​Reflections over Resolutions

As one year ends and another begins, it's easy to fast forward into determining our goals and desires for the new year.... to focus on those resolutions.
 
Instead, why not take time for reflections?
  
In our go, go, go world we can forget to stop, rest and reflect.  Whether you spend a day journaling your personal highlights of 2012 or set the intention to be in a reflective state in your next meditation, allowing the emptiness between what was and what may be can be both insightful and rejuvenating.

Here are a few ways to create the space for reflection:

• Journal - What was the summary, or highlights, of your last year? What areas did you experience growth? What lessons did you learn? Where were the obstacles and how did you feel about them?
• Meditate - Breathe and simply allow whatever arises. When a thought comes along, you can greet it with, "This is an interesting thought. Let me observe it." And do your best not to engage; merely witness.
• Peruse - Look at your personal writings, artwork or photographs you took from the past year. Contemplate them with as much compassion and observation as possible. 
• Feel - Reflect on the relationships in your life. How do they make you feel? What other feelings emerge when in a reflective state?
  

There is nothing wrong with resolutions (unless you use them as an excuse to beat yourself up) but making room for reflections can not only give us the time and space for contemplation, but we can - just might - discover gratitude in the process. 

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