Love, Family

10 Daily Living Resolutions For The New Year!

New Year's Resolution

Great dress? Check. Wonderful New Year's Eve gathering to attend? Check. Hot guy on your arm? Check. Champagne for the toast? Check. New Year's resolutions created and posted on the fridge, laying on your nightstand or inside of your iPhone? Check. 

Then you are all set to ring in 2012, right? Hmm...not so much.

You looked fabulous in that dress, the New Year's Eve party was super fun, the hot guy turned out not to be the man of your dreams but he was definitely hot and you had a great time with him! The champagne...ooh, the champagne! You drank a little too much champagne. But, New Year's Eve does only come once a year! So, no worries there. Now for the New Year's resolutions...umm, where did you place that list? What were they? Crap! Not again!

Let's face it ladies, we mean well when we create our resolutions each year. After all, these are things that we have been meaning to work on forever...or at least since last February (2011) when we fell off of the New Year's resolution bandwagon — again.

The issue with New Year's resolutions are that they tend to be impractical. Research shows that it takes at least 21-30 days to create a habit. It's easier to CREATE one or two habits at a time just as it is easier to BREAK one or two at a time. A huge list of items we want to work on and achieve by a certain date NOT because we are ready, but because of the symbolism of the date (New Year = fresh start) is a LOT to hold yourself accountable for. Then when February or March comes around and you are overwhelmed and have let the list slide away from you little by little; you begin beating yourself up for not staying on track — again! Who needs that? Don't we already have enough in our lives that we unnecessarily beat ourselves up for? Your Super Self-Esteem Tool

Contrary to the New Year's resolution tradition, there is NEVER a more perfect time than the present to change what you have been meaning to change; to create a new habit and/or do something a different way. Now is all that there ever is.

SO...I propose ten "Daily Living Resolutions". These resolutions are simple reminders that will help to keep you in the moment and on task. You do not have to wait until New Year's Day to start them, and if you fall off of one of them one day you can easily pick it back up. It is not necessary to adopt all of them! Pick which ones speak to you the most and start there! These Daily Living Resolutions will help keep you on track to living a productive life every day. Imagine that!

I guarantee that if you start living your life with these daily resolutions, you will find that you actually purchase that gym membership and GO to the gym; that you start being more discerning with who you go on those dates with; you pick up a new hobby, etc.

Why, you ask? Simply because you will have created more space in your life and you will have increased your self-worth. I don't know about you, but I would rather take THOSE resolutions and qualities to the bank any day. So let's dig in:

10 Daily Living Resolutions For 2012

1. Spend time and nurture relationships with individuals that WANT you in their lives. Life is too short and your energy is too precious to expend it on people who do not value you and recognize your worth. Period. When you feel as if you are constantly trying to earn someone's affection it can start to become draining, and feel degrading. Subconsciously you may start to step outside of yourself to fit into the other person's mold. Who wants to do that? The time that you spend silently shouting out "Love me,"  "like me," I'm great!" can go to working on you and doing things that you love with people that you have a mutual love, like and respect for. If nothing else remember this, "You should never have to fight for a spot in someone's life, they should make room for you." If they value you, they will make room. If they do not, wish them well and send them off with light and energy and go on your way. There are plenty of people out there that love you and like you simply BECAUSE you are you!

2. Be honest with yourself in all ways and at all costs. The one person that you can never get away with lying to for a long period of time is you. There will always be those moments where you are caught unaware and the lies that you have been perpetuating in your head will leave you for the truth. When you are falling asleep at night or when you first wake up in the morning; when you run into your ex with his new girlfriend in the grocery store, the truth of the matter is this: As long as you are attempting to lie to yourself you are delaying the progress and improvement that comes with facing the truth. Once you honestly look in the mirror and take inventory you have the ability to see where you TRULY are and determine where it is that you want to go. From there comes the roadmap. The roadmap is how you decide to get from your point A (where you are now) to point Z (your ultimate goal). You can't create that roadmap to follow to your destiny if you are caught up trying to live a lie. Telling yourself lies to begin with only reveals to you that you are unhappy enough to want to sugarcoat and pretend. Hello, we live in the real world. It takes courage to be honest with yourself, but know that courage is always rewarded. 

3. Go ahead, make a mistake! Making a mistake means that you took