Back

Evaluation Mood - a New Year State of Mind

Cecilie Conrad·Jan 1, 2024· 3 minutes

Tijuana, Mexico

Do you also want to evaluate at the edge of the new year? I want the statistics: How many museums, how many cities, how many beach days, where did we go, how did it unfold? What do we want to change, and how can we do it? What is the better plan, based on the things we learned?

This kind of evaluation goes through my mind while the new year unfolds in the celebration on the last night of the year and the humble beginning on the first day.

Yet I don’t really want to do the work. Logging everything is boring. I rather want to live. Today. I rather want to find a golden middle way.

So today, on the second day of the new year, I will sit down and write a longer thing about what is going on, what we learned, what we want to do in this new year, and how to unfold it all. I will do it in my language and privately. In the past year, I have shared all of my written notes and decided to continue doing so (without the irritating day count, which clearly does not work). If it is interesting enough, I might make a blog post out of it.

But more interestingly, I want to know how you all feel. What does the new year do to you? How do you handle it? Is it just another day, or is it time for scrutiny, resolutions, change, evaluation - and if so, how do you do it and how does it make you feel? Can we learn from each other's strategies so we all become better people?

IMG_5830

We took it slow. Yoga on the roof. A bit of jogging. Walking in the sunshine, talking. Big salad and chili sin carne lunch. Sunset walk to meet the trash at the entry point to the beach, and the beauty of the sunset and the sunset itself, the first one of the year. We sang our sunset song of gratefulness for the day and the days, and met the Amish people who we had heard there is a big community of here - and felt the vibe of people who live by their values and have principles they stick to. We might not agree with their choices and worldview (but I would not be surprised; I would agree with at least 85%), but we do very much agree with those standards: Live by your values and stick to your principles.

So, this might be it. The core of what is worth evaluating and brushing up on at the edge of the new year: What will be the values of this year and the principles to stick to in order to have one more amazing year of no regrets?

Happy New Year, all.

As in: Congratulaions. One more! What a treasure. Let’s make sure we cherish it, feel it, stay in the infinity of moments in it, and stick to our most important values so we unfold what really makes sense and truly matters.

What is a good life? What makes us happy? How do we succeed in doing the things that make for a good life and make us happy? Hiking in the rain, chan…Read more
It is not very interesting to drive on a highway in the rain, slowly, because of road construction. One of the delays was a 27 minutes queue deriving…Read more
There is something about the footpaths in England. At some point, a law was installed to protect the paths, allowing everyone to walk on the establis…Read more
Watching Britain in a park. The different people, their vibes and styles, and projects. I love to look at people. I was amused by observing most of t…Read more
It is not like the world will stop spinning until I am done thinking. Wouldn’t that be nice, though? If the planet would please stop spinning, the in…Read more
We have seen a lot of European Cathedrals, as in very many. It is one of my passions to visit them, as I find them all astoundingly beautiful, Read more
Sinead O Conor died. Fjord's best friend called. When we finally went for a little walk, the rain started again. We shared the wash. Discussed shampo…Read more
Walk and talk is just as perfect together as dahl and rice or sunshine and beach. Here are some observations on England as we walked there, some thou…Read more
On Learn Nothing Day, 24th of July, I launched my podcast, which I am doing with 3 Ladies, two in this house in The Midlands and one in Tenerife. The…Read more