I'm all about the new beginnings. The new opportunities to leap, search, grow. It's pretty intoxicating when you accomplish a change or notice a difference in yourself and your quality of life. I want that for myself in this new year, 2014.
I want one main thing for myself this year, though, to learn to relax. And enjoy relaxing. I don't want to get caught up in guilt for sitting down and feeding my soul with a good book or that sinking feeling while I'm painting that I should be doing something else. Those things cannot wait. My heart and mind and soul and life cannot wait.
Each year of my life I have striven to be better, stronger, smarter, etc. I work so hard in many areas of my life, except for relaxation. The phrase, "Work hard, play hard" has never applied to me. I get so worked up in being perfect as I do it all, too, that I do not even enjoy much in my life. I am so worried and stressed and anxious about doing it all, doing it perfectly, and doing it best that I have lost that sense of awe for the world, for the beautiful people in my life, and for the little things. I want to let it all go and relax and enjoy what I have around me.
Even as I sat down to write this blog post, I thought about writing it with letters uncapitalized and without punctuation, because I am so often concerned with those things. But I couldn't. All I could do was not capitalize the title of this post. Even that is a small victory for me. But I did it, and I'm letting it go and laughing that this is really all so hard for me. I hope one day that I look back on this year with gratitude for what I have and a cultivated sense of relaxation.
Happy 2014 to us all!
I'm off the relax.
SO appreciated your note on the blog. And what a word to aspire to! We all struggle to take the time we need to give our minds, hearts, and bodies rest and space to live! Loved this!
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