my word of the year

I seriously cannot believe it’s almost March.

Over the last few months I’ve been feeling overwhelmed, drained, anxious – and it’s not because we have a little babe in the house and sleep is not what it used to be. I have spent the better part of the last decade building up my career and figuring out who I am and where I want to be in life and last year, I kind of stopped dead in my tracks and for the first time in a long time I was content. I wasn’t waiting for the next thing to happen, I wasn’t looking at my next career move. I was happy being still and soaking in everything that was happening. And then we had Cora. All of a sudden, this peace I had found was gone. Part of it was adjusting to the new normal – Irwin and I had been together for over nine years when we brought Cora home and we’d been living together for over half of that time – but the majority of it was falling right back into my old ways.

Spending too much time on social media.

Becoming lazy about my job as soon as my “back from maternity leave” to do list was done.

Spending money that should’ve been saved on things we really, truly don’t need.

Either binge-eating while on the couch and watching too much TV and mindlessly scrolling, or not eating at all.

I wanted to be a better mom for my daughter, but I was so stuck in my ways that I found it hard to dig myself out. I knew I needed help. I started researching self help, listening to podcasts, taking a few minutes after my daily devotionals to listen to what God was telling me. Last night as I was rocking my daughter, I looked on her wall and saw the print we had made of Proverbs 31:25. I cannot tell you how many times I’ve read this while rocking her, and anytime I am changing Cora she looks up at this print and smiles {mostly because it’s in a shiny brass frame, but I digress}. And it hit me that I was the furthest thing from the Proverbs 31 woman. I had been reading this verse over and over for years as something to strive for and as I rocked all I could think about was how I am the furthest thing from my ideal. So without further ado, my 2019 word of the year is…

Discipline.

This is an ugly word. And when I first landed on it I was like there has GOT to be a better one but nothing else did justice to how I wanted to spend my year. This is something that I so severely lack and it effects every part of my life. I find it difficult to put down my phone in fear of missing something that SOMEONE ELSE does that has no effect on me. I get by on the bare minimum at work because by the time I get to work I’m exhausted. I eat or drink whatever I want because it feels good in the moment. And I am sick. of. it. I have this nagging feeling in my chest that something HAS to change and this is it.

I need to stick to social media free home time {which means deleting those apps from my phone}.

I need to get better about our household budget and get back to paying off our debt and saving for the future instead of spending all the money because I “deserve it”.

I need to cook more quality meals and eat them at our dinner table instead of picking up take out because it’s been a long day and sitting in front of the TV while we have dinner.

I need to spend time learning more about my field, honing in on exactly where I want to be at the end of the year and how my life looks in five, ten, and even thirty years from now.

I need to get better at discipline myself and sticking to what I say I’m going to do. It’s too easy to take the lazy way out and I’m finally calling myself on it. Is this year going to be challenging and ugly at times? Absolutely. But in 10 months from now, I can guarantee I’ll look back and say THANK GOODNESS I took this step in the right direction. I do have some big goals set and am working on the small steps to get there, I’ll touch more on this in another post on another day.

 

SO what about you? What is your word of the year? Any big or small goals? And if so, how do you stick to them, what is your plan of action?