🗣️Audio: The gentle + nourishing way to start the year

Starting my year as I want the rest to flow - going to bed early in 2022, much to the kid’s disgust and getting up with the sun and with a beach swim.

Well, hello there from Queensland, where we’ve been hitting the beach up most days when we can brave the influx of tourists. It’s so nice to see people travelling again!!

Today I’m writing to you in the lead-up to our year ending in the hope that I will catch you before the momentum begins to usher in the new year.

I am not the best at brevity, but I will try my best to keep it shorter than normal (I will try!), understanding that everyone is gearing up for end-of-year celebrations or wind-downs.

Today I wanted to share my thinking for the year ahead and how I’ve been approaching it.

This year, rather than getting to the 31st of December and freaking out about what didn’t get done this year or how I wanted to install life changes by January 1 (and often, would end up calling January a practice month and start on Feb 1 instead!), I’ve intuitively been called to do something different this year.

This is something that has organically transpired, and I deeply feel it’s setting me up for a season of more internal trust and less crowd-sourcing or external validation.

I will talk more about this in a sec, but first of all, I wanted to share something that has touched my heart this Christmas and for many who read this email (I know a lot of you here’ve shared the same journey as I, having lived in Saudi Arabia over the years.)

As an expat and a guest in the very closed and restricted country of Saudi Arabia, I accepted the many rules that were imposed, and one of those was having to celebrate any Christian holidays in secret. As a strict Islamic country, Christmas trees were banned, and the holiday was never allowed to be spoken about in the media. 

This year the English newspaper Arab News celebrated its very first Christmas edition in print and digital (you can read the very well-written article here if you wish) - as part of many of the reforms taking place across the region under a newer, more moderate progressive leadership which has seen many wonderful changes for women and non-Muslims amongst the reforms.

This might not sound exciting for those who have not been to the region or wonder why an Aussie girl would care. Still, I lived and worked in Saudi for 6 years, met and married my husband there, and formed many lifelong friendships with both locals and other expats; I learnt so much about the wonderful things of the country and its culture, and both my kids were born there, so there will always be a special place locked away in my heart for Saudi; however, it hasn’t always been that way. Maybe that’s a story for another day. I did leave Saudi with darkness surrounding my experience of it and was so happy to move to neighbouring Bahrain for another 7 years. Still, the darkness has shifted over the years as I remember all the good it brought, and these new changes are history-making.

So back to how I am preparing for 2023 and thought it might be helpful for you, too, if you’re seeking a similar gentle, nourishing introduction to next year.

• Starting several weeks ago, I’ve been mindfully surrendering and allowing a new flow of energy before Jan 1 by lifting gratitude for all that was in this year - it was a doozy. But for all its challenges, I am focusing on its gifts!

• Focusing on intentions rather than resolutions.

• Cleansing, clearing, detoxing, minimising, simplifying. These apply not only to myself but our environment, mindset/thoughts/words, relationships, and how we spend our time.

• Starting my year as I want the rest to flow - going to bed early in 2022, much to the kid’s disgust and getting up with the sun and with a beach swim.

• Breaking 2023 intentions into quarter seasons - this is a project planning and business technique, but I am softening it up for a gentler season intention setting. Season 1 will be a planning phase, Season 2: Planting, Season 3: Nourishing and Season 4: Harvesting.

• Bringing in a gentle receiving energy, not an aggressive doing/productive energy, into the first season of 2023.

• Easing myself into the changes before the new year so that they are cumulative rather than all at once and shocking to the system (this is how I coach my clients, too - changing one thing at a time rather than all the things to keep it steady and sustainable).

• I’ve been allowing quiet and intuition to guide me on what I’d like to bring forth in 2023 Season 1 - for example, I allowed myself to wander in my mind whilst gardening, during which several intentions spewed forth, rather than sitting with an empty notebook or dream board and expecting my brain to perform on demand which can stun me (looking at you, on the spot brainstorming sessions at my last job!)

• Working with my strengths and not trying to fix my weaknesses: I recognise what I am good at and not so great at, so why focus on the latter when I can play to my advantages and strengths?

• Recognising that flowing with the Lunar new year, which is January 22 next year, is what works best for me. Appreciating how this impacts you means that maybe the new year won’t begin until later in the month…you can see what Danielle LaPorte has to say about this here.

• I recognise that 2022 has been a year of grieving of sorts for our old life and ways. I’ve been looking backwards a lot and sharing from that space, so I want to rebalance and focus more on the now and looking forward (although I do have so much colourful life experience to draw upon when needed, ha, but I want to re-shift that towards the here and now and look ahead for the most part.)

So I have a flowy list of intentions for Season 1 2023; when I feel into the list, it has more introspective energy rather than that which wishes to be shared. Whether just for now or forever, I’m not sure.

With all of this, I do hope you manage to end 2022 the way you wish and that 2023 begins with all that you imagined. And if not, you can start the next minute, hour or day again - we can be gentle with ourselves and have an inner knowing that all is happening the way it should.

Go gentle, with love, kindness and gratitude. Thank you for being with me in 2022; I look forward to saying hello to you in 2023 xxx.

Robyn xxx

PS - did anything resonate with you and your thoughts for 2023? If so, I’d love to hear what you did and how you intend to move into the new season.