I don’t have any travel plans this year (unfortunately, we’re not jetting off to Europe again this summer) but I would like to find the time to plan shorter trips to check in with everyone. It’s time to change our normal.
I hope you have time to give yourself space this year. Space to think and dream and work on your boundaries. I want to give myself the space to be brave in my own way and to be kind to myself as I figure it all out.
In the spirit of change, I’ve also finally changed my Sincerely, Rowan font to my own handwriting! It feels fresh and authentic to have my wonky handwriting on my blog instead of the chasing embers font I’ve been using for four years. Let me know what you think!
Big hugs.
