kattitudes

A few hours away from a new year and another new beginning.

The end of the year and the New Year holiday always leaves me so introspective, which is great (as long as maudlin does not creep in there). I find that I spend time evaluating where things are and where I want them to be. Sometimes it is internal and sometimes it is external. Do you do the same?

This year it is a little of both.

I keep wanting to talk about external issues on Kattitudes. I want to talk about my home. There are different thoughts that immediately spring to mind.

First, the positive; what am I doing that makes my residence a home and a place of comfort? Then, the not-so-positive; what am I doing that sabotages that effort, either consciously or subconsciously? I want to talk about that this year.

I have the talents (and obviously you do too, because you are here reading this) to make such beautiful things, which means that you can make beautiful things for your own home.

But when I look around at my home, there are days when I know that my home is not beautiful. Enough said. We all have our reasons. I want to change that this year.

I have a lot of personal introspection that happens during the last week of the year too. I really gave up New Years resolutions. I just do not believe in them anymore. I am a professional procrastinator. And a perfectionist. Combined, the two are a deadly combination.

Over the years, I recognized that within the first two weeks of the New Year, my resolutions were fond memories (at best) and (more often) filed directly into the “save these for whipping posts when you are at your lowest point please”, if you know what I mean.

Not for me. I hit forty this year. That scared me and energized me at the same time. Well, maybe not. That is not the description for which I am looking. Oh, I know. The ticking got louder. Much louder. And some days I cannot hear for the sound. Those are the days that I know that I cannot wait for the start of a new year to change what I want to change and be who I want to be. I just do not have the time anymore.

I have spent and sometimes still spend so much of my life waiting and then racing ahead planning, then waiting and racing that I forget the now. Now is living. Now is being alive. Now is our life. Now is my life.

This is it. This is what we get.

Some think they know for sure, for absolute sure that we get more. Bully for them. I do not.

What I know is that this is what I get and I want to remember it and enjoy at least as much of it as I can. Don’t you?

If you are here, reading this blog, you found it because you have creative skills enough to be searching for how to make something. I know I do. When is the last time I used my skills to make my life beautiful? To make my home beautiful? To make my life full of peace?

When I am full of peace and joy and comfort and cheer, only then I can share that with others.

This year, find peace within yourself. Find peace for the first time or again.

Find joy. Even if for a moment, find a moment to feel joy and remember how good that moment felt.

Give yourself comfort so that you might offer it freely to others.

Bring cheer to yourself every day so that you can fill the life of anyone (or everyone) you meet with cheer.

And with these thoughts, I am slipping away to prepare for the evening. Even though we will not be at our home, I know I will still carry on my father’s tradition, witnessed so long ago as a young girl. His grandmother always slipped away from their festivities at midnight to open a door or window in the home to let out the old year and let in the new. Dad always did as I grew up, and now habits dying hard, out of love, I still will. I doubt that the New Year would overlook my house if I did not, or that the Old Year would fester if I did not let it out, but I would not take the chance, when my family paved the way so well for me.

My wish for all you creative folk is that the new year treats you well. Time can be so cruel.

I have new skills to learn in 2008. I have so many creative skills I have yet to explore fully (having just learned enough to get by literally). I received some amazing crafting gifts for the Christmas holiday, so I am going to be doing an incredible amount of jewelry making in 2008. I am also starting off the year with in depth crochet and cross stitch and menu planning and cooking. Plus I am determined, absolutely determined to teach a class on family budgeting this year, so I am going to be practicing through Kattitudes on that. And back to organizing! We are going to find joy this year, by Just Organizing Yourself (hey, it might be cheesy but if it works that is all that counts). Oh, I have so many plans, but I might as well save that for tomorrow and the next day and the next.

We will talk again in 2008. Best wishes to you in the New Year. May you be healthy and happy and wise.

This entry was posted on Monday, December 31st, 2007 at 2:58 pm and is filed under kat chat. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.