Merry Holidays, and a happy new year!

I want to wish everyone a happy holiday season, and a safe New Year.

I know thats generic, but I don't care. I have so many friends of different faiths, and mine doesn't really fit "mainstream" so perhaps generic is good. It doesn't negate my hopes for everyone's happiness and safety.

There has been a lot of recent tragedy, and I want to look into a positive light going into the new year.

I won't make any new years resolutions, I won't be the fat girl at the gym for the first few days of the year, and then sitting on my ass the rest of the time. I'm going to focus my energy on taking care of myself. I'd like to say things like, "I'll lose x# of lbs and start doing yoga" this is unrealistic.

I pour all of myself into everyone around me, and I am working myself into an early grave. I need to focus on nourishing myself before I can give myself to others. I love my kids and my husband more than I have ever loved myself, and it's starting to show. I think I'm starting to crack, and I need to work hard on repairing those cracks.

I vow to take myself on me-dates. Coffee to people watch, WITHOUT taking my work. Movies and dinner to be in my own head. I need to work hard on the subconscious tendency to feel selfish and embarrassed when I do anything without my family. It's been so long pounded into my head that I must work all the time, and taking time for my own happiness is a waste that I don't know how to do anything else.

How do I move forward? My husband wants me to take a vacation on my own, but I feel like it's a betrayal to go on my own, without him. I go to the store to buy myself some work clothes, and some boots for bad weather, and I walk out with new school clothes and snow boots for my kids, and nothing for me.

My internal self-neglect is a large part of the issue of my self-confidence. I can't justify doing things for myself when the kids and the husband need things too. And when I do something that is self-nurturing, I feel guilty.

I've got issues, and I want to work hard to resolve, or learn to work with them instead of against them in the new year.

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