This year feels different

I opened the door gently to January 2023 and found my brain kept wanting to think ahead. I can’t tell you how different – different in a good way - that feels.

I wrote this a few weeks into 2023 - laying out my intention for the year ahead and I feel like my birthday month - August - is a good time to remind myself of these intentions.

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There have been so many years where January has rolled round, I’ve read and discarded all the ‘New year, new you’ articles, forced myself to grind through the gears and splutter into action.

This year feels different. I know we’re only ten days in, but I’m taking each and every tiny, individual step right now and seeing it as exactly that. Something positive with no strings attached. For too long I’ve attached a huge importance and meaning to lots and lots of things. Holding on for dear life. But my grip is loosening and I’m cradling life, holding it lightly.

This is new to me, and I’m loving it.

I think I’m able to look forward because I’m learning how to look back. I mean properly look back, not just rehash what went before but look back so that I can move freely, in whichever direction I want to. I was so bored and fed up with forever trying to move forward only for the bungee cord to snap me back and leave me swaying in the wind, not knowing (again) which way was up.

I wonder if there comes a point where holding onto the past is easier than trying to work out how to live in a new future?

I wrote about asking for help when self-care isn’t enough back in October and the counselling sessions I’ve had since then have made a huge difference to how I view myself and my life. My past and my future lives.

I guess in that room on a Monday amongst the tears shed, words shared and the momentary silences I’ve begun to understand what emotions are. And what they aren’t.

I’ve been walking around thinking that sadness, dread and anxiousness were my permanent state whereas happiness and joy were no more than fleeting friends. That I was sad, that I’d never be happy, rather than recognising that none of these feelings are permanent. They’re all fleeting friends – some more welcome than others.

I feel gentler waves of grief these days and recognise for the most part when it's coming towards me. There's a niggle in my stomach, an uneasy feeling I can't quite put my finger on. If in doubt, I go for a walk, I play music. I read and sit with it or go and make a cup of tea while I work out if it's staying a while or just passing through.

But more importantly, I've learned to feel and relish the moments of joy and happiness. I understand that they too will move through me, but I've learned to enjoy their company and the door is open for them to come back anytime they want.

The second big shift is how I manage my boundaries. Scrub that. To have boundaries full stop. I see that it's freeing. That being able to say no clearly, confidently and without guilt is the opposite of what I had resisted for so long. I’d been wary of having clear lines for fear of upsetting…upsetting who? I'd been contorting myself to try and fit into a world that wasn't shaped for me. I now see that I need to create a life that's designed just for me, truly live in it and have clear, sharp lines outlining it.

‘You need to learn how to start saying no the things you do want to do, with the recognition that you only one life, and you don’t have time and energy for everything.’
Elizabeth Gilbert

I think the difference this year is that I feel grounded and I feel free. I don’t feel as weighed down by life. Less battered and bruised. I’ll always be a work in progress but I’m finally beginning to feel like me. And I quite like me.

And so, on this, is our sixth damp January living in Ilkley I wish you and yours a 2023 that you too can hold lightly in your hands.