I posted a question on Facebook the other night. I asked to describe your 2018 in one word. For me, my word was heartbreaking. The loss of my marriage was unexpected and devastating. The post reached over 3500 people with 649 responses. I was totally taken back when most of the responses I received were “hard, difficult, struggle, sorrowful, poor, challenging, broken, etc.” It’s been a tough year it seems for many.
Sometimes in the midst of my own sorrow, I forget the rest of the world could be struggling as well. I have been so wrapped up in my own heartbreak; I didn’t look past my own nose. So what can I do to help shift the energy around me to help make 2019 a better year?
Kindness. I need to start being kinder to myself, so that I can be kind to others, and they can be kind to others, and so on and so on. Kindness, it’s so simple, that it often gets overlooked. It’s about “showing up” in my life, not just run through the day on auto pilot. By showing up I can make sure that I make choices as the day blows by me are based on kindness towards me, and kindness towards others.
Kindness. It’s simple and free, but requires one to be fully awake in their life. So there is the challenge, but one I think is worth accepting. I am going to use one of the tools in my emotional tool box to help – the emotion calendar I talked about awhile back. Each day I am going to reflect on was I mostly kind or mostly blind. (By blind I mean asleep at the wheel) My goal will be to have way more kind days than blind days. At the end of the year, I will be able to look back and see as 2020 is rolling in, if it was a better year.
I certainly hope so - for all of us.