I both love and hate this day: the first day of a new year.

Welcome to 2020

You enter it full of hope and excitement, planning and dreaming for a new year of possibilities. You set out new year resolutions, make promises, and set new goals, but truthfully, it’s just another day.

What’s different about today, and why don’t we have this hope and excitement every day we wake up? Shouldn’t we? Every day is a gift after all.

I love the passion and excitement that comes with today, but I hate that it’s all quickly lost as the days begin to pass.

So, this year I’m striving to keep those good feels going. This year I’m focusing on creating a list of what I’m passionate about and what will keep me excited for the entire year.

Ask Yourself the Question

Can you list anything that you’re truly passionate about? The question was harder for me than I thought.

Unfortunately, 2019 was a tough year for me and a year of losses: a big accident from which I’m still recovering plus an unexpected surgery has meant the inability to exercise/run over the past 10 months as well as the loss of my career. Add to that two cancelled vacations…I could go on but I won’t. The point is, all of this has me questioning what lessons I can take from the past year and wondering how to move forward in a positive way with the things I still have or can do.

So, I asked myself what am I truly passionate about? Part of it was easy…

Sure, I was used to running, something I can’t do right now, but the running in fact evolved from my love of walking. The walking became trail walking and I loved it, and that became trail running, which evolved into simply running. But in fact, I would always run those trails where it all started. Walking, or trail walking, was the one thing I wrote down quickly. The ideas stalled after that.

Lost in Life Roles

In trying to come up with more items to add to my list, I found myself lost in being a wife, mother, employee, friend, daughter, sister… Sure, I do a lot of things in these roles, but how many of them am I actually passionate about? To get the answer, I had to go back and look at what I used to do before I took on some of these roles, things I used to do in the spare time I used to have. What were the things that made me happy, that I wanted to devote time to?

That’s when the answers started coming.

I remembered how much I loved photography, spending hours driving or hiking just to find new territory and new landscapes to photograph.

I recognized the hours I spent meal planning for myself and my family and remembered my love of nutrition, health and fitness.

I smiled thinking of the hours I had spent in an art journaling workshop and how peaceful it was to just take one hour of quiet time to create and spend one hour away from my thoughts and worries.

And I realized the hours spent on online courses and seminars learning whatever I could about the the things that interested me.

Suddenly, I had my list.

Passionate About 2020

Now I find myself suddenly excited and passionate about the upcoming year in a new way. I have a list of things that will carry me through all 365 days in a positive and rewarding way.

Cheers to 2020!

May you find your list or whatever it is that will carry you happily through the next 365 days.