Well, it's that time of year again. All of this new year, new you talk that you're going to see everywhere, how to set goals that are going to make the difference this year, all the things that you have to do to get it right this year, et cetera, et cetera. And you are in the back of your head knowing that you're just gonna fail again or you have well-intentioned loved ones who are saying, why are you setting yourself up like that? You're never consistent with anything.
You're not gonna keep up with this. New Year's resolutions are just silly. And that can be really frustrating because this energy we have to have this excitement of a new year and feeling like there's some sort of fresh start, it feels like we should put it to use. And I say we can. We can actually put this new fresh start energy to good use. We just have to do it in the right, more realistic way. So let's dig into just how that can happen.
A wise person once said, everybody is a genius, but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it's stupid. Well, Fish, quit trying to climb trees while getting advice from well-intentioned monkeys. It's time to jump in the water and learn how to swim with the current of your life. I'm Joy, a professional organizer, mom of four, and fellow Fishbrain.
If you're looking for a place to get understanding, encouragement, and ideas for your home that actually fit how your brain thinks, then I'm glad you're here. Let's ditch the type A advice and embrace what makes our brains and our homes unique. Together, we could have a joy-loving home. Before jumping in, I just want to say welcome or welcome back.
If you happen to have found me during that 12 Days of Chaos series that I just completed, I invite you to please stick around a little bit and just sort of see how the regular podcasts work out for you. But if you have been here for a while, you know that I love to talk about an author and fellow podcaster named Gretchen Rubin. Her podcast is called Happier, and she is the bestselling author of, I don't know, like five books now.
But one of the reasons that I tend to speak so highly of her and sort of send you in her direction for some resources and ideas is because she is one of the very few people that I have discovered understands that there is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all when it comes to plans or advice or programs that people suggest. If you will notice while you're looking around at all the things you're being inundated with, it's try my plan, do this plan.
Here's the way to make changes in your life as if there is just one way and we're all exactly alike. And I love that she has a Four Tendencies book that says, you know, sort of examine yourself and which of these things tends to be like the way you approach tasks or expectations or goals that you set for yourself. And then when you discover which way is your way, lean into the things that are your strengths and help build up against your weaknesses.
Those are really great resources. She also has an entire book that was called. Better Than Before? Yes, Better Than Before. And it's all about a year she explored all the different strategies for making or breaking habits. And she narrowed it down to 21 different things that you can try so that if the first thing you attempt doesn't really work out for you, you have other choices, you have options.
So I love that about her. But one of the ones that she says is really strongest and we all sort of lean into and that is this fresh start approach and we get it when we change jobs or move to a new city or move to a new house or start just a new chapter of our life in any way shape or form and guess what one of those is that turn of the new year. It is not coincidence that we all feel like starting something new at the beginning of a new year.
I think it's worth harnessing that excitement, that natural inclination to lean into that fresh start. We just need to do it in a way that is useful to us and to our brains and to the weaknesses we have for that sort of all or nothing thinking that if we were to fail on day one or day six or day 23, we give up completely for the rest of the year of approaching it ever again.
And so I just want to suggest a couple things as we're leaning into this feeling of a fresh start as we're about to turn the page from 24 to 25. Sort of as an aside, I never can tell what's going to make it into the sounds of the podcast, but we have no hot water in our home and it is currently being worked on. So there are periodic background sort of drilling, sawing sounds going on. So apologies for that if you're listening to that. But you know what?
Needed to get this podcast out. So we're doing it in the very imperfect way that is happening around me. So we're gonna jump in. First thing I wanna say is that I strongly recommend never starting anything on January 1st. Why? You just said you want us to jump into this fresh start feeling. Well, I don't ever see January 1st as the beginning of anything. It still feels like the wrap up of last year. If your house is anything like mine, kids are still around, spouses maybe not working that day.
You have all kinds of leftover treats and goodies and things from the holidays or a New Year's Eve party or whatever. you still have decorations laying everywhere. You have gifts that have yet to find a home in your house. And it feels like trying to light a fire in a rainstorm. Why are you trying to set off this spark of excitement in the midst of all this chaos? It is an incredibly unrealistic day.
Even if you're like, I am determined and I'm going to do all the things and you do all the things and you're ready to do them all again as the kids head back to school and now all of a sudden you're driving everywhere and you've got all these other errands and you didn't figure out how to fit these new ideas into what is quote unquote real life, your day-to-day life, it's gonna feel like you have to start again when all of that sort of takes shape.
So I'm not saying don't start something new this year. I'm saying just wait, wait just long enough for the rhythm of what we will call quote unquote normal life to kick back in. That might be the first Monday of the month, which is the 6th of this year, or maybe your kids don't go back until the 10th. And so you start on the 10th. Whatever day it is that gets you back into this is a quote unquote normal day in the rhythm of our lives, that is a great day to start.
But what do you do with all that energy leading up to that? Well, if you haven't stopped to think, how do I want to do what I want to do this year? That is actually the great runway to do it in. For folks like me who sort of like dream abstractly, but haven't really thought anything through and then try to jump in on whatever day and we're just shooting, you know, we're still throwing spaghetti at the wall.
Then maybe we take these days that are still in January and we start piecing together or dreaming or being as creative as we want, where we're not bogging ourselves down once we start with the details of it. We actually do the details of it before we start. Not typically our strong suit. So use those days leading up to the 6th or the 10th or whenever you're choosing to start to really put a framework under what it is you're wanting to accomplish.
One of the things that I also love about Gretchen Rubin, yes, very Gretchen Rubin-heavy podcast here, is that she doesn't suggest resolutions the typical way, as in, I am going to walk 10,000 steps a day every day of 2025, or I am going to.
There's no perfect consistency in her suggestions she suggests what she calls her her and i'll use it for this year 25 for 25 list and she's been doing this i think since 2018 where she had like an 18 and 18 list but it might go back further than that i can't remember but it's picking for this year. 25 concrete, finite things that you would like to accomplish in 2025 that you can actually tick off and know they're completed.
So things like this is the year we're finally going to paint the guest bedroom, or this is the year I'm finally going to determine that a capsule wardrobe is good for me and I'm going to narrow down my closet to the 36 items suggested by the capsule wardrobe people or whatever. You get to choose your things. That's the fun part of it.
One of the things I love that she does is she suggests that at least one of your 25 be something that is super easy to accomplish that you could do in those first couple weeks of January to get a win in your column and roll with it, which is fun. But as resources for things to listen to, I'm just going to suggest her episode 511. It's about choosing a one word theme for your year and sort of how she approaches that.
Episode 512 is a review of how they did on their 24 for 24 challenge. Um, it's, And it's nice to hear somebody recap after the fact so that you can really see what is being talked about for something you're trying that's new in the new year. And then 513 is their introduction to their 25 for 25 challenge. So those are just three fun podcasts that if you're like, okay, well, all of this is making sense to me, but I want to start thinking about it. I want to start digging in.
Those would be great resources to listen to. If you want to wait on me, I am going to begin my sort of nod to this with our ADHD brains and the approaches I'm suggesting on that January 6th as we build our runway leading up to starting that following week. I choose that because I happen to have college-age children, and if any of you are in that boat, you know they have the longest possible windows of breaks, and my life won't start being what I will call quote unquote normal until the 10th.
So I am using all of those days to build up to that and to lean into my new way of doing planners, which I haven't done in a while. And if any of that sounds like something you want to lean into with me and get a good footing on the year and taking January or at least the beginning of January to set all those foundations. Then I encourage you to hit follow wherever you're listening to your podcasts.
Keep sticking around with me and knowing that you can sort of relax into, I don't have to start anything tomorrow. It's okay. I'm off the hook. There's no harm, no foul in getting our feeling and leaning into our fresh start. And if you're getting those naysayers around you, you can just ignore them. Join the community over here where things are encouraging.
And just if you want that extra accountability, I have the free group, which is you go to bit.ly slash joy loving home community to be a part of it there. I have my membership still open until midnight of January 5th. Get there by going to joylovinghome.com slash membership. That is a $10 a month membership. Join anytime, cancel anytime.
And in there for January, we're doing a theme that is all around getting ourselves up and rolling with this accountability of setting ourselves up well for the year and seeing how we do planners so that things aren't forgotten. If you want to jump in and be part of that, I would love to have you join us there. I'll put links to all of these things that I've just spoken about in the show notes.
But to not have this go too long on me, because I try to keep them 15 minutes or less, I just want to say, enjoy the rest of this 2024. Let it be whatever it is. Enjoy tomorrow with one last, what feels like a really nice, lazy day. Wrap it into the ending. Maybe start putting those holiday decorations away so that when we do have our fresh start, the house feels like it's ready for it as well.
That would be a great use of your January 1st, 2nd, 3rd time frame as you're getting everything back to a starting point in your home. And yeah, just continue to choose joy.