Conscious Connections

self-awareness, personal growth Jenny Jansen self-awareness, personal growth Jenny Jansen

New Year, Same Me: Embracing self-acceptance and reducing goal-setting pressure

Well… New Year’s is here again. Time to change our hair, up the ante, make lofty, ‘life-changing’ goals, and then exhaust ourselves trying to accomplish those resolutions… Yay.

To be fair, sometimes this works. Depending on your personality, season of life, and other nuanced variables, the whole New Year, New Me thing could be fun and may even be feasible. But if the mere thought of New Year’s resolutions provokes a tired sigh from the depths of your being, then please know you are definitely not alone.

Pressure from elaborate New Year’s resolutions often leads to burnout, stress, or worse – inaccurate and unwarranted feelings of inadequacy. The truth is that sometimes those New Year’s goals simply aren’t achievable. There. I said it. And I don’t say that to disempower you or suggest your potential is limited. It’s not.

All I’m saying is, what if the goal you really need to set for yourself this year is to embrace who and where you are? Because there is a time and place for ambitious resolutions, but for many of us, setting realistic intentions instead of goals may be the far more mindful option.

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