I’ll let you in
on a little secret – I love to set New Year’s Resolutions! They aren’t gimmicks to me. The New Year brings about a real chance to set
goals for the year ahead, to determine something that I can really connect with
and keep focus on throughout the year.
They’ve certainly worked for me over the last few years and when I have achieved
the goals I set for myself I feel really proud.
Being able to achieve goals brings much satisfaction to my life and gives
me the motivation to do it over and over ….. and so here I am again at the
start of the New Year ready to make my resolutions for 2015.
I’ve thoroughly
enjoyed connecting with a simpler approach to life in 2014, and I want to keep
the momentum of this going. During the
year, as my radar detected stories from like-minded people in the press, I read
about some particularly inspirational people doing some amazing things in the
space of simplicity.
Sasha Milne is a
Perth mother-of-one who decided last Christmas Eve as she stood in a department
store with a shopping cart full of items, surrounded by crying kids and
stressed parents, that she really didn’t need all the ‘stuff’ she was about to
purchase. She decide then and there to
not purchase anything new for 12 months.
In October 2014 she gave a presentation at a local Ted Talks event in
Perth, which inspired me along with many others.
The other inspirational
story I picked up on last year was that of The Minimalists (Ryan Nicodemus and Joshua
Fields Milburn) who came to Perth in October as part of their national (and
international) tour. They have turned
their backs on consumerism and sold off most of their possessions to discover a
new way of living that didn’t involve material things. They found a new level of happiness and
appreciation for life, and share their quest for a more meaningful life beyond
excess with others via their blog www.theminimalists.com
.
It is truly
amazing what people can achieve when they set a vision and philosophy for how
they will live life. Natalie Isaacs of
One Million Women is another person who holds a strong philosophy about
life-style in relation to climate change and the simple things we can do in our
everyday lives to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases emitted to the
atmosphere. By not disposing of items to
the tip, but instead re-using, re-cycling, gifting, swapping or loaning we can
prevent the wastage of materials and ensure that items have the maximum
possible life-span, thus reducing the equivalent amount of CO2 emitted by the
items if they were simply discarded to the tip.
Considering all
three approaches to lifestyle and how I’d like them to shape my life, I’ve
decided that for 2015 I will take up the challenge of not buying anything new
for myself for 12 months and to limit anything new for my family – with a
couple of exceptions being food, petrol and medicine. I will make a huge effort to make home-made
gifts or source gifts for people from recycled materials, or even quality
second hand items or antiques. I don’t
expect this to be easy – it wouldn’t be a ‘challenge’ otherwise, and I’ll keep
a track of progress in future blogs.
Here’s to a
sensational, simplistic 2015!
Do you set
yourself New Year resolutions and have you achieved success? I’d love you to share your aspirations, so
send me a post or comment below or you can email me at livewelllivesmart@gmail.com .
