I love ringing in the New Year. Not so much for the booze and parties, but more as a set time to reflect on my life, and make sure I'm heading in a direction that is meaningful to me. Tyler, on the other hand, is pretty irreverent about holidays like this; he is of the mind that this sort of questioning should be happening constantly. I definitely agree with him, but I still appreciate the ritual of special days and celebrations.
While I was sleeping, (having passed out way before midnight), Tyler stayed up late, programming some new features for our GSDB. He made us a database for tracking our life goals! Now, all of these ideas swirling around and around in our minds have a concrete place to go.
It's a bit rough around the edges, and it isn't the ultimate solution (someday it needs to be something huge and visual that we'll look at on a daily basis, like a big white-board with a set of colorful dry erase markers), but for the time being, it is just what we need.
As we celebrate the beginning of another year, we talk about our goals and plans for the coming ones, making lists of everything from books we want to read, to things we're going to research for our homesteading project. Soon, we'll have new hobbies to explore, shorter trips to schedule, and an enormous list of skills to learn, from lambing and cheese-making, to welding and strawbale/cob house building.
After we've planned and plotted, watching our to-do lists come together, our minds feel fresh and clean. Getting ideas down on "paper" really frees up a lot of mental space. Now, it's time to eat cookies and watch another Harry Potter movie.
What a nice way to ring in the New Year!