New Year's Revolution

Happy New Year!

I had every intention of at least posting here a few times during the holidays but that clearly didn't happen....I keep making excuses for myself like, we only have one computer, the kids are home and I can't write when they are around, I'm sick and I'm really tired.....all of these things are and were true but they are things that are facts of my life (well not the being sick part).

Here's the other thing, I was really grumpy after Christmas....like not happy.  I threw myself a pity party and I didn't want to leave.  Actually I still feel like being at it, but honestly it's getting old and its time for me to act on what was bringing me down.

Every year our parish, St. Joan of Arc hosts a program called GIFT....It's three weeks of workshops intended to nourish our faith in the new year.  Most of the workshops are intended for adults so that they can grow in their faith, but a few of them are intended for the high school and middle school kids and their parents.  Last night, I was supposed to go to a workshop entitled
Adolescent Development:  Keys to Improving Communication With Teens....I have 2.75 teens currently plus a 7 year old who acts like a 16  year old...of course this was perfect for me....It got canceled due to low registration, UGH!  So I thought, oh good, I can go to the workshop entitled Living with Emotional Balance: Emotion Regulation As A Hallmark of Mental Health....after my thoughts around New Years Eve, I so needed this workshop.  But, and there's always a BUT my Freshman's water polo practice was canceled so he was available to attend the High school group's LIGHT night entitled A New Year's Revolution....parents were encouraged to attend.  So, I went with him, and honestly I'm so glad I did.

You see, I needed a push to make changes in my life, I need to spark a Revolution for me.  The week leading up to New Year's Eve, I was in a funk.  You know what really pushes me further into a funk?  Facebook.  Scrolling through Facebook and seeing people's post on their awesome vacations and social lives got me thinking about how I lack those things.  I have friends, but I honestly don't have a group of girlfriends that gets together often anymore.  I used to have that, but life happens and people move away and with 4 kids, it's hard to get out in the evenings.  We're not good money people, so we don't have extra money to take off for a weekend in the mountains, we don't own a vacation home anywhere nor do our parents so we don't have a place to go and again, we don't have a group of friends that we can go do that with.  So, all these thoughts were running through my head by the time New Year's Eve rolled along and I wasn't happy....I was annoyed with our lives or lack of one.  I was annoyed that my husband spent his day off volunteering with the Boy Scouts instead of with us where we could have gone out to the City or to Berkeley like we've done in the past.  I was annoyed that he didn't plan an awesome meal since we were staying home.  I was grumpy!

I've been feeling like I'm in a transition phase of my life for about 6 months now.  Last year, I began a journey of health and fitness.  I committed to working out 6-7 days of the week, drinking a meal replacement shake called Shakeology daily and eating fairly clean (big emphasis on fairly).  I've been consistent with that for a year and I feel great.  It took  having to put myself first and to be OK with that.  I guess now that I have that under my belt, I feel like I need to work on some other things like finding a tribe of people that will provide me with the social input that I need and crave.  I also need to help our family get our finances under control so that we can take off on weekends and not have it be a hardship.  This is going to be hard for me...and us because in 20 years of marriage we've never functioned with a working budget.....

So, yes instead of Resolutions this year, I need to spark a Revolution in my life for continued growth in all areas of my life.  You see,  I'm the only one that was annoyed on New Year's Eve.  Everyone else in the house was perfectly fine with being home, eating dinner together and hanging out watching ABC.  And honestly after the busy weeks leading up to Christmas, I should've been fine too...but I wasn't.

 How am I going to do this?  Well, first off, I'm going to start by having a better attitude towards everything I do have.  I have a loving husband, who works hard to provide for us.  I have 4 healthy kids who are good to each other and actually like each other.  I live in a community of kind people who are happy to help when I need a hand.  We belong to a wonderful parish that is dynamic with their offerings for families.  I'm going to work hard to change my spending habits...this is going to be hard for me.  I've been researching information on how to create budgets and how to implement them.  It's going to take sacrifice, commitment and consistency but I know that I can do it.  I'm also going to reach out to people instead of waiting for them to reach out to me.  I have a 7 year old daughter who wants to participate in family activities at school and I have had the worst attitude about taking her to things because well, I've been there done all that with my boys.  However, it's not good for her or me because we're missing out on building relationships and I'm feeling like I need some new ones in my life.

Sparking a Revolution isn't easy.  It takes courage, consistency, sacrifice, discipline.  But here's what I got out of last night, I don't have to do it alone.  I have people in my corner that are going to be willing to help me along.   I just need to show up, be brave, ask for help and do the work.  Here's to my Revolution!