Setting Intentions
On the first day of January, I attended a virtual event on destigmatizing wellness and mental health in the Filipino-American community called New Year's Resolusyons. No that’s not a typo. That’s the phonetic spelling of how Filipinos pronounce “Resolutions''. The event had workshops on work-life balance, cooking demonstrations, a therapist meetup, and classes that brought us back to our roots, like the healing art of hilot. What was most impactful for me was a workshop led by political strategist Holly Lim, who taught how to set intentions instead of having resolutions. I am one of those who has a resolution in mind but at the end of January, I’ve failed at following through, finding no motivation to get back on track.
Lim had us close our eyes to envision what December 1st, 2021 would look and feel like. Before she said the year, my heart raced briefly to think I had to recall December 1st, 2020 -- triggered much?! I closed my eyes and felt immense peace. I saw myself at home, Christmas decorations were up, the kids were running around, I had family over, and cookies were in the works.
I gave further details to my vision, noting that I wanted only 2 weeks worth of work left to do in the year -- content planned and scheduled, only needing to hit publish. For my art business, I would be packaging art, preparing to mail them by the end of the first week to ensure delivery in time for Christmas. Yeah, I went all out on this daydream because all I want for Christmas is (do you have Mariah Carey in your head?) to have a carefree holiday with my family.
Lim then led us to ask ourselves what we needed to do to make this happen. My previous resolutions were often vague and, as Lim taught, emitted energy centered in needing to fix myself. I always thought my problems were that I wasn’t working hard enough, that I was lazy. I believed the stereotype that artists were bad at managing their time. I had always sought advice on how to work better and made goals to work better. Advice like, “batch create” or simply “work backwards from when you want to publish a project” never fixed my problem. Those bits of advice offered tools, not solutions, and my problem came from a mentality of not having enough.
“Do not come from an “I need to fix” or “I’m not enough” mindset. Come from a place of abundance!
I was able to recognize that my happiness and well-being isn’t connected to my work, but instead comes from having genuine connections with my family. This isn’t the first time I've been taught this and I know my saying this sounds like it's new and profound. We’ve all had this lesson, to get our priorities straight. Somehow my priorities became muddled with the idea that if I work hard then I will have time for my family, centering work and then trying to fit family around it. Lim’s exercise helped me to recenter; to put time with my family first and then plan work around that time (vacations, holidays and what time to end my work day). This was my intention and through this self-reflection, I can see a path forward with the ability to navigate this year with purpose and with order instead of haphazardly working, leaving whatever time I have left for my family like I’ve previously done.
In a meditation I did with Calm, Tamara Levitt said, “At the start of the year, it’s common to set resolutions, and it’s a healthy practice to take stock of our lives and consider habits we’d like to change, or ways we’d like to grow. But it’s important to ensure that the strategy we’re using to implement change is an effective one. When we make resolutions, we’re often looking at what’s wrong in our life and taking action to fix that problem. . . Intentions, however, have a much more compassionate energy because they don’t tie us to an outcome. . . With intentions our focus is not on what we need to fix, but rather what we want to create. As the character Socrates in “The Way of the Peaceful Warrior” said, “The secret of change is to focus all your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new.”
This year has already presented us with some troubles that may have put its first dents in our transformative year. But I hope with this insight, you can find a way forward and along that way you can mindfully be kind and patient with yourself.
What I’m Wearing: Frank and Oak Trousers, Soko Earrings and Capsule Necklace from The Fixx Collective, Ética Denim tee from The Fixx Collective
