FSS Spotlight: “Start Fresh” in 2008

The New Year is often depicted as a baby in diapers, usually wearing a top hat, unusual head gear for a baby perhaps, but there you have it--most definitely a baby. There's a reason for that. The New Year is a great time to start fresh, to start anew, like a baby staring wide-eyed at the marvelous world he or she is just discovering.

So yes, you've made your "start fresh" New Year's resolutions and that's great. You've committed to changing old worn-out habits and creating new beneficial ones. Now, take it one step further and "start fresh" with what already makes up your life. Marvel wide-eyed at the incredible world you live in. Not just at the sheer physical beauty of our planet and the universe we inhabit, but at the people, experiences and situations of your life.

For example, look at your family with new eye. What fascinates, uplifts and inspires you about your spouse? Before you say "I wish!" be still inside and really look at your mate. Leave aside your criticisms, dissatisfactions and frustrations for now, and look at him or her as if you were just discovering them. What do you find that delights you? What do you see that you could admire? What about them puts a smile on your face? If you truly want to look upon your spouse with favor, if you really want to find something about your mate to value, to appreciate, then you will.

Do the same with your children, your co-workers, your mother-in-law, or whoever else populates your life. Start fresh. Find that something wonderful, surprising or pleasing about the person and dwell on it. Let that aspect of the individual be what you focus on, what you pay most attention to.

Then there's your work, whether you're a full-time homemaker, part-time worker or career professional. Look at your work deliberately to find what fascinates you, what uplifts you, what it is about your work that puts a lift in your step. Maybe it's the work itself, the joy of doing something well. Maybe it's those you interact with at work that give you the most joy. Maybe it's the rewards you receive, from a happy child's, "Great sandwich, Mom!" to a grateful client's relief, to a paycheck, to stock options. Focus on whatever in your work brings you joy as you start fresh this New Year, and choose to back-burner the unpleasantness, difficulties and other bumps in the road.

The New Year gives us a wonderful opportunity to let go of the old and get on with the new. Sometimes the new isn't as much about things, as it is about attitudes. When you choose to view the people in your life for the value they bring to you, to their world and to others, for what you appreciate about them, you experience people differently and your life changes for the better. When you choose to look upon your work, your day to day, with that same desire to see the value in it, you experience your work differently, and your life changes for the better.

Choose, this New Year, to start fresh in every way--new habits, new attitude, new view on life, and revel in the joy that will inevitably come your way.

Noelle C. Nelson Ph.D.