Ushering in a New Decade

That phrase falls from the fingers and lands on the heart in several ways. It feels weighty and full of responsibilities. It also feels light and full of possibilities. It’s both OK and important to acknowledge both sides of that reality and allow oneself to contemplate both. This week I did a few things to say goodbye to 2019 and welcome 2020.

I took time to fully tackle the archive project that has been sitting on the back burner. I’ve been wanting to organize each of my story ideas in my archives into one central location.  It’s a project I work on from time to time, until I get overwhelmed and walk away from it. I feel good each time I go back to it because I know I’m making progress, but it always remains unfinished. I finally forced myself to sit and fully complete the project. I managed to locate all of the bits and pieces of writing that were floating around in half a dozen folders on my desktop, several places in my Google Drive, and spread across a few Scrivener documents. I sat down and made one master document in Scrivener called Ideas in Progress. This now holds each story idea and will be where I go when I finish revising my First Five manuscripts and am ready to tackle a new project.

I also took time to set my intentions for 2020, both in my personal and professional goals.  I wrote long lists and ramblings about what I want to accomplish and where I want to see myself at the end of 2020 and then distilled those into my goals for the year.  I used the goals I had set for 2019-2020 back in May to lead this work for my professional goals and managed to focus my last half of my writing year goals even more than I had before.  After that, I worked out what my word for 2020 will be.  This idea of focusing on one word was something I’d heard some YouTube channels I follow discuss back in 2018.  Some of them referenced Ali Edwards and One Little Word while others discussed the idea of choosing a word to set your intentions by more generically.  I did some journaling and decided on my word for 2020. My word is Complete. I’m excited to lean into that word and to find out all the ways it will mean something to me in 2020.

Leaving 2019 behind is going to be bittersweet. It’s saying goodbye to the last year I had my Papa in my life, the last year my youngest daughter isn’t in school full day, and the last year my oldest is in Elementary school. The other side of that is it was the year my husband and I got to go on our first cruise, the first year my oldest daughter participated in dance competitions, and a year full of growth for our youngest. Looking back over this last decade is a similar journey of highs and lows. I’m entering 2020 stronger than I’ve ever been because of it, and I’m excited to see what the future will bring.

What are some things you’ve done to prepare for the new year? What are you looking forward to in the next year?

Happy Writing and Happy New Year!