New Year, New You? How about finding "Delight" and removing toxicity instead? - updated "Delights!"
We discussed our New Year's resolutions this month and realized neither of us had really settled on anything because none of the traditional resolutions seemed interesting or inspiring. Instead, we both recently read articles that took a different twist on resolutions and focused instead on changing one's perspective, which seems more meaningful and worthwhile to us.
Catherine Price contributed a guest essay to The New York Times on December 31, 2023 entitled “When the World Feels Dark, Seek Out Delight.” She wrote about the importance of finding delight each day. While similar to gratitude, the focus is more on the little things in life that bring us joy: a beautiful sunset, the first snowfall, a tearjerker movie, leg warmers. The trick is to take notice, then share it. Hopefully, at the end of each day, you have at least one thing that brought you delight. If you're lucky, you will have many.
We are sharing ours by text, but we will also start sharing some of them here. We aren't convinced "delight" is our preferred term...perhaps, "beautiful," perhaps, "love." Perhaps, each item will spark a different term of endearment.
We've decided to take this practice a significant step further and incorporate another practice we heard about on a number of podcasts about removing the toxicity from one's life. We aren't talking about vices, though maybe those could be the target. In this case, "toxicity" is referring to those things that add more negativity to your life than positivity. Something that stresses you out. Something that you complain about incessantly. Something that drags you down.
Of course, sometimes you have to keep a job you hate or you have to endure a lengthy commute. But, when it is possible to remove an obligation that is bringing lots of negativity to your life, do it! Or, examine if there is a way to make it less toxic. A podcast for that commute; a comfy sweater you only wear at work.
If you aren't sure what we are talking about, ask one of your friends. You will be surprised by how quickly they will be able to identify the toxins in your life. For me, it is a nonprofit board on which I serve. While there is reward in terms of the mission of the organization, the amount of work is unending. I need to figure out a way to extricate myself from feeling like all of the work of the organization rests on my shoulders. Easier said than done, but the timing of the New Year seems like the right time to try to address this.
At the end of the day, we all need more delight and less toxicity in our lives. So....challenge accepted! We will report back with our delights and our progress on eliminating the toxins!
